| My dissertation is a study of the development and political significance of various forms of social protest during the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the late 1960s. It seeks to develop a new interpretation of the Cultural Revolution, by opening up a space in which an alternative history of the movement---one which attends more to internal differentiations and critical possibilities-can be written. Addressing questions pertaining to class and identity formation, hegemonic processes, and counter-hegemonic possibilities, it explores how resistance or ruptural moments may develop, political boundaries may be reinterpreted and contested, and transgressive forces reworked or partially appropriated.; The Cultural Revolution began in 1966 largely as a "revolution from above" which, while requiring much mass mobilization, was dependent upon highly centralized political direction. The disorder unleashed by revolts from below and power struggle on the top, however, created a genuine political crisis, and a potentially revolutionary situation. My dissertation examines protest activities by various marginalized and excluded segments of China's laboring population, whose social conditions were symptomatic, in rather condensed fashion, of broader class relations characteristic of Chinese society---e.g., temporary and contract laborers, rusticated urban youths, and youths from "undesirable" class backgrounds. Based on archival and field research, I explore the political dynamics of radicalizing the Cultural Revolution from below, through documenting and analyzing several key instances of popular socioeconomic grievances and their political expressions. Through these currents, dominant forms of social representation were scrutinized, and new forms of political critique arose that transgressed and challenged the hegemonic boundaries of the Cultural Revolution. In excavating these lesser known instances in their local mobilizational contexts, My dissertation attempts to offer new insights into the study of the Chinese Cultural Revolution with newly available materials, and hopes to contribute to the understanding of broader theoretical and political issues as well. |
