Training the body for China : sports in the moral order of the People's Republic

Bibliographic Information

Training the body for China : sports in the moral order of the People's Republic

Susan Brownell

University of Chicago Press, c1995

  • : cloth
  • : paper

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Note

Includes bibliographical references (p. 345-374) and index

Description and Table of Contents

Volume

: cloth ISBN 9780226076461

Description

Anthropologist Susan Brownell, heptathlon gold medallist in the 1986 National College Games of the People's Republic of China, draws on her direct experience of Chinese athletics to provide an insight into the culture of sports and the body in China. The book introduces the notion of "body culture" to analyze Olympic sports as one element in a whole set of Chinese body practices: the "old people's disco dancing" craze; the popularity of bodybuilding (following reluctant official acceptance of the bikini); mass calisthenics; martial arts; military discipline; and more. Translating official and dissident materials into English and drawing on performance theory and histories of the body, the text uses the culture of the body as a focal point to explore the tensions between local and global organizations, the traditional and the modern, and men and women. The author's intimate knowledge of Chinese social and cultural life and the wide range of historic examples utilized aim to provide a novel perspective on how gender, the body and the nation are interlinked in Chinese culture.

Table of Contents

  • Acknowledgments 1: Winning Glory for Beijing 2: Historical Overview: Sports, the Body, and the Nation 3: Public Culture: On Sports Clubs, Public Events, and Representation 4: Body Culture and Consumer Culture in China's 1987 National Games 5: Qing Dynasty Grand Sacrifice and Communist National Games: Rituals of the Chinese State? 6: Training the Body for China: Civilization, Discipline, and Social Order 7: "Those Who Work with Their Brains Rule
  • Those Who Work with Their Brawn Are Ruled" 8: Sex, the Body, and History in Chinese and Western Sports 9: Bodies, Boundaries, and the State 10: "Obscene" Bodies, the State, and Popular Movements: Bodybuilding and Old People's Disco 11: "Face" and "Fair Play": Sports and Morality in the Economic Reforms Epilogue: Beijing's Bid for the 2000 Olympic Games Select Glossary of Chinese Terms and Names References Index
Volume

: paper ISBN 9780226076478

Description

Anthropologist Susan Brownell, heptathlon gold medallist in the 1986 National College Games of the People's Republic of China, draws on her direct experience of Chinese athletics to provide an insight into the culture of sports and the body in China. The book introduces the notion of "body culture" to analyze Olympic sports as one element in a whole set of Chinese body practices: the "old people's disco dancing" craze; the popularity of bodybuilding (following reluctant official acceptance of the bikini); mass calisthenics; martial arts; military discipline; and more. Translating official and dissident materials into English and drawing on performance theory and histories of the body, the text uses the culture of the body as a focal point to explore the tensions between local and global organizations, the traditional and the modern, and men and women. The author's intimate knowledge of Chinese social and cultural life and the wide range of historic examples utilized aim to provide a novel perspective on how gender, the body and the nation are interlinked in Chinese culture.

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