Separation and Reunion in Modern China
Douban
Charles Stafford
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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