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Few readers notice that in a celebrated essay, Goffman, in a footnote, acknowledges the Chinese source of his concept of face. Around the time that Goffman published 'On Face-work,' Merton urged that theory development requires, among other things, clarification or refinement of concepts. If culture is taken to be effectively related to action and meaning, it is necessary to go beyond the approach in which theories, concepts, and methods developed in one socio-cultural context are simply applied to data generated in another. The present paper shows that concepts from other cultures may challenge taken-for-granted assumptions, received wisdoms, and established conventions. The paper draws on semi-structured interviews with respondents in a number of sites in mainland China. Examination of the various notions of face articulated by respondents suggests possible developments in sociological conceptualizations of face neglected in previous discussion. It is shown that an individual's face generation and outcome may arise out of another individual's status or behavior. An individual's action may give rise to a collective face outcome and a collective's circumstances may have impact on an individual's face state. Additionally, it is shown that face itself may become an object of self-conscious deliberation and construction. The paper demonstrates that conceptualizations employed by Chinese subjects can lead to the identification or illumination of properties and relations neglected in mainstream cultural sociology. New directions of research and theorization are thus encouraged by incorporation of culturally extraneous experiences and categories into mainstream sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although sociological insights into the relationship between consumption and class are mostly borne out by current research in the Chinese context, it is important to consider the implications of applying such an analytic framework-which arose within American and European social contexts-to contemporary China. This paper examines the relationship between consumption and class relations. Drawing on ethnographic research and interviews with young urban professionals in Beijing and Nanjing and young rural migrants in Shenzhen, it asks how individuals from these two socioeconomic cohorts participate in the ritual of romantic consumption. In particular, the paper asks how individuals from these groups think about and rationalise their decisions surrounding two wedding-related consumer items: bridal photography and diamond engagement rings. The discussion reveals some distinct features in class formation in contemporary China, where class structures are fluid, unstable and still in the process of being defined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research over several decades about subjective life satisfaction has led to the conclusion that the majority of people seem to be satisfied with their lives when their social and physical needs are met. In empirical studies which have used self-report instruments, this trend is reflected in respondents’ consistent preference for the positive end of scales. This led to the suggestion that there is a normative range for life satisfaction, which should hold true for general population data and, therefore, serve as a reference point, or a gold standard, for comparison (Cummins "Social Indicators Research," 35, 179–200, 1995, "Social Indicators Research," 43, 307–334, 1998). Subsequent research has shown that Western and non-Western samples generally conform to the normative range, but more data are needed from Chinese societies. In an attempt to remedy this situation, this paper investigates normative life satisfaction there. This paper reanalyses published and unpublished data from various Chinese societies (People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, and Taiwan) in order to confirm whether or not they lie within the normative range for non-Western countries. The results provide support for the relevance of Cummins’s normative range in Chinese societies. That the normative range generalised to the present study is a very useful finding, as it supports its utility for Chinese samples, and adds support to a theoretical explanation – i.e. the Wellbeing Homeostatisis theory—in Chinese groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing upon the concept of culture as a 'tool kit' from which social actors draw pragmatically, this paper explores the relationship between cultural definitions of good mothering and breastfeeding among middle-class, urban Chinese women. We argue that an emerging culture of 'intensive mothering' that focuses on infant feeding is taking shape among privileged urban women. Based upon interviews with new mothers in urban Shanghai, we describe the intense efforts and commitment by these women to provide their babies with breast milk, and we consider the complexities of their attempts to put mothering ideals into practice. We suggest that the linkage between breastfeeding and motherhood represents a 'gendered burden' for Chinese women and that infant feeding has become important, early terrain on which new mothers grapple with their own and others' expectations about mothering and caring for a child. We show that intensive, demanding forms of parenting now extend into the earliest years of a child's life, a period largely neglected in sociological studies of parenting in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To explore the rapid development of digital technology and its profound impact on human behavior and social functioning and to study the mechanisms by which digital technology and the social environment interact, a new branch of sociology—digital sociology—has emerged and rapidly entered a stage of vigorous development. This article briefly introduces digital sociology and outlines the research progress of digital sociology in six areas: labor economy and production, digital politics and power, social relations and interaction, body and self, social inequality, and methodological innovation. Based on this, the article compares digital sociology research in China and the West. The rapid development of digital technology in China provides a superb opportunity for sociology, and digital sociology has great potential for development in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through the in-depth analysis of the features of Huabei rural industrialization, the unique factory regime in Baigou, Hebei, and the resulting special workers, this paper reveals two dilemmas the migrant workers in Baigou and larger Hubei area face: Because of the interpersonal network of labor market, personalized trade, familial labor process, and patrimonial management, the workers are unable to become either industrial working class or citizens. Facing this special group of workers, we still believe in their power of self-liberation. Drawing on Touraine’s action sociology and sociological intervention, and Burawoy’s public sociology and praxis-oriented research, we modify “sociological intervention” according to the reality of Chinese society and propose the methodology of “strong sociological intervention” whose vehicle is “Baigou Migrant Worker Night School.” The night school provided workers with courses of labor law, English, and computer based on their actual needs. Labor law is the core to evoke the self-consciousness of the workers. Through communications in the night school and workers’ real living circumstances, we collected their true information and treated it as the source of sociological knowledge. After three sessions of night school training, workers showed changes in skills, social, and psychological aspects, laying a foundation for the growth of self-consciousness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the residential pattern of parents and their married children in contemporary China. Using the China Health and Nutrition Survey (1991, 1993, 1997), the analysis shows that the residential pattern of parents and their married children is not a static phenomenon, but changes over the life span. The analysis provides evidence that parental residence often responds to changed circumstances over the life course, adjusting to the need of married children as well as that of their parents. It is found that childcare needs, death of one parent, and health status of parents all play important roles in transitions in parental residence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this editorial for the Thematic Series: Cultural Sociology and China, we discuss the global growth of cultural sociology as a sociological sub-discipline, its current state and future prospects in mainland China, and the aims of this special issue in promoting the subfield’s further growth domestically in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the successful cloning of genes for mostly rare genetic diseases in the early 1990s, there was a nearly universal enthusiasm that similar approaches could be employed to hunt down genes predisposing people to complex diseases. Around 1996, several well-funded international gene-hunting teams, enticed by the low cost of collecting biological samples and China’s enormous population, and ushered in by some well-connected Chinese intermediaries, came to China to hunt down disease susceptibility genes. This alarmed and, in some cases, enraged many poorly funded Chinese scientists, who perceived them as formidable competitors. Some depicted foreign gene-hunters as greedy pilferers of the vast Chinese genetic gold mine, comparing it to the plundering of national treasures from China by invaders in the past, and called upon the government and their fellow countrymen to rise up and protect China’s genetic gold mine. Media uproar ensued, proclaiming the imminent “gene war of the century.” This article chronicles the key events surrounding this “war” and its aftermath, exposes some inherent complexities in identifying susceptibility genes for complex diseases, highlights some issues obscured or completely overlooked in the passionate and patriotic rhetoric, and debunks some misconceptions embedded in this conflict. In addition, it argues that during the entire course of this “war,” the public’s interest went conspicuously unmentioned. Finally, it articulates several lessons that can be learned from this conflict, and outlines challenges facing human genetics researchers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Danwei as a cornerstone of Chinese urban society has received great research attention. The relationship between the Danwei and psychiatric patients, however, remains unclear. This article aims to shed light on the subject with an integrated micro–macro approach. It introduces a historical understanding of mental health in urban China under the “economic state in transition” framework. A detailed case study in clinical sociology is provided to reveal the many social factors affecting the experience of a schizophrenic patient and his significant others. A changing role of the Danwei is hypothesized and validated with qualitative data. The Danwei was shown to have changed significantly before the mid-1990s, yet it still played a major role in urban workers’ lives, including those of psychiatric patients, and even more so in people’s expectations. This lends support to the need for a more responsive public policy to address various social issues brought about by economic reform, with the learning of worldwide experiences including “community care,” “social support” and “social rehabilitation.” Implications for social research, policymaking and professional practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to revitalize Max Weber's sociology of domination and show it to be a useful, discerning approach to the study of historical societies. The author's effort to renew a Weberian perspective is based upon a critical evaluation of Weber's work, following the lead of Roth, Schluchter, and Turner. The point of criticism is Weber's interpretation of Imperial China. In particular, the author criticizes his insistence that patriarchalism in China was the same as patriarchalism in the Mediterranean societies of Antiquity, and his conclusion that Imperial China was a static civilization because it was unable to break the fetters of the sib. These criticisms are not petty ones because Weber's analysis of China is central to his understanding of world history and of the West's unique place in that history. Weber made China the archetype of patriarchal, patrimonial societies, and hence the standard against which all changes in the West can be assessed. Weber misread the character of a patriarchal domination in China and this misreading throws into question the adequacy of Weber's typology of domination for the analysis of non-Western societies. But, on the positive side, understanding Weber's misinterpretation of China provides a way to view and to appreciate Weber's penetrating analysis of the developmental trends of Western civilization.