it seems ridiculous to play the 关系 game sometimes, in the sense of it’s sometimes cunning regard for strategy and alterior motivations, but on the other hand, it also seems awkward to 挖 a 关系 with someone whom you have no specific thing to ask of, without an alterior motive and only the hint that you may have certain interests in common. is it just me?

anyhow, bea, just someone i took note of… came online across a U. of Pennsylvania department of Geography doctoral student named Melissa Rock. She posted a paper that looks right up our hutong (嘿嘿 bad pun) at a conference last year, here is the abstract:

Commodification and Gentrification: Hutongs of “Old Beijing”

According to the Beijing Urban Master Plan (2005-2020), the preparatory construction for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games marks only the first wave of urban redevelopment, transforming China’s capital in to a “world-class city”. The promise and process of this transformation calls for significant de- and re-construction of Beijing’s physical landscape as well as its socio-economic, historic, and cultural configurations. China’s progressive transition towards a market economy, in conjunction with Beijing’s expedited city restructuring to host the Olympics, has triggered city-center land valuation and housing speculation. As a result, thousands of Beijing hutongs have been demolished in favor of high-rise commercial and residential buildings; former neighborhoods become spatially fragmented and former residents are displaced. The demographic splintering of these hutongs marks a simultaneous disruption to socio-spatial practice, culture, community, and identity. However, in the rush to modernize, Beijing has not overlooked the cultural and historic value of the Old City. The Beijing city government has designated at least twenty-five hutong districts as cultural heritage conservation sites. Measures regarding hutong conservation include stipulations on residential density and architectural style. Nonetheless, conflict and contradictions abound as the commodification of hutongs precipitates the gentrification of Beijing’s city-center, prompting the question: do history, culture, and identity reside in place-specific architecture or in the socio-spatial practices of the residents who inhabit and traverse it? Through analysis of Beijing’s urban redevelopment and image-making process, this paper examines how place meanings are constructed through the dynamics of representational discourses, spatial configurations, as well as socio-economic and cultural institutions.

The question of place versus practice is one familiar to you, i think, as it came up a lot in your proposal for Sichuan, and this element of practice—-the doing of daily life—-is something highly important to HomeShop. Going back to the question of context, it’s not merely a question of time and place, but situation specificity, whereby culture and identity seem to be largely determined, by “the matter at hand” and giving oneself—-when there is no real sense of security (in the State)—-to matters as they are. Perhaps a lot of Buddhist values are inscripted here, but non-action (on one hand) and utter passivity (on another) is in such a way, perhaps a very active kind of being.