A recent reproductive crisis has brought renewed interest in the century-old “family problem” (家庭问题) and “women’s problem” (妇女问题). Related issues have not only been debated in the discursive field, but also informed cross-border fields such as social policymaking and the law. Intrigued by questions such as why the state calls for increasing reproductivity have met with lukewarm responses, we will start with a historical overview before discussing some of the ongoing important changes in the family system and women’s roles in Chinese society.

Dr. Jin Jiang received her PhD in East Asian History since 1600 from Stanford University (1998) and her MA in Modern Chinese History from East China Normal University (1984). Her research interests are at the intersection of women and gender, popular culture, and Shanghai history. She is the author of Women Playing Men: Yue Opera and Social Change in Twentieth-Century Shanghai (London & Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2009), and the award-winning Chinese version of the book appeared in May 2015 from Social Sciences Academic Press (Beijing). She also published numerous articles in both English and Chinese languages, including “Times Have Changed: Men and Women are the Same,” “Modernity East and West: Melodrama and Yanqing in Shanghai’s Popular Culture,” and “Gender, History and Medicine in Feminist Scholarship: An Interview with Charlotte Furth.” In the past eight years, Dr. Jiang put much effort working with her graduate students on a source book that collects entertainment advertisement carried by major daily newspapers in Shanghai from 1907 to 1966, a period that witnessed the rise, blossom, and decline of an urban popular culture against the background of war, revolution, and emerging urbanism in China. The source book, titled Newspaper Entertainment Advertisement in Shanghai: A Source Book, 1907-1966, was published in March 2015 by Shanghai Cultural Publishing House.

Sponsored by the Asian Studies Program and co-sponsored by the Chinese and Japanese Department, History Department, Political Science Department, Women, Feminist and Queer Studies Program, and the Office of the Dean of the Faculty.

This event is free and open to the public.