Separation and Reunion in Modern China
Douban
Charles Stafford
overview
In this original and readable book, Charles Stafford describes the Chinese fascination with separation and reunion. Drawing on his field studies in Taiwan and mainland China, he gives a vivid account of raucous festivals of reunion, elaborate rituals for the sending-off of gods (and daughters), poetic moments of leave-takings between friends, and bitter political rhetoric about Chinese national unity. The idioms and practices of separation and reunion - which are woven into the fabric of daily life - help people to explain the passions aroused by the possibility of national division. In this book, the discussion of everyday rituals leads into a unique and accessible general introduction to Chinese and Taiwanese society and culture.
contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction: an anthropology of separation
1 Two festivals of reunion
2 The etiquette of parting and return
3 Greeting and sending-off the dead
4 The ambivalent threshold
5 Commensality as reunion
6 Women and the obligation to return
7 Developing a sense of history
8 Classical narratives of separation and reunion
9 The politics of separation and reunion in China and Taiwan
constraint
Notes
References
Index