Gregor Benton 班国瑞
Professor of Chinese History
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Education.
Literature.
Chinese Migrants and Internationalism - book review
Ace Explorers
Gregor Benton, who graduated in Oriental Studies from Cambridge in 1968, is Professor of Chinese History at Cardiff. Before that, he was Associate Professor in the Centre for Anthropology and Sociology at the University of Amsterdam (1979-89) and Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Leeds (1989-99).
He has published books on Marxism, political humour, the history of the Chinese Communist Party, Red guerrillas in China in the 1930s, the Sino-Japanese War, dissent in China, Chinese Trotskyism, Hong Kong, the theory of moral economy, and overseas Chinese.
His Mountain Fires: The Red Army’s Three-Year War in South China, 1934-1938 (Berkeley 1992) won several awards, including the Association of Asian Studies’ prize for the best book on modern China.
His latest books include New Fourth Army: Communist Resistance Along the Yangtze and the Huai, 1938-1941 (Berkeley 1999); Diasporic Chinese Ventures: The Life and Work of Wang Gungwu, (Routledge 2004), Mao Zedong and the Chinese Revolution, 4 vols (Routledge 2008), Chinese in Britain, 1800-200: Economy, Transnationalism, Identity, (Palgrave 2008), and Chinese Migrants and Internationalism: Forgotten Histories, 1917-1945, (Routledge 2007).
His interest in ethnic Chinese communities outside China started in 1979, when he recruited a group of postgraduates in Amsterdam to do anthropological research in the Chinese community in the Netherlands. His close collaborator in ethnic Chinese studies is Dr Edmund Terence Gomez of the Economics Faculty in the University of Malaya.
In the mid 1990s, Benton helped found Chinese Worlds at Curzon Press. This series has established itself as a major outlet for work on Chinese society and culture. One of its main areas of interest is international migration and ethnic Chinese studies.
Current research
Chinese in the Cuban Revolution.
A study, on the basis of materials by Chinese-Cuban and Cuban veterans, of the Chinese community in Cuba and its relations with Cuban political movements. The project aims to rescue from oblivion the history of what was, proportionately, the most important Chinese community outside Asia, and is funded by the British Academy.
Chinatowns worldwide.
The study compares Chinatowns in countries that accept or exclude migrants; compares Chinatowns in a single country, to show the importance of context; and explores each Chinatown’s historical evolution, to demonstrate how culture and identity change over time. This methodology subverts essentialism and brings new perspectives to the concept of “Chineseness”.
The study is written from archival research and interviews in China, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, Europe, the United States, and Japan. The research challenges the essentialising of diasporan-Chinese identity by studies that misrepresent how ethnic Chinese perceive themselves, relate to other Chinese abroad, and view China. The issue of “Chinese identity” becomes more complex still when generations with few or no ties to the “ancestral homeland” are factored in.
The methodology is comparative. Chinatowns are often said to reflect Chinese “homeland” social and cultural practices, yet a cross-country comparison reveals a wide range of influences on ethnic-Chinese identity. The project is funded by the British Academy.
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Updated on 13 June, 2008
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He has published books on Marxism, political humour, the history of the Chinese Communist Party, Red guerrillas in China in the 1930s, the Sino-Japanese War, dissent in China, Chinese Trotskyism, Hong Kong, the theory of moral economy, and overseas Chinese.
His Mountain Fires: The Red Army’s Three-Year War in South China, 1934-1938 (Berkeley 1992) won several awards, including the Association of Asian Studies’ prize for the best book on modern China.
His latest books include New Fourth Army: Communist Resistance Along the Yangtze and the Huai, 1938-1941 (Berkeley 1999); Diasporic Chinese Ventures: The Life and Work of Wang Gungwu, (Routledge 2004), Mao Zedong and the Chinese Revolution, 4 vols (Routledge 2008), Chinese in Britain, 1800-200: Economy, Transnationalism, Identity, (Palgrave 2008), and Chinese Migrants and Internationalism: Forgotten Histories, 1917-1945, (Routledge 2007).
His interest in ethnic Chinese communities outside China started in 1979, when he recruited a group of postgraduates in Amsterdam to do anthropological research in the Chinese community in the Netherlands. His close collaborator in ethnic Chinese studies is Dr Edmund Terence Gomez of the Economics Faculty in the University of Malaya.
In the mid 1990s, Benton helped found Chinese Worlds at Curzon Press. This series has established itself as a major outlet for work on Chinese society and culture. One of its main areas of interest is international migration and ethnic Chinese studies.
Current research
Chinese in the Cuban Revolution.
A study, on the basis of materials by Chinese-Cuban and Cuban veterans, of the Chinese community in Cuba and its relations with Cuban political movements. The project aims to rescue from oblivion the history of what was, proportionately, the most important Chinese community outside Asia, and is funded by the British Academy.
Chinatowns worldwide.
The study compares Chinatowns in countries that accept or exclude migrants; compares Chinatowns in a single country, to show the importance of context; and explores each Chinatown’s historical evolution, to demonstrate how culture and identity change over time. This methodology subverts essentialism and brings new perspectives to the concept of “Chineseness”.
The study is written from archival research and interviews in China, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, Europe, the United States, and Japan. The research challenges the essentialising of diasporan-Chinese identity by studies that misrepresent how ethnic Chinese perceive themselves, relate to other Chinese abroad, and view China. The issue of “Chinese identity” becomes more complex still when generations with few or no ties to the “ancestral homeland” are factored in.
The methodology is comparative. Chinatowns are often said to reflect Chinese “homeland” social and cultural practices, yet a cross-country comparison reveals a wide range of influences on ethnic-Chinese identity. The project is funded by the British Academy.
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Updated on 13 June, 2008
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