HERE’S THE TEST ON TURBULENCE Choose 3 questions from 3 sections each and 1 from another section FOR A TOTAL OF 10 ANSWERS. For example, you might choose to answer 1 from section 1 on Feng Shui, 3 from section 2, 3 from section 3 and 3 from section 4. Or you might decide to choose 3 from section 1, 1 from section 2, 3 from section 3 and 3 from section 4. You decide based on where you think your strengths lie. If you know a lot about the role of Dakong and very little about Feng Shui, then you should choose 3 from section 4 and only 1 from section 1.

Do not just do 4 from one section, please. And do not give answers to

every dashed question here. I’ll be all month getting the test back if you do that. Aim for at minimum 50 words per answer. 谢谢！(Thanks!)Also, please avoid just cutting and pasting definitions. Try to explain your answers in your own words. Remember one of my goals is to encourage you to try to teach Chinese Literature if you ever get the chance. Pretend you are preparing lecture notes!

I. Traditional China1. Crossroads Township is

described in the opening of the novel as a traditional village, rather isolated. “The tall, narrow houses . . . are

connected by eaves topped by roof tiles whose tips swoop up into the air like wings soaring above the water.” And water comes into the houses by means of bamboo pipes that direct the waters of the lakes into the town. Explain how the architecture and the way of life in the town accords with the principles of Feng Shui. What does Feng Shui mean?

2. A geomancer surveys the town with “stone glass and compass in hand.” The Chinese invented the compass, but they didn’t use it the way it came to be used in the west. What was its purpose? Consider:

Can we see the forces represented in this picture? How should we arrange our lives and the places where we live if we consider that such forces really do exist?

3. What happens to this pattern of life in the town once changes come? “Turbulence surrounds the peaks of Shaman

Mountain.” What produces turbulence in the novel? Explain why Golden Dog would say this. What is producing turbulence in China during this period of REFORM?

4. Han Wenju, in the opening chapter, reaches for an “ ancient, thread-bound book, so dog-eared it was nearly falling apart.” What book is this and what is its history? What is the other “notebook” that comes in at the end of the novel? Who is the “surveyor”? What is he doing and how is he like our author?

II. Rubber boots and business suits1. The Shaman Mountain people

know absolutely nothing about what? Detail the changes that happen to them when they start selling walking sticks. Don’t forget the two columns I put on the board!

2. Why do the Mountain people buy rubber boots? What is the problem with wearing them? How are these boots symbolic and what do they have to do with these guys?>>

What are these suits, symbolically speaking? What do they tell us about these three? Is there a direct line from what we see happening to the mountain people and these guys?

3.The following comes from http://thediplomat.com/2011/02/fear-and-loathing-in-america/ and is by Jiang Xueqin

I like to eat well, and that can be hard to do in the United States, considering American restaurants—no matter where you go—typically offer mostly salt, sugar, and fat. Scientists have long known that those three substances are what humans most crave, and because they were previously so scarce in nature, we humans yearn to stuff ourselves with them. This has led to

an obesity epidemic in the United States. But a much more disastrous upshot is ‘The Biggest Loser’, a US game show where obese people compete to lose the most weight for cash prizes.

The shopping mall's equivalent of salt, sugar, and fat are sales, advertising, and new product lines. A friend took me to an outlet mall where I splurged on Hugo Boss and Calvin Klein—all items half price. I knew I was still paying a lot, but thanks to my MasterCard it was all quick, easy, and painless. Anyone who knows me also knows that I’m in desperate need of new clothes, but that mall was packed with Americans who were dressed in nice clothes anyway—shoppers there seem like they just can't resist either a good deal or a greasy burger. 

Coming from China and having grown up in Canada, it's unbelievable to me how much Americans consume—their houses, their cars, and even their dogs are all so big. And this is at a time, as one American friend told me, when the United States is no longer manufacturing anything, and its kids can't seem to do math. Meanwhile, in China, you have hundreds of millions of Chinese leaving their tiny farms to work in sweatshops in Shenzhen or on construction sites in Beijing. On the backs of China's migrant workers, China is re-inventing itself overnight and reported a $14 billion trade surplus in December. No wonder many think China will overtake the United States soon. 

Explain how Americans are like the mountain people, who are so proud of their rubber boots. For example, my folks used to eat collards and chitlins, but just last Halloween people were eating a holiday Burger King burger that turned their poop neon green.

What is the difference? Why did Burger King score a big hit with this “green” burger? You need to consider the effects of exchange value and “commodification” of things. Are we connected to our food as a real thing? Why do we eat such things that are not really nourishing?

4. What happens to Shaman Mountain once the people start selling lumber? What does land become in a commercial economy? (Consider sacred v. profane.) How does that change in attitude lead to this?>>

Or to this?>>>

Headline in the article that includes this picture? Oceans a Dumping Ground for Plastic Waste. See

http://www.iol.co.za/scitech/science/environment/oceans-a-dumping-ground-for-plastic-waste-1.1817730#.Vh_KIH6rTcs

III. The blacksmith shop1. What happens to normal life in

the town when Pockface dies? Consider this:

Go back to the geomancer with the compass. What does a compass do? How is cultural ritual and symbolism like a compass? What does it provide? Note that on page 63, at the beginning of Chapter 5, the abbot

proclaims “that heaven and earth had turned upside down and that the nation was in for chaotic times.” What happens to people when their world turns upside down? What happens when a familiar place becomes strange?

2. What does the blacksmith shop become, and how is this part of the story a sort of parable or allegory that explains what is going on in China as a whole during this period of opening up to the West? What gets lost?

3. What is the difference between a local, craft economy and a full-blown commercial economy? What takes value? Use?

Exchange? Consider the water crisis in Detroit, where a couple of years ago citizens who could not pay their water bill had their water turned off and children went to school without being able to brush their teeth or even wash. Or consider the situation in Flint, Michigan. The officials there sacrificed public health for “cost savings.” What is at the center of our cultural compass?

4. Deng Xiaoping, at the commencement of the Reform program in China, said this about TRUE SOCIALISM:Our modernization program is a socialist program, not anything else. All our policies for carrying out reform, opening to the outside world and invigorating the domestic economy are designed to develop the socialist economy … The aim of socialism is to make all our people prosperous, not to create polarization. If our policies led to

polarization, it would mean that we had failed; if a new bourgeoisie emerged, it would mean that we had strayed from the right path. In encouraging some people to become prosperous first, we intend that they should help the economically backward ones to develop. Similarly, in encouraging some people to become prosperous first, we intend that they should help others who are still in poverty to become better off, so that there will be common prosperity rather than polarization. A limit should be placed on the wealth of people who become prosperous first, through the income tax, for example. In addition, we should encourage them to contribute money to run schools and build roads, although we definitely shouldn’t set quotas for them …

In his survey and description of the life of the rural poor in China, how does Professor Jia Pingwa assess the success of this ambitious program of Reform? Remember the scene where Golden Dog sees rural poverty? Has China failed? Don’t forget that the novel moves from COUNTRYSIDE TO CITY BACK TO COUNTRYSIDE. What is the difference in the standard of living going from one to the

other? Has the new wealth from the reforms been fairly spread out to all the people? How does Golden Dog attempt to correct the situation?

IV. Dakong1. Dakong starts out selling rat

poison. It turns out it is no good. His downfall comes later when he stands trial for “selling a load of useless pine seedlings.” What is the value of such things to Dakong? Does he care that the seedlings are mildewed? How can his “rat poison” be seen as symbolic? How does Dakong go after the real rats later on? Can he stay a poor peasant if he wants to root out a corrupt

leadership? What is the poison eating away at China in this period of crisis and reform?

2. When Dakong starts out, he is a peasant and dresses the part. How does his wardrobe change and how does his new image indicate a shift in traditional Chinese communities? What did Mao wear? What do leaders of China wear today? See what Dakong says about his own career trajectory on page 321. Note that Golden Dog doesn’t even recognize him when he sees him.

3. Unlike Dakong, the “mountain men” or peasants Golden Dog sees in Zhou City have on tattered clothes and the little girls

are “dirty faced” and “they were ugly and pitiful as they held straw hats for handouts from the crowd.” What division is professor Jia outlining for us here? How stable is the peasant situation in China today?

4. On page 329 Dakong has a breakdown:

Was he a man or a devil or a half-man/half-devil? He implored them not to despise him. Since he’d let things go this far, all he wanted, he said, was to smash his head against the southern wall and knock it down. Then he began throwing up, covering the floor with the filthy detritus of the food he’d just eaten.

What in the world has happened to this man? What does his name mean? See what the Abbot says at the top of page 257. Be sure you also look at pages 485-486.

Directions: due Thursday, March 16 by midnight. Send these to: raymoye@coastal.edu (all lower case).

Please use specific language that I have tried to introduce. For example, “sacred” v. “profane” or “continuity” or “alienation.” (Land is sacred, for example. “Profane” simply means “not sacred,” literally “outside the temple.”) Think about the columns I put on the board and on the blog contrasting traditional culture/local

craft economy with commerce. Use the terms. They are helpful.