Lin GCS Changing discourses in China geography: a narrative evaluation. Environment and Planning A 34(10):1809-1831 October 2002

[Eugene Garfield]

George C S Lin : GCSLIN at hkucc.hku.hk



TITLE          Changing discourses in China geography: a narrative evaluation
AUTHOR     Lin GCS
JOURNAL    ENVIRONMENT AND PLANNING A   34 (10): 1809-1831 OCT 2002


 Document
 type: Review     Language: English     Cited References: 130    times Cited: 5


Abstract:
Existing literature on the status of the field of China geography has been focused either on what has been
written or on the internal advancement of knowledge in the field, without considering its relationship to the
broader social context and academic environment. In this study I adopt a contextual approach to
analyzing two interrelated issues: (1) the changing position held by China geography in the grand
geographic discipline; and (2) the evolution of discourses formulated by China geographers as a result of
interactions with the broader academic environment. A systematic survey of research papers published in
leading international journals has placed China geography in a peripheral position, with a volume of
research output disproportionate to the size and importance of the nation. Nevertheless, several
encouraging trends are observed, including the dramatic growth of research output since the 1990s and
the broadening of the field beyond physical geography to encompass human geography and urban
studies. A narrative investigation of the professional experience of a leading China geographer reveals a
process of discourse (re)construction conditioned by both the changing political economy of China and
the shifting emphases in the geographic discipline. Four periods of discourse formation are identified in
this case study, namely the conception of the Chinese city as the center of change in the 1970s,
interpretation of the uniqueness of Chinese urbanism in the 1980s, modeling of spontaneous town-based
urbanization and regional development in the 1990s, and, most recently, the use of the notions of
space, place, and transnationalism to construct the Chinese diaspora as a geographic system.
Discourse formation in China geography can be understood as the consequence both of the rapidly
changing material conditions in China and of discursive practices in the geographic discipline. Much
needs to be done by China geographers to go  beyond the empirical arena of area studies and become
more actively engaged in the ongoing theoretical debates in the mainstream of geography and China
studies.

KeyWords Plus:
POST-MAO CHINA, REGIONAL-DEVELOPMENT, TRANSITIONAL ECONOMY,
URBAN-GEOGRAPHY, GUANGDONG PROVINCE, TOWN DEVELOPMENT, STATE POLICY,
URBANIZATION, EVOLUTION, GLOBALIZATION

Addresses:
Lin GCS, Univ Hong Kong, Dept Geog, Pokfulam Rd, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Peoples R China
Univ Hong Kong, Dept Geog, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Peoples R China

Publisher:
PION LTD, 207 BRONDESBURY PARK, LONDON NW2 5JN, ENGLAND

IDS Number:
607WA

ISSN:
0308-518X