The large-scale changes that had affected every corner of Shanghai since the early 1990s made it easy for us to assume that territoriality has become less an issue than it was in the recent past. Over the course of our ethnographic fieldwork and observations conducted intermittently between 2000 and 2010, however, we came to realize that the age-old dichotomy between the lower quarters and upper quarters had hardly been blurred by the profound social and economic transformations. Making explicit links among Shanghai nostalgia, place attachment, and neighborhood gentrification, this article explores the ways in which historical memory was reified and manipulated in dichotomized "upper and lower quarters" as a consequence of conscious efforts by local residents and municipal officials. Our research findings suggest that the notions of the "lower quarters" and "upper quarters" continued to be an extremely meaningful category of articulating one's status and position in a rapidly stratified society. We argue that the ongoing spatial reconfiguration have answered the strategic need of the municipal officials in their bid for a global metropolis and has impacted the community-building practices in rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods such as Bay Bridge.
"Contemplating Inequalities: An Intersectional Perspective on Gender Dynamics, Marriage Patterns, and Housing Practices in Contemporary China." Chinese Sociology & Anthropology, 43(4), pp. 3–4
On. the basis of comparing and reflecting on diverse measurements of conjugal powers, this study uses "who, on the whole, wields more powers of decision in the household" as the dependent variable, and operationalizes the resources hypothesis, the analysis of cultural norms, the theory of marriage dependence and satisfaction, and the process perspective of power as multidimensional interpretational variables. The results of analyzing urban and rural samples in China's Shanghai and Lanzhou indicate that socioeconomic resources such as education and income had no great significance between spouses, and that interviewees who contributed more efforts to the household, were good housekeepers, and received more support from relatives wielded more powers of decision. The party who depends upon and needs marriage is more willing to forgo family powers. Local subcultural and cultural norms have a significant influence on conjugal powers. However, parties who wield greater family powers do not necessarily express satisfaction with their gender equality in the family; the individual's autonomous power rather than relative power is more predictive of satisfaction with gender equality.
From the community life perspective, this article argues that the segmentation feature of new urban migrants in contemporary China has set back their integration as well as current community construction. The making of interests-based communities to embrace new migrants instead of settlement-based communities may accelerate their inclusion and promote community building.
Multiple linear regression model based on the survey of new migrants in Guangzhou, Dongguan, Zhengzhou, Shenyang, Hangzhou and Chengdu in China showed that gender, education, period of living in the city, having children or not, place of origin, and human relationships are among the key factors influencing the willingness of the labor migrants to settle down.
