Hi!
I am researching Bian Zhongyun and came across your wonderful blog (great name). Who are you and where did you get your information on the Cultural Revolution? Do you live in the States? I think your point about the ritualized aspect -- and needing an anthropological take on the CR -- is excellent.
I am delighted every time I receive an email on China or from China.
And guarded. This site is banned in the PRC; a couple of years ago Google notified me and others that their sites were targets of an extra-territorial attack (or some language like that) which everyone knew was from the PRC (Google didn't tell us about NSA); how do I know an email is legit, the writer a sincere person?
This email had no indicia of illegitimacy: not in Chinese, not from China, no stilted English-as-Second-Language, no attachment, a real return email address, and it was signed:
Jennifer Ruth
Associate Professor of English
Portland State University
The Vikings! I'd heard of the school.
I responded immediately. How did I know, though? I didn't. I believed.
What did I know? I studied the email.
Hi!
Friendly. Peppy. Sounded like an American. But, Hi! was also the way Dr. Weili Ye began her email to me a few years ago and she was not friendly or American (born). Jennifer. Can't get much more American than that. Youngish name, right? Mildred, older name; Jennifer, younger name. "Jennifer-Juniper." Some song. From the '60's? I guessed she was born then.
wonderful blog (great name)
Nice thing to say. Weili Ye didn't say that. Friendly. So that was a friendly "Hi!" not a Weili Ye "Hi!"
Who are you?
Direct. Americans are direct: "Hi, I'm Hillary Rodham. What's your name?" "By that time, I didn't know what my name was." (Bill Clinton). But. Weili Ye also had asked the identical question.
Where did you get your information about the Cultural Revolution?
Another Weili Ye question.
Do you live in the States?
Weili Ye didn't care where I lived; she would rather I hadn't.
anthropological take on the CR...excellent.
No, that's two compliments to none by Weili Ye. Dr. Ye's email was responsive to mine. I had initiated, had harshed her mellow in so-doing and her response was challenging, defensive, irritated. Chinese. Dr. Ruth's initiating email taken in its entirety was friendly, interested, engaging, extroverted. American.
Was Dr. Jennifer Ruth really a woman? Why would I ask myself that? We all wear masks. I did not take "Hi!" as conclusively feminine. It was androgynous and the rest of the email was gender-neutral also.
