Re-visioning the public in post-reform urban China : poetics and politics in Guangzhou

This book offers a theoretical intervention into the normative ideals of public space that are deeply rooted in Western urbanism. It disrupts the binaries of presence/absence, inclusion/exclusion by presenting a series of case studies that vividly convey the complexity and vicissitude of grassroots spatial practices. It engages powerfully with the question of what constitutes the “urban public” in our everyday cities. Moreover, it provides a fresh perspective on the proliferating scholarship on Chinese urbanism in the reform era by seriously considering the ways in which ordinary urban inhabitants respond to and negotiate the impacts of rapid social change and the reshuffling of the systems of values and ideologies. The urban public, therefore, is analyzed as an important field in which identities and cultural differences are formed and performed. This book is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in theories of urban public space in general or urban transformation of post-reform China in particular. Front Matter ....Pages i-xii Introduction (Junxi Qian)....Pages 1-12 Public Space: Ideals, Predicaments, Practices (Junxi Qian)....Pages 13-39 Public Space Beyond the West: Practices of Publicness and the Socio-spatial Entanglement (Junxi Qian)....Pages 41-52 Performing the Public Man: Mapping Culture and Identities in China’s Grassroots Leisure Class (Junxi Qian)....Pages 53-77 Closeted Heterotopia: Public Space, Gay Sexuality and Self-disciplining Subject in People’s Park (Junxi Qian)....Pages 79-105 From Performance to Politics? Constructing Public and Counterpublic in the Singing of Red Songs (Junxi Qian)....Pages 107-136 No Right to the Street: Motorcycle Taxi, Discourse Production and the Regulation of Unruly Mobility (Junxi Qian)....Pages 137-164 Conclusion: Re-visioning the Public (Junxi Qian)....Pages 165-177 Back Matter ....Pages 179-198