[ { "id": 209474, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1982", "page_number": 131, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "109\n\nproletariat,\" under the leadership of the CCP. It confirmed many of the changes which had taken place in China's legal system since 1958, including the elimination of the procuratorate and Ministry of Justice as well as such individual rights as that of the accused to a defense and an open trial.\n\nHowever, the 1975 Constitution was to have a short life. 1976 was one of the most traumatic years in modern Chinese history. Zhou Enlai died in January and an intense struggle erupted between his supporters and the Gang of Four. Mao himself died in September, in October the Gang of Four headed by Mao's wife Jiang Qing was arrested, and China entered a whole new era with the re-emergence and rise to power of Zhou's chosen successor, Deng Xiaoping, beginning in the summer of 1977.\n\nIn March 1978 a third Constitution was adopted which restored many of the provisions dealing with the legal system contained in the 1954 Constitution, including the Ministry of Justice, procuratorate, the use of people's assessors, and the right to defense and open trial. Article 47 also stipulates that “No citizen may be arrested except by decision of the people's courts or with the sanction of the people's procuratorate.\" Far more important than the Constitution itself were the various steps taken by the new leadership to rectify the excesses of the past, and a series of new laws designed to provide a stable base for a rational legal system.\n\nAccording to published reports, some 110,000 persons who had been detained as “rightists\" were released in June 1978, and by the end of June 1980 people's courts at various levels had reviewed over 1.13 million criminal convictions meted out during the Cultural Revolution and redressed over 251,000 of them.10 In early 1979, political and civil rights were restored to landlords and rich peasants and their descendants as long as they supported socialism. Also, in July 1979, the NPC adopted seven major laws including a Criminal Code, a Criminal Code of Procedure, an Organic Law of People's Courts, and an Organic Law of People's Procuratorates, which took effect in January 1980. By the end of 1980, there were over twenty law departments and institutes producing personnel to meet the needs of the new system. A system of people's lawyers was reinstituted in 1979 and legal", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212032, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1989", "page_number": 447, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "422\n\nMao Zedong translated, with an Introduction and Notes, by Roger R. Thompson Report from Xunwu, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1990, pp. 1-1x. 1-278.\n\nThis is Professor Thompson's translation of a social enquiry report compiled within the short space of ten days in a small Chinese county town on the borders of Guangdong, Fujian and Jiangxi in 1930, not in peaceful times but in a period of turmoil as the Communists took over towns and villages in the surrounding countryside. Eleven persons including Chairman Mao as chairman and secretary produced the Report (p. 47).\n\nThe translator has also provided a most helpful introduction (pp. 3-41). This sets the scene and explains why the report was not included in the 1941 edition of Mao's Rural Investigations and had to wait until Chairman Deng Xiaoping sponsored its publication in 1981.\n\nProfessor Thompson calls the Report \"an extraordinary document, far exceeding in scope and depth the other investigations Mao made in Jiangxi and Fujian 1930-34\", which were published in 1941. The high degree of care taken with the text prior to eventual publication involved the editors in spending 51 days in retracing Mao's steps of half a century before. In all, they travelled 5000 li (1600 miles), talked to 35 organisations and 14 families, and conducted discussion sessions, making, all told, 800 textual emendations of information in categories like proper names, place names and the names of goods and products. As Thompson puts it (p. 37), there was an \"intense scholarly effort to prepare the text for publication\". He supports the authenticity of the text and explains how Chairman Deng found the report a useful vehicle to demonstrate his own legitimacy and to underwrite his call for accurate fact-finding to help solve the problems of the present (pp. 31-32).\n\nThe long Chapter 3 dealing with shops and commerce in Xunwu is especially interesting. It is almost as long (67 pp.) as the chapter on Traditional Land Relationships, Chapter 4, indicating the importance Mao attached to the subject. Mao's frankness is engaging. He says in the Report (p. 64) that he lacked \"understanding of what a market town is\". He had recognised the problem, but had never found people who could supply sufficient data. \"Two old gentlemen\" had been introduced by Comrade Gu Bo (the local communist leader). \"Many thanks to these two gentlemen\", he continued, \"for allowing me to become like a young", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212419, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1990", "page_number": 361, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "338\n\nconsiders the scale of the task that he set himself. The Search for Modern China is a landmark in China scholarship. Spence's talent as a raconteur and his immensely readable style enable him to succeed in making history interesting to the nonspecialist.\n\nOn the present succession crisis in China, Spence points out the eerie parallel between Deng Xiaoping's behavior today and that of Mao Zedong in his last years, with each man anointing, then purging, one hand-picked successor after another. Even greater perspective is provided by his relating the present situation to that of the early Qing dynasty, when the emperor Kangxi was brought, as Spence put it, \"to the edge of despair\" by the succession question (p. 245), not being able to decide which of his many sons to name as his heir.\n\nThe author provides a rare perspective on China's centuries-old struggle to come to terms with the rest of the world,\n\nHe recalls that the reformers of 1898 had sought to resolve this tension by developing the concept of ti, or \"essence,\" and yong, or \"practical use.\" This formulation, Spence says, \"affirmed that there was indeed a fundamental structure of Chinese moral and philosophical values that gave continuity and meaning to the civilization. Holding on to that belief, China could then afford to adopt quickly and dramatically all sorts of Western practices, and to hire Western advisers\" (p. 225).\n\nSpence sees Deng and the other Chinese leaders today falling victim to the nineteenth-century fallacy that China could join the modern world entirely on its own terms, sacrificing nothing of its prevailing ideological purity\" (p. 746).\n\nHe feels this effort is doomed to failure. \"The task was even more hopeless in the late 1980s than it had been in the 1880s”, Spence concludes. \"What was left of Chinese Communist doctrine after the rejection of many of Mao's ideas and the emergence of the enterprise system was a thinner gruel even than the overformalized Confucianism that had guided the reformers of the late Qing. The party elders flailing out at Zhao Ziyang and his noisy supporters were reacting in an oddly similar way to the Empress Dowager Cixi as she struck back at Emperor Guangxu for attempting his Hundred Days' Reforms\" (p. 746).", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212533, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 87, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "67\n\non a year by year basis, with events mainly related to performing arts and art exhibitions. In 1980, five performing arts groups visited the United States and two art exhibitions were launched. After a slight decline in activity in 1981, the number rose to eight events in both 1982 and 1983, taking performing arts and art exhibitions together. In the following two years, the numbers of Chinese cultural events continued to rise, though not drastically.\n\nLooking at these statistics, though not complete it is easy to see that there have been up and downs in the 15 years of Sino-American arts exchanges between 1972 and 1986, reflecting domestic political developments in both countries. In China, the years 1972-1978 were politically uncertain. The death of Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong in 1976 and the dismissal of Deng Xiaoping led to new political disorder. After the fall of the Gang of Four in 1976, the country began to concentrate on modernization. Eventually this programme led to a loosening of the controls of Chinese political life.\n\nThe relaxation of political control started in late 1978, which was regarded both by the leadership and by a national consensus as a prerequisite to modernization, was followed by the appearance of many posters, unauthorized journals, mimeographed sheets and demonstrations, some of which expressed demands for radical changes and some of which even questioned the authority of the party leadership. This soon caused a political reassessment. Between 1978 and 1988 there were three swings from loosening political control back to more restricted policies, which were marked by reassessments beginning respectively in 1981, 1983 and 1986. Though these reassessments were politically oriented, some of them did centre on cultural issues and all of them affected China's cultural life.\n\nMeanwhile, the Sino-American intimacy of 1979 was cooled by Ronald Reagan's campaign promises to re-establish diplomatic relations with Taiwan. A strong anti-Communist, Reagan introduced into his foreign policy deep ideological prejudices in his initial years in office.\n\nBy the second half of 1983, the atmosphere of Sino-American relations began to improve, leading to Premier Zhao Ziyang's visit to the United States in January and President Reagan's tour to China in April of 1984. However, the affinity that existed around 1979 was not regained.\n\nIn this paper, I shall try to establish a framework of analysis which", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212537, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 91, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "71\n\nthe Gang of Four gained considerable influence over policy between 1973 and 1975. Though granted extensive power, Deng Xiaoping was by then once again losing the favour of party chairman Mao Zedong who was very annoyed by Deng's systematic measures to reverse the Cultural Revolution. As the major administrator when both Mao and Zhou were seriously ill, Deng's position was also weakened by the slowness in normalizing Sino-American diplomatic relations.\n\nAt the same time, the American enthusiasm for close relationship with China had lost its initial impetus, largely because of the Watergate crisis and the consequent Presidential succession problems. With the inauguration of Gerald R. Ford in 1974, relations deteriorated rapidly and cultural exchanges, which had been mainly relegated to the exchange of sports delegations, decreased to their lowest level. During this time, the only Chinese performing group which might have visited the States to strengthen the delicate link established by the Philadelphia Orchestra, was cancelled due to the Ford Administration's ban on the inclusion in its programme of a Chinese song calling for the unification of Taiwan with the mainland. If the Philadelphia Orchestra's tour was perceived by the Chinese as more of a political event to celebrate a new relationship than merely a professional exchange in the arts, the cancellation of a delegation's tour of America was also interpreted, as an unequivocal signal of the Ford Administration's wish to alienate China.\n\nModernization and cultural openness\n\nHaving passed through these unsteady years, Sino-American cultural exchanges flourished. With the establishment of diplomatic relations on 1 January, 1979, cultural ties expanded in all areas. Student and scholarly exchanges were initiated. The two countries began to share scientific knowledge in energy, physics, and the study of earthquakes, and in other fields as well. Meanwhile, American presentation of artistic programmes in China increased to an unprecedented level.\n\nBehind these developments, there were profound changes in domestic politics as well as the international environment. By the end of 1978, Deng Xiaoping had decisively consolidated his leadership in the Party and begun to push the modernization programme forward according to his own blueprint. At the same time, China finally established diplomatic relations with the United States.\n\nThe first years of Deng Xiaoping's leadership expanded modernization", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212543, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 97, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "77\n\nincoming events did take the role of initiating a new trend in China.\n\nChina's domestic policy reassessments were mainly motivated by political considerations and were generally centred on political and theoretical matters. Accordingly, art and literature were less affected than policies by these reassessments. Nonetheless, the bearing of these reassessments on art and literature were enormous.\n\nIn 1977-1978 there appeared a literary genre called “scar literature” (“wounded literature”), under which a number of stories, plays and poems were published or staged. Among these works were \"Class Teacher\" (\"Ban zhuren”) and “Scar” (“Shanghen”), after which the genre was named. The themes of the works under this genre were almost exclusively focused on the wrongs done in the Cultural Revolution. The open, and sometimes forceful condemnations of past policies were pretty much the same as the practices in earlier campaigns to criticize Liu Shaoqi and Lin Biao, but the content showed that writers tried to analyse history from their own perspective. After the Third Plenum in December 1978, at which Deng Xiaoping called upon the intellectuals to “emancipate their minds” and to break into previously forbidden zones, more works under this genre were published.\n\nThe impact of political reassessment in the post-Mao era was strong though, the first reassessment affected the development of art and literature only marginally. With the pulling down of the Xidan \"Democracy Wall\" and the arrest of Wei Jingsheng, an activist in the demonstrations who advocated adoption of a Western system of democracy, there appeared a tendency to limit the scope of literary and artistic activities. In June 1979, an article \"Praise and Shame\" was published arguing that any writer who criticizes the dark side of socialism is shameful. This article ignited a nationwide criticism of “ultra-leftist tendencies in literary and artistic creation.” In the following few months, major newspapers and journals published articles to refute this stand, dubbing its supporters the \"whatever\" faction.\n\nThis development made high culture a victim of political campaigns.\n\n16\n\nThough \"scar literature\" was unaffected by the campaign started in the spring of 1979, it had become out-of-sale by the autumn of that year as the mood of the nation turned more to the present and the future rather than concentrating on the past. So this literary genre was replaced by a more controversial genre, \"exposure literature\", in which social", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212551, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 105, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "85\n\nNonetheless, a large portion of the participants in U.S.-China arts exchanges believe that, since the two countries are major players in international relations, mutual understanding of the other's culture was crucial in making the world a better place to live in. To the people in whose mind this theme loomed large, it was important to have a friendly relationship with China and exchanges in the arts were a handy way to achieve this goal.\n\nThe uniqueness of Chinese culture has also motivated some Americans who saw that exchanges could bring to American culture some diversity and therefore enrich it. The interest of Americans in Chinese culture was obvious, as can be seen by, for instance, the increasing number of Americans travelling to China each year.\n\nFinally, but by no means the least important factor in supporting arts exchanges with China by private sectors, there was a rejuvenation of the affinity which can be traced back to the 19th century \"special relationship\" between the United States and China which existed to the 1940s. To some, the special opportunity for the United States to transfer its culture and products to China on favourable terms re-emerged as a result of the drastically increased contacts between the two countries in the Carter years. \"Recognition of the People's Republic set long suppressed dreams of a return to China swirling in the minds of educators (the legatees of the missionary impulse) and businessmen.\" This helps to explain the involvement, rather intensive, of the RBF and the Henry Luce Foundation, which maintained close ties with China in the 1940s, and the United Board For Christian Higher Education, in China's arts education.\n\nAffinity and crisis\n\nThe highpoint of Sino-American arts relations was in 1970-1981. In his visit to the United States in January 1979, Deng Xiaoping personally signed a cultural agreement with President Carter in Washington D.C.. While in the United States, Deng extended to Seiji Ozawa, conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, an invitation for the BSO to visit China. When the BSO arrived in Beijing in March 1979, Deng again paid his personal tribute to Sino-American arts exchanges by personally attending its performance and welcoming it as the first American performing art group to visit China since the elevation of relations to ambassadorial level.\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212552, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 106, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "86\n\nLike the visit of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1973, the significance of the BSO's tour lay more in political consequences than in artistic accomplishment. Though the quality of the BSO's first Beijing concert was controversial to some Americans, due to some flaws in performance, all of its four concerts in China were fully attended and two of the three in Beijing were transmitted by China Central Television (CCTV). The media, musicians, music critics and journalists all offered praise. The atmosphere around the BSO's visit was so warm that the U.S. ambassador claimed the event pushed U.S.-China relations 20 years ahead.\n\nWhat made the BSO's trip different from that of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1973 was that, though overshadowed by political significance, this tour did bring a chance for Chinese artists to exchange artistically with their American guests, due to the improvement in China's political and cultural environments. By 1979, many artists in China had returned to their former posts. Artistic activities were normalized to a significant extent. Artistically, the BSO's visit generated several concrete results: the Central Philharmonic Orchestra performed with the BSO under the baton of Seiji Ozawa; two of China's most prominent musicians, Liu Dehai and Liu Shikun, toured the United States along with the BSO when it went home in March 1979 and performed with the BSO in the United States; in December, Seiji Ozawa came to China again and conducted the CPO. This event was thus successful both politically and artistically.\n\nThe impetus of Sino-American cultural exchanges resulting from the BSO's tour to China was reinforced in August 1979 when Vice President Mondale visited China and signed the first implementing accord under the cultural agreement. In his visit, Mondale praised Deng Xiaoping's visit to the United States in January for resparking the friendship of the American towards the Chinese people. This atmosphere of Sino-American cultural intimacy created by top political leaders received a new impulse in 1980 when the two governments exchanged high-level cultural delegations. In July, Chinese Vice Minister of Culture Liu Fuzhi visited the United States and the USICA director John E. Reinhardt returned his visit in October. In the latter's visit to China, both parties expressed hopes for more high-level exchanges, and confirmed the policy, agreed upon in Liu's earlier visit to the United States, to encourage and support private sector activities in cultural exchanges.\n\nTraditionally, China's cultural relations with Western countries have", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212562, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 116, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "96\n\nThe interest of the Chinese in American culture was surprising. For example, between 1979 and 1986, 13 American plays were produced by Chinese theatres, including Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. The production of Death of a Salesman was not, in fact, an American event because all the people involved directly in the staging were Chinese, except for Arthur Miller who directed the play, and it was a production of the Beijing People's Art Theatre. Nonetheless, it was seen as a symbol of Sino-American affinity and cooperation. The opening night performance in Beijing was attended by the American ambassador to China, and David Rockefeller, Jr. In the Chinese press, the production of the play was hailed as \"the most significant cultural event in China since the Cultural Revolution\".38 This interest in American cultural events in China actually upgraded the intensity of American cultural presence.\n\nOn the other hand, the American involvement in China's arts education was massive and intensive. In 1985, for instance, the number of Americans teaching in Chinese arts institutions roughly equaled the total of artists from all other countries serving in similar capacities. In sum, the eight years between 1979 and 1986 saw an influx of American culture nurtured by as well as resulting from the disproportionate interest of the Chinese in the United States and its culture.\n\nAt the beginning of the process of diplomatic normalization and in the two years following it, China's external relations were almost monopolized by developing the American linkage. The much-publicized visit of Deng Xiaoping to the United States, the signing of dozens of agreements between the two governments, the massive arrival of Chinese students on American campuses, the exchanges of delegations, and the encouragement of non-governmental contacts by the governments and so on, all helped make the impression on the Chinese that the United States was the best in everything and the American linkage was the only relationship to be valued. In the first two years following normalization, an average of 100 Chinese delegations visited the United States monthly.\" Furthermore, the use of arts exchanges to consolidate the general relationship and to win U.S. economic and technological cooperation made arts exchanges a handmaiden of politics.\n\nIn specific terms, when a major American cultural event took place in China, it was praised all around for political reasons, while the necessary objective evaluations of the quality and the artists involved were rarely or sometimes never provided. The flaws in the BSO's", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212956, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1993", "page_number": 24, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "In the economic sphere, the concept of face also prevails. A Japanese who worked in China for quite some time thought that a strong sense of nationalistic pride among Chinese was at work. Chinese thought that being a great nation with a great history, they could achieve whatever the foreigners had accomplished. While it had been clearly stated that the country could not lose in the competition with other developing nations such as India, Taiwan, etc., China chose to spend much more time modernising her own model than learning from the developed industrial nations whose colonial spirit she refuted (Funadashi, 1985: 224-228).\n\nRegardless of the excuse of colonial spirit, Chinese people could not learn from foreigners because they thought they belonged to a superior race. To follow foreigners' steps would mean depreciation of face (Hsu, 1981: 469; Bo, 1987: 199). Even when a Chinese praises Western culture and civilization, he is bound to be called by his fellow countrymen a worshipper of the West (Bo, 1987: 69).\n\nSome Recent Observations\n\nIt is the question of face at work, the importance of it, which pervades the whole country, her culture and her people. Now, in the 1980s, face still seems to be at work. Sun Longji (1983: 60) has cited Yu Luoji's (44) and Li Shuang's (*) cases. Had they not been publicised, they would not have encountered such great reaction from the authorities. It was the revelation of these cases which put the Communist leadership into an embarrassing situation. It could not help putting heavy sentences on these two persons who openly acted against what it preached, otherwise its reputation and power as the outright governing body of China would be hampered.\n\nIn the political sphere, in the 13th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (the most recent session of the All-China Representatives Meeting), a new Central Committee was elected and a once powerful man, Deng Liqun, believed to have lost power in the recent shuffle, was given membership in the Central Advisory Commission. Hu Yaobang, the General Secretary having resigned in disgrace, remained in the Politburo. Hua Guofeng, the former chairman, deposed in the third comeback of Deng Xiaoping, continued his party member status. Aside from the recognition of these men's contributions as a reason for their retention of some participation in the party, it might just be evidence of Pye's postulation - avoidance of putting someone in a totally defeated", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214206, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1998", "page_number": 64, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "27\n\nOf course obscene jokes and a preoccupation with excrement and body functions are common in many societies and have raised smiles, like other familiar jokes, for centuries. For example, instead of saying a Chinese laughed, one can say: 'Saw teeth but did not see eyes.' Because of physiognomy, one is hardly able to use this expression about Europeans.\n\nIn most countries satire survives partly because it tweaks the authorities. In England, there is the Yes, Minister series, which has stood the test of time, just as there is an assortment of tales about party leaders in China where jokes go back decades. Over the last half century many certainly do not conform with Communist Party intentions. For example, with a play on words, the late elder statesman, Deng Xiaoping, was sometimes ‘insulted' by calling him 'Little Bottle,' which the sound of his given names suggests. Certainly it is not the done thing in China to insult the leaders and humour, like most things, is expected to serve the state.\n\nTwo other anti-establishment jokes, which went the rounds not too long after the Communist government took over in China in 1949, run as follows:\n\nA parrot said, 'I'm smart, I listen to people and mimic what they say.'\n\nA government official replied, ‘I'm smarter, I only copy what our leaders say!'\n\nThe second joke runs:\n\nTwo men had a fight and one contestant bit off the other's nose. The case went to court. The man being tried insisted his opponent bit off his own nose. 'But how could he possibly do that?,' enquired the magistrate, 'His nose is situated above his mouth.' 'Simple' came the reply. 'He stood on a chair to get at it!' This joke seems to fall rather flat on most Westerners (and indeed on many Hong Kong Chinese) for whom it is not sufficiently subtle.\n\nAlthough not considered good taste today, as mentioned before, just as there are English jokes about the Welsh, the Irish and the Scots,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214208, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1998", "page_number": 66, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "29\n\nXiaoping.' The second said, 'I'm here because I opposed Deng Xiaoping.' The two turned to the third who piped up, 'I am Deng Xiaoping.' Deng was, of course, incarcerated for a spell during the Cultural Revolution.\n\nGenerations of Chinese have endured hard lives and they frequently surprise Westerners by laughing at things which are construed in the West as horrible and cruel (Bonavia, 1980:59). 'Blood and guts' at the cinema are examples, although a nervous giggle is perhaps a better description than an outright laugh. Use of this 'safety valve' not only rejuvenates the mind and body but also diffuses anger. Humour and laughter help relieve stress and tension and the immune functions which they bring into being can sometimes help one get out of a trying, embarrassing or difficult situation.\n\nYou will sometimes see a Chinese who has been jaywalking, and has had a close shave with a car, or someone who drops his camera, grinning, or even giving a mild laugh. This reaction provides an escape mechanism. A giggle can make the serious seem ‘unserious' and bring about counterproductive results. Vittachi, the Hong Kong comic, has pointed out to the author that it is by no means confined to Chinese. Other Asians, such as Vietnamese, use 'laughter' to express embarrassment. One not infrequently sees bafflement (or even anger) on the face of a Westerner who tells the Hanoi custom officer that his ticket has been stolen, only to see the officer break into a nervous giggle.\n\nIn fact, the practice is not even purely Asian. The author recalls during World War Two when even British conscripts learned to laugh at the 'horrific' in order to adjust to the situation. If you could go into battle singing the song, 'Hurrah for the Next Man to Die!' you were better able to shrug off death and less likely to go 'shell happy.' Humour acts as a kind of release and can be borne out of pain. Sigmund Freud wrote a dull paper entitled, 'Jokes and their relation to the unconscious,' in which he stated that humorous laughter was a kind of catharsis, a release of tension that returns the body and mind to a state of homeostasis or equilibrium after stress (Freud, 1960).\n\nThe fact that humour can be born out of pain gives rise to the saying: 'I have migraine at the moment and everything seems funny in a peculiar (mirthless) sort of way.'", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 } ]