Maura Elizabeth Cunningham

Even as Twitter crumbles into irrelevancy, it remains populated enough to set one’s mentions aflame in reaction to a quick post—as David Brooks learned this week. But I was also reminded of this when on Friday I retweeted a photo from the Shanghai History Museum, tweeted by Lingnan University historian Peter Hamilton, and have spent the last two days seeing my notifications refresh with new responses every few minutes.

“Not museum staff are not allowed to explain the contents of the exhibition,” declared the museum sign in English, “禁止非馆方人员讲解展览内容” in Chinese. Now, yes: I did understand that the point behind the sign is that the Shanghai History Museum does not want private tour guides bringing in groups and clogging up the museum hallways as they lecture on exhibits. (Not that, um, I have ever done so in that very museum.) But the sign can easily seem sinister and controlling—a reflection of the Chinese Communist Party’s attempt to maintain a firm grip on official history. And thus my Twitter mentions are filled with responses from people who think that I don’t understand the former, as well as those who only want to believe the latter.

(This is why Twitter is not the venue for serious or nuanced discussions, especially these days. I know.)

It’s easy to see why so many look at the sign and read it as an indication of authoritarian politics and Party-state control. The CCP does work hard to maintain one official historical narrative and silence those who counter it, and under Xi Jinping, the Party-state has redoubled its efforts to counter “historical nihilism.” The idea that a museum would permit only official tour guides as a way to ensure that no counter-histories spread fits neatly into the broader narrative about repression in Xi’s China.

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There are, however, “underground historians” seeking to make space for alternate histories, even if they’re not doing so in the exhibits of the Shanghai History Museum. Those individuals are the subject of a new book by journalist Ian Johnson, Sparks: China’s Underground Historians and Their Battle for the Future. To get a taste of Johnson’s work ahead of the book’s publication on Tuesday, check out an extended excerpt at the New York Times and an interview with Johnson by Jonathan Landreth at The China Project, as well as this episode of the Sinica Podcast featuring Johnson in conversation with Kaiser Kuo. Johnson is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and CFR’s website offers a collection of teaching resources for Sparks, which will be helpful for anyone thinking of using the book in a course on contemporary China.

Recent Goodreads Reviews

In addition to reading Sasha DiGiulian’s new memoir of her career as a professional rock climber, I also watched and recommend her short film, The Trilogy, which follows DiGiulian as she works to become the first female climber to ascend three intimidating routes in the Canadian Rockies.

Recommendations

China Stories
Mary Gallagher, “In Xi’s China, ‘Common Prosperity’ Now Means Lowering Expectations”
Gyal Lo, “The One Million Tibetan Children in China’s Boarding Schools”
Austin Ramzy, “China Sentenced Scholar of Uyghur Culture to Life in Prison, Rights Group Says”
Alexandra Stevenson and Zixu Wang, “A Chinese Journalist Gave #MeToo Victims a Voice. Now She’s on Trial.”
Gina Anne Tam, “China’s Language Police: Why Beijing Seeks to Extend the Hegemony of Mandarin”
Meaghan Tobin, “How China’s ‘broke ghosts’ are keeping up appearances during straitened times”
Lingling Wei, “China’s Former Foreign Minister Ousted After Alleged Affair, Senior Officials Told”

Wanderings Around the World
Ross Andersen, “What Comes After the British Museum?”
Sean Williams, “Purple Haze: Cannabis returns to Kathmandu”

Standout Story
Craig Calcaterra, Coast to Coast Diary

Craig Calcaterra is a Columbus-based baseball writer; Monday-Friday, I read his “Cup of Coffee” newsletter while drinking my own early morning cup of coffee. Over the past week, I’ve been following along as Calcaterra hikes northern England’s Coast to Coast trail and files daily dispatches. The spectacular photos alone are enough reason to check out Calcaterra’s Coast to Coast Diary—the landscape is rugged and pastoral, the towns quaint and charming.

The Coast to Coast trek is something I’d love to do, and reading Calcaterra’s blog posts is enormously instructive—while the hike looks challenging, especially on the days with significant elevation changes, it’s not nearly as intimidating as, say, the Pacific Crest Trail. And while some people choose to backpack and camp, I would definitely, like Calcaterra, opt to sign up with a luggage transport service and spend each night in a small inn along the route.

Calcaterra is about halfway through his trip, and I wish him luck as he continues the journey to the North Sea. I’ll be reading along.

Feature Photo: Exterior of the Shanghai History Museum, November 7, 2018.