Abstract
The harmony of family life is a key Confucian ideal in traditional Chinese culture. Deferential obedience to members of the family who are senior in age is seen as a virtue. Dong’s extended maternal family exemplifies this picture even in testing times. Dong’s mother also upheld this ideal for her own family life, which put its roots down in an urban environment. Visiting the United States brought about Dong’s conversion. In China, after two generations of the One-Child Policy, every four grandparents now enjoy the presence of one grandchild. As a result, educational choices of a nuclear family often involve input and financial contributions from grandparents. After selling a good school-district apartment and deciding to homeschool their daughter, Dong experienced conflicts with her mother.
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Notes
- 1.
Since the mid-2000s, China has funded the sending out of many visiting scholars (including professors and doctoral students) from state-sponsored universities and research institutes to the United States. By late 2010s, suspicion towards China’s overseas academics has grown. See Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “China’s Long Arm Reaches into American Campuses,” Foreign Policy, March 7, 2018. https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/07/chinas-long-arm-reaches-into-american-campuses-chinese-students-scholars-association-university-communist-party/
Also Emily Feng, “FBI Urges Universities to Monitor Some Chinese Students and Scholars in the U.S.,” National Public Radio, June 28, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/06/28/728659124/fbi-urges-universities-to-monitor-some-chinese-students-and-scholars-in-the-u-s
- 2.
Dandan Ni, “Outlaw Educators: China’s Growing Homeschooling Movement,” Sixth Tone, December 13, 2017. http://www.sixthtone.com/news/1001294/outlaw-educators-chinas-growing-homeschooling-movement
Elaine Yau, “The Chinese Parents Who Homeschool Their Kids, and Why They Reject Public Education,” South China Morning Post, July 5, 2018. https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/families/article/2153883/chinese-parents-who-homeschool-their-kids-and-why-they-reject
- 3.
Emigration from China has increased after Xi Jinping’s rule since 2012. See “Wealthy Chinese Are Fleeing the Country Like Mad,” ChinaFile, February 3, 2015. http://www.chinafile.com/multimedia/infographics/wealthy-chinese-are-fleeing-country-mad
About Chinese emigration to Hungary, see Marton Dunai, “Hungary Welcomes Wealthy Chinese Despite Migrant Hostility,” Reuters, October 5, 2016. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-europe-migrants-china-hungary/hungary-welcomes-wealthy-chinese-despite-migrant-hostility-idUSKCN1250RN
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Narration by Xu (age thirty nine, former art editor; stay-at-home mom)
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Ma, L. (2019). Familial Harmony. In: Christianity, Femininity and Social Change in Contemporary China. Palgrave Studies in Oral History. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-31802-4_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-31802-4_13
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