The Future Is Now: Theory and Method of the Newborn Socialist Thing
Whereas the contemporary era in China is often depicted in terms of rampant, ideologically vacuous commodification, the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) is typically cast as a time of ubiquitous politics and scarce goods. Indeed, the media and material culture of the Cultural Revolution are often characterized as a void, out of which the postsocialist world of commodity consumption somehow sprang fully formed. By contrast, this talk argues that the Cultural Revolution media environment and the ways in which its constituent elements engaged contemporaneous discourses of materiality and political economy anticipated the widespread commodification now so closely associated with the Reform Period (1978-present).
Laurence Coderre is an assistant professor of East Asian Studies at New York University.
Date: 3 February 2022, 17:00 (Thursday, 3rd week, Hilary 2022)
Venue: Online
Speaker: Professor Laurence Coderre (New York University)
Organising department: Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies
Organisers: Dr Yi Lu (University of Oxford), Dr Coraline Jortay (University of Oxford), Professor Denise van de Kamp (University of Oxford), Dr Chigusa Yamaura (University of Oxford), Dr Giulia Falato (University of Oxford)
Organiser contact email address: information@chinese.ox.ac.uk
Part of: China Studies Seminar series
Booking required?: Required
Booking url: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_S3Rp_At2Sd6taKwnM9FXVg
Cost: Free
Audience: Public
Editor: Clare Orchard