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In this paper, we engage with Chinese diasporas research through recourse to Bourdieu's relational, reflexive sociology. We start with the historical and recent developments of Chinese diasporas research and point out the potential of using Bourdieu to strengthen the theoretical underpinnings of this research. While we see a steady stream of Bourdieu-informed Chinese diasporas studies and acknowledge their contribution and innovation, we observe that some studies use Bourdieu's capital and/or habitus without field. In response, we draw on Bourdieu's relationalism to highlight the significance of 'fielding' Chinese diasporas research. In addition, we turn field analysis onto Chinese diasporas researcher-selves through Bourdieu's reflexive tool of participant objectivation. In this vein, we ponder over the positions and position-takings of Chinese diasporas researchers within and beyond the academic field of Chinese diasporas. To conclude the paper, we make a call to shift the intellectual landscape by developing a research agenda to sociologise Chinese diasporas challenged by complex and difficult issues of power, politics, and participation. Our critical sociological approach may have implications for doing scholarship reflexively and relationally in other research fields.

Chinese international students represent a significant social, economic and cultural force in Australian society. Research has demonstrated that Chinese students enrich Australia not only through their economic contribution, but through soft diplomacy and cultural links. Despite this, and the recent rapid growth in the number of Chinese international students to the country, only a small number of studies have focused specifically on understanding the health and employment experiences of Chinese students in Australia. This paper examines interview data from an ethnographic study involving ten Chinese international students pursuing higher education in New South Wales, Australia. Topics concerning work rights and exploitation, migration, and cultural differences are touched upon within their health and employment experiences. This paper provides insights for those working with Chinese international students in the areas of health education and promotion, diversity and inclusion, employment and mobility studies. The results contribute to broader insights into the inward/outward mobility of higher education students and Australia's "National Strategy for International Education 2025."

Social media are influential sociocultural forces that construct and transmit information about gender, health and bodies to young people in the digital age. In health and physical activity, Chinese people are often represented and positioned differently to other (minority) ethnic groups. For example, Black young people are often understood as having low academic motivations and aspirations but as 'natural' athletes; in contrast, Chinese young people, seen as the 'model minority' who excel in STEM subjects, are fragile, reserved and disinterested in physical movements. These public forms of representation may sit in opposition to the young people's embodied identity. When these misrepresentations are internalised, issues such as micro-aggression and racism may have an impact on Chinese young people's health and wellbeing. This paper aims to examine how Chinese bodies are gendered and racialised in contemporary social media sites (e.g. Google News, LiveJournal, Medium, Wordpress). Drawing on critical discourse analysis and Foucault's concepts of normalisation and discursive practice, the paper will problematise the often taken-for-granted gendered and racialised stereotypes related to Chinese physicality and health on social media sites. Implications for developing future research and teaching resources in critical media health literacy for young people on issues related to gender and equity will be provided. The results affect how we understand, represent, and discuss Chinese (young) people on social media sites, thereby how Chinese young people engage, construct, and perform their embodied identities in Western, English speaking societies.

Young people with English as an Additional Language/Dialect backgrounds are often identified in public health messages and popular media as "bodies at risk" because they do not conform to the health regimens of contemporary Western societies. With increasing numbers of Chinese students in Australian schools, it is necessary to advance teachers' understandings of the ways in which these young people negotiate notions of "health" and "(un)healthy bodies". This paper explores the ways in which young Chinese Australians' understand health and (un)healthy bodies. The data upon which this paper focuses were drawn from a larger scale study underpinned by critical, interpretive, ethnographic methods. The participants in this study were 12 young Chinese Australians, aged 10--15 years, from two schools. Photographs of a variety of bodies were sourced from popular magazines and used as a means of interview elicitation. The young people were invited to comment on the photographs and discuss what "health" and the notion of a "(un)healthy body" meant to them. Foucault's concepts of discursive practice and normalisation are used alongside Chinese concepts of holistic paradigms and Wen--Wu to unpack the young people's subjectivities on health and (un)healthy bodies. The findings invite us to move beyond Western subjectivities of health and (un)healthy bodies and highlight the multidimensional and diverse perspectives espoused by some of the young Chinese Australians in this study. The research findings can inform future policy and practice relevant to the exploration of health and (un)healthy bodies in health and physical education and health and physical education teacher education.

This paper begins with a question: can concepts generated in the Chinese context in the sociocultural relations of the periphery contribute to the development of the social sciences in the field of Health and Physical Education (HPE) that have their roots in the metropole? Setting the scene in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR), a postcolonial city reverted to the rule of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1997, this paper aims to develop a critical sociology of HPE by having a dialogue among Continental philosophies (e.g., Bourdieu) and Chinese philosophies around embodiment concepts. Although HKSAR is a complex meeting point of Eastern and Western ideologies, the current HPE field tends to focus on Western and 'scientific' ways of knowing, such as the measurement of health and physical fitness, and often at the expense of sociocultural perspectives, social justice and diversity and inclusion in HPE. In other words, the (post) positivistic research paradigm underpins the HPE field. This paper argues that in order to reap the benefits of a more holistic health education for academics and students in HPE, it is vital to de-imperialise the positivistic ways of teaching and being in HPE. In doing so, this paper creates a space for Bourdieu's habitus to meet Chinese perspectives on embodiment to engage in a dialogue for knowledge production that extends the current knowledge base in HPE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to Eccles et al.’s (1983) Expectancy Value Model, the two major constructs that influence young people’s activity choice are subjective task value and expectancy beliefs (Eccles et al., 1983). Eccles et al. (1983) conceptually distinguished four dimensions of subjective task value: attainment value, intrinsic value, utility value and cost, and two dimensions of expectancy beliefs: expectancies for success and competence beliefs. Previous studies have been conducted with Western populations, but little is known about how the subjective task value and expectancy beliefs act in relation to physical activity for Chinese populations. This study sought to examine the factors that contribute to Hong Kong Chinese young people’s values and expectancy beliefs in physical activity. The participants were selected purposefully for this qualitative interview study from a larger mixed method study (Pang and Ha, 2010). Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 Hong Kong Chinese young people (six boys and six girls, aged 10–12) in three government-funded schools. Results invite us to take into account the two contrasting values of collectivism and individualism, the deeply rooted capitalistic economy and the philosophy of Confucianism that act hand in hand in shaping the physical activity values and expectancy beliefs of contemporary Hong Kong Chinese young people. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Subjective Task Value (STV) is a multidimensional construct of values predominantly used to examine western culture (Eccles et al., 1983); it is influential in motivating individuals to make choices and display long-lasting behaviours. While existing studies were conducted with western populations, the manifestation of value has yet to be investigated from the viewpoint of the Chinese culture. This study sought, first, to test the validity of the construct with schoolchildren in the Hong Kong cultural context; second, to investigate gender differences in children’s STV and physical activity participation, and last, to examine relationships between the STV components and physical activity participation. Questionnaires were completed by 172 boys and 163 girls (mean age = 10.71) in assessing their STV in physical activity, and participation in physical activity. Significant findings were as follows. (1) Confirmatory factor analysis provided initial support to the multidimensional construct of STV (intrinsic, attainment and utility value) as construed by Eccles et al. (1983). (2) The three value constructs significantly correlated with the children’s physical activity participation. (3) Boys and girls differed in their intrinsic value and utility value but not attainment value. (4) Utility value had the greatest effect in predicting boys’ and girls’ physical activity participation. These results supported the validity of the STV model with Hong Kong Chinese schoolchildren and provided empirical evidence that there is a need to embed cultural and gender strategies in order to further promote Hong Kong children’s participation in physical activity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study compared the self-reported physical activity, perceived social support for, and perceived barriers to, physical activity of primary and secondary school children from Hong Kong and Australia. Hong Kong boys and girls reported spending significantly less time, outside of school hours, on physical activity than their Australian contemporaries (p < .05). There was significantly higher perceived support for activity from Australian parents (p < .001), teachers (p < .001) and peers (p < .001) compared to their Hong Kong counterparts. Parental support significantly correlated with self-reported activity in Australia, but not in Hong Kong. These data add support to the notion that strategies to increase physical activity need to embed family and school. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]