MCLC: Beijing's dangerous game (2,3)

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Covell Meyskens <cfmeyskens at uchicago.edu>
Subject: Beijing's dangerous game (2)
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I mean in no way to discount the sincerity or importance of the emotions
that some Chinese have towards Japanese conduct during World War II.

However, I am not sure if "living memory" is the right term for describing
who is remembering and where these memories come from, since under 8% of
the current population in the PRC and around 10% in the ROC is over 67 and
thus could have lived during World War II. The percentages would go up
some if you included people who lived through the era of reconstruction,
but even then, Japan is strikingly absent as an enemy at least in popular
media or government documents, which tend to place much more emphasis on
domestic enemies of the revolution, the KMT, and American imperialism.

The current situation seems to be much more a case of learned memories,
where no doubt the elderly transmitting stories to youth have played a
role, but are dwarfed by the power of public education and popular media
systems that, make very selective use of elders' stories, and unlike their
European counterparts seem to be more geared towards fostering hatred and
resentment rather than understanding and reconciliation.

Covell Meyskens

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From: Sean Macdonald <smacdon2005 at gmail.com>
Subject: Beijing's dangerous game (3)

I suppose Grandpa Lu Xun's "Mr. Fujino" still has some place. Mao Zedong
was a military strategist. I thought that was understood.

Still, patriotism is complex. But haven't there always been competing,
even contradictory discourses?

Cultural studies have given a couple of productive categories, mass
culture (from "above" either governmental or corporate) and popular
culture (like "natural" language, sometimes a sort of readers response to
mass culture).

http://kotaku.com/5945759/chinese-cosplayer-attacked-for-dressing-as-um-a-c
hinese-character

http://games.qq.com/a/20120919/000054.htm#p=2

All the best,
Sean