The last days of old Beijing : life in the vanishing backstreets of a city transformed /

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Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:	Meyer, Michael J., 1972-
Edition:	1st U.S. ed.
Imprint:	New York : Walker & Company, 2008.
Description:	vii, 355 p. : ill., maps ; 25 cm.
Language:	English
Subject:	Alleys -- China -- Beijing. Streets -- China -- Beijing -- History. Urban renewal -- China -- Beijing. Alleys. Manners and customs. Streets. Urban renewal. Beijing (China) -- Social life and customs. China -- Beijing. History.
Format:	Print Book
URL for this record:	http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/7239511

Hidden Bibliographic Details
ISBN:	9780802716521 0802716520
Notes:	Includes bibliographical references (p. [331]-339) and index.
Summary:	A fascinating, intimate portrait of Beijing through the lens of its oldest neighborhood, Dazhalan. Meyer examines how the bonds that hold the neighborhood together are being torn by forced evictions as century-old houses and ways of life are increasingly destroyed to make way for shopping malls, the capital's first Wal-Mart, high-rise buildings, and widened streets for cars replacing bicycles. Beijing has gone through this cycle many times, as Meyer reveals, but never with the kind of dislocation and overturning of its storied culture now occurring as the city prepares to host the 2008 Summer Olympics--From publisher description.

Table of Contents:

Maps
Chapter 1. Through the Front Gate
Chapter 2. Becoming Teacher Plumblossom
Chapter 3. Mocky & Me
Chapter 4. "Say Farewell to Dangerous Housing"
Chapter 5. Wintertime
Chapter 6. A Brief History of [characters not reproducible] Part One: Traces of Pre-Beijing
Chapter 7. The Evening News
Chapter 8. High Times in Happiness City
Chapter 9. Preserving a Sense of Place
Chapter 10. Springtime
Chapter 11. A Brief History of [characters not reproducible] Part Two: The Rise and Fall of Imperial Beijing
Chapter 12. The Unslumming Slum
Chapter 13. Saving the Old Street
Chapter 14. A Summer of Recycling
Chapter 15. Past Tense vs. Future Tense
Chapter 16. A Brief History of [characters not reproducible] Part Three: The Modernization of Republican Beijing
Chapter 17. Miss Zhu Remembers the Trees
Chapter 18. "If Someone Is Sick and You Do Not Aid Him, It Is Your Fault, Not His"
Chapter 19. The Widow's Story
Chapter 20. A Brief History of [characters not reproducible] Part Four: The Industrialization of Maoist Beijing
Chapter 21. Echo Wall
Acknowledgments
Appendix. Gazetteer
Notes
Bibliography

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