...This chapter explores the economy of recycling in Republican Beijing through an examination of the Tianqiao district. It examines some of the contemporary perspectives on Tianqiao and describes the processes that led to the formation of this district. This examination of the dynamics that formed...

... a comprehensive history of Republican Beijing, examining how the capital acquired its identity as a consummately “traditional” Chinese city. For residents of Beijing, the heart of the city lay in the labor-intensive activities of “recycling,” a primary mode of material and cultural production and circulation...

... not contribute to its productive development; and a preindustrial economic network which served as the main source of sustenance for the majority of the city's population. The chapter suggests that Beijing's recycling economy reveals in specific material terms how a complex web of practices bound the most...

...This chapter examines Republican Beijing's new market system and patterns of consumption. It explains that three types of goods, excluding food, circulated through Beijing's markets: industrial products, handicraft items from Chinese cities and the countryside, and recycled articles. Despite some...

...This chapter discusses the concept of “transient mental illness.” It outlines the specific constellation of psychiatric, political, and social processes that are slowly leading to a new category of mental illness, namely the self-traumatized perpetrator. The chapter explains how the recycling...