Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T11:08:00.657Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - Urban Outposts in Rural China

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2019

Emily Honig
Affiliation:
University of California, Santa Cruz
Xiaojian Zhao
Affiliation:
University of California, Santa Barbara
Get access

Summary

Chapter Five explores how, in the wake of the 1973 campaign, the Shanghai government intensified efforts to help urban youth leave the fields, launching projects such as technical workshops in Shanghai in which youth could participate during their home visits as well as distance-learning courses offered for sent-down youth in rural areas. This promotion of education and technical training enhanced the opportunities for sent-down youth to escape fieldwork and take on less physically taxing jobs in rural areas as office clerks, accountants, electrical engineers, machine technicians, and barefoot teachers and doctors. In some areas, the Shanghai government provided material and financial resources for the establishment of small factories and sent-down youth stations; urban outposts scattered across the rural landscape that were entirely independent of the village economy. Although these programs were ostensibly initiated to support the sent-down youth movement, they inadvertently intensified a new boundary in the countryside that divided sent-down youth and villagers. They also turned urban youth into educated and skilled rural residents who became some of the most privileged residents in the countryside.

Type
Chapter
Information
Across the Great Divide
The Sent-down Youth Movement in Mao's China, 1968–1980
, pp. 117 - 136
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×