Behind the Gate: Inventing Students in Beijing (Studies of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University)

On May 4, 1919, thousands of students protested the Versailles treaty in Beijing. Seventy years later, another generation demonstrated in Tiananmen Square. Climbing the Monument of the People's Heroes, these protestors stood against a relief of their predecessors, merging with their own mythology while consciously deploying their activism. Through an investigation of twentieth-century Chinese student protest, Fabio Lanza considers the marriage of the cultural and the political, the intellectual and the quotidian, that occurred during the May Fourth movement, along with its rearticulation in subsequent protest. He ultimately explores the political category of the "student" and its making in the twentieth century. Lanza returns to the May Fourth period (1917-1923) and the rise of student activism in and around Beijing University. He revisits reform in pedagogical and learning routines, changes in daily campus life, the fluid relationship between the city and its residents, and the actions of allegedly cultural student organizations. Through a careful analysis of everyday life and urban space, Lanza radically reconceptualizes the emergence of political subjectivities (categories such as "worker," "activist," and "student") and how they anchor and inform political action. He accounts for the elements that drew students to Tiananmen and the formation of the student as an enduring political category. His research underscores how, during a time of crisis, the lived realities of university and student became unsettled in Beijing, and how political militancy in China arose only when the boundaries of identification were challenged. Columbia University Press On Sunday, May 4, 1919, thousands of students protested the Versailles treaty in Beijing. Seventy years later, another generation demonstrated in Tiananmen Square; climbing the Monument of the People's Heroes, these protestors stood against a relief of their predecessors, and merged with their own mythology while consciously deploying their activism. Through an investigation of twentieth-century Chinese student protest, Fabio Lanza considers the marriage of the cultural and the political, the intellectual and the quotidian, that occurred during the May Fourth movement, along with its r CONTENTS ILLUSTRATIONS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ABBREVIATIONS INTRODUCTION PART 1 1. THROUGH THE WALLS 2. UNTRAINED BODIES AND FRUGAL HABITS PART 2 3. THE DISPLACEMENT OF LEARNING PART 3 4. LEARNING POLITICS 5. IMPROPER PLACES PART 4 6. BETWEEN STREETS AND MONUMENTS 7. THE PEDAGOGY OF THE CITY EPILOGUE 8. THE END OF STUDENTS? NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX SELECTED TITLES Through an investigation of 20th-century Chinese student protest, Lanza considers the marriage of the cultural and the political, the intellectual and the quotidian, that occurred during the May Fourth movement, along with its rearticulation in subsequent protest Through the walls: everyday life in the university Untrained bodies and frugal habits The displacement of learning Learning politics Improper places Between streets and monuments The pedagogy of the city The end of students?