Silencing Shanghai
eBook - PDF

Silencing Shanghai

Language and Identity in Urban China

  1. 277 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

Silencing Shanghai

Language and Identity in Urban China

About this book

Silencing Shanghai investigates the paradoxical and counterintuitive contrast between Shanghai's emergence as a global city and the marginalization of its native population, captured through the rapid decline of the distinctive Shanghai dialect. From this unique vantage point, Fang Xu tells a story of power relations in a cosmopolitan metropolis closely monitored and shaped by an authoritarian state through policies affecting urban redevelopment, internal migration, and language. These state policies favor the rich, the resourceful, and the highly educated, while alienate the poorer and less educated Shanghainese geographically and linguistically. When the state vigorously promotes Mandarin Chinese through legal and administrative means, Shanghainese made the conscious yet reluctant choice of shifting from the dialect to the national language. At the same time, millions of migrants have little incentive to adopt the vernacular given that their relation to the state has already firmly established their legal, financial, and social standing in the city. The recent shift in the urban linguistic scene that silences the Shanghai dialect is ultimately part of the state-led global city-building process. Through the association of the use of national language with realizing the "China Dream," the state further eliminates the unique vernacular characters of Shanghai.

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Information

Year
2021
Edition
1
eBook ISBN
9781978756977

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half Title
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright Page
  5. Dedication
  6. Contents
  7. List of Figures and Tables
  8. Preface
  9. Introduction
  10. Chapter 1: A Cosmopolitan Past
  11. Chapter 2: “China Dream” versus the Shanghai Dialect
  12. Chapter 3: Geographical Displacement and Language Loss
  13. Chapter 4: Social Integration and New Shanghairen as Euphemism
  14. Chapter 5: Honorary Shanghairen or Forever Waidiren?
  15. Appendix I
  16. Appendix II
  17. Appendix III
  18. Appendix IV
  19. Appendix V
  20. Bibliography
  21. Index
  22. About the Author

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