| Residential College | false |
| Status | 已發表Published |
| Becoming and Being Middle-Class in Contemporary China: Intergenerational Investigation of the Pursuit of an Elite Overseas Education | |
CHEN JUAN
| |
| 2018-11 | |
| Publisher | American Anthropological Association |
| Conference Name | Change in the Anthropological Imagination |
| Conference Place | San Jose,CA |
| Conference Date | 2018 November 14-18 |
| Country | United States |
| Abstract | This article studies Chinese middle-class subjectivity through the lens of overseas educational strategies. It analyses the experiences of education and social mobility of three generations of contemporary Chinese middle-class families—grandparents, parents and children. The article aims to capture an intimate and 'up- close' picture of the ways in which the different generations understand, conceptualize and respond to increasing pressures for the younger members to undertake higher education overseas. It discusses how the family members struggle with and resist socio-cultural forces specific to their generational identity and personal history, their individual experiences of education, and the extent of the individual members’ mobility within the Chinese context. The article argues that a combination of a person’s suzhi (accumulation of cultural capitals), wenping (educational credentials) and guanxi (social network) is required in contemporary China to enhance social status and facilitate upward mobility. I discuss the overseas education choices faced by the younger family members, the intergenerational and interpersonal negotiations involved, the global capitalist economy, and neoliberal subject formation in Chinese society. I argue the undertaking of overseas higher education fulfills key middle-class Chinese desires, making the subject central to the understanding of middle-class intersubjectivity in contemporary Chinese society. |
| Keyword | Suzhi, Guanxi, Wenping, Middle-class Families, Precarity |
| Language | 英語English |
| Document Type | Conference proceedings |
| Collection | DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY |
| Affiliation | University of Cambridge |
| Recommended Citation GB/T 7714 | CHEN JUAN. Becoming and Being Middle-Class in Contemporary China: Intergenerational Investigation of the Pursuit of an Elite Overseas Education[C]:American Anthropological Association, 2018. |
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