MCLC: Learning from Big Brother

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Gerth, Karl <kgerth at ucsd.edu>
Subject: Learning from Big Brother
***********************************************************

LEARNING FROM BIG BROTHER
What Soviet and Central European Histories of Everyday Life May Teach
Historians of the Mao Era

 
The Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK) and the British
Inter-university China Centre (BICC) will host the conference “Learning
from Big Brothers” on 26-28 September 2013 in Oxford.  Advance
registration is mandatory and places limited.

 
The conference brings together Central European and Soviet historians of
everyday life with Chinese historians who are starting to work on similar
issues for the Mao era (1949-76).  The conference will form the foundation
for a network of scholars in China, the EU, and the US who are interested
in consumerism and everyday life in non- and quasi-market economies since
c.1945.  Creating a dialog between scholars of European and Chinese
history will ensure that Chinese historians take into account the range
and depth of important work that has been done in the past decade on the
experience of socialism in Central Europe and the USSR.

 
The first two panels will outline the conference agenda.   The conference
will open with a roundtable discussion led by East German historian Paul
Betts, author of a recent article comparing consumerism across communist
societies, and Steve Smith, the Oxford Handbook on the History of
Communism, on the strengths and weaknesses of such social histories across
national contexts.  Their opening remarks will be followed by comments by
two China scholars working on similarly comparative projects.   And the
second panel will discuss the new types of sources available and the types
of histories now being written while attempting to answer the question:
What are the methodological challenges of studying everyday life under
socialism? 

 
The subsequent five panels will provide explicit case studies, ranging
from recently completed comparative studies by European historians to
recently initiated projects by Chinese historians.  Both sides will
suggest how their findings might help shape the research agendas of the
other geographical side.  Frank Trentmann will discuss the challenges of
comparing socialist and capitalist societies in his new book, The
Consuming Passion: How Things Came to Seduce, Enrich, and Define our
Lives.  And Patrick Patterson will describe his comparative project on
Eastern European consumerism with a talk entitled, “The Machinery of the
Market in Communist Europe: What May Apply to Communist China?”  The
following three panels will consist of Chinese historians at the early
stages of researching everyday life under Mao from home furnishing to
shopping to diary-keeping, with brief presentations followed by comments
by European historians who have already worked on similar topics.

 
The final panel will introduce large-scale projects underway.  Eastern
European historian Josie McLellan will speak on “How to Investigate
Dropping Out of Chinese Socialism: Notes from the Central European
Experience” and Sun Peidong will address “What Oral Histories Can Teach Us
about the Everyday Life under Mao.”

 
ORGANIZER: Karl Gerth (Oxford University and UCSD)

 
 
CONFERENCE PROGRAM
FRIDAY, 28 September 2013
 

9:30-10:00
Coffee and Tea Reception
 

10:00-11:15
Panel 1
Introductions and Agenda Setting
What Might Big Brother(s) Have to Teach Chinese Historians of the Mao Era?
 
Karl Gerth (Chair)
 

* Paul Betts, “Comparing Consumerism Across Communist Societies: An
Initial Attempt”

 

* Steve Smith, “What’s Comparable?  Notes on Editing the Oxford Handbook
on the History of Communism,”

 
Responses from NYIRI Pal and Patricia Thornton
 
 

11:30-12:30
Panel 2
Comparing Sources for the Studying of Everyday Socialisms
 
Paul Pickowicz (Chair and Discussant)
 
A Roundtable Discussion with Opening Comments by Feng Xiaocai, Natalya
Chernyshova, and Frank Trentmann
 
 

12:30-1:30 LUNCH
Catered lunch at venue
 
 

1:30-2:30
Panel 3
States of the Field: Lessons from Two Forthcoming Books
 
Aaron William Moore (Chair)
 
Frank Trentmann, “The Challenges of Comparing Socialist and Capitalist
Societies in The Consuming Passion: How Things Came to Seduce, Enrich, and
Define our Lives” 
 
Patrick Patterson, “The Machinery of the Market in Communist Europe: What
May Apply to Communist China?”
 
 

3:00-4:00
Panel 4
Comparing Cases: Official and Unofficial Culture
 
Josie McLellan (Chair)
 
Matthew Johnson, “Geographies of Official and Unofficial Culture in Maoist
China: Big claims based on Local Case Studies”
 
Karl Gerth, “Service without a Smile: Shopping under Socialism”
 
Responses by Natalya Chernyshova and Patrick Patterson
 
 

4:30-5:30
Panel 5
Comparing Cases: Subjectivities
 
Paul Betts (Chair)
 
Aaron William Moore, “Socialist Self-Help: Chinese Personal Diaries from
the Jiangnan Region, 1948-1958”
 
Jon Howlett, “Revolution, new culture and daily life: social change and
personal readjustment in China, 1949-57”
 
Responses by Josie McLellan and Polly Jones
 
 
 

SATURDAY, 29 September 2013
 

10:00-11:00
Panel 6
Comparing Cases: From the Most Intimate to the Most General
 
Henrietta Harrison (Chair)
 
Jennifer Altehenger, “Furnishing the Revolution: bringing Chinese
socialism home during the 1950s”
 
Felix Boecking, “Financing New Lives in New China”
 
Toby Lincoln, “Chinese Socialist Urban Visions”
 
Responses by Sebastian Gehrig and Steve Smith
 
 

11:30-12:30
Panel 7
States of the Field: Lessons from Current Research Projects
 
Rana Mitter (Chair)
 
Sun Peidong, “What Oral Histories Can Teach Us about the Everyday Life
under Mao”
 
Josie McLellan, “How to Investigate Dropping Out of Chinese Socialism”

Karl Gerth
Professor & Hwei-Chih and Julia Hsiu Endowed Chair in Chinese Studies
Department of History
University of California, San Diego
9500 Gilman Drive MC 0104
La Jolla, California, 92093-0104 USA