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About Me

As a Harvard-Yenching Visiting Scholar for the 2016–17 academic year and a W. Glenn Campbell and Rita Ricardo-Campbell National Fellow for 2017–18, Peidong Sun is working on her third book project, tentatively titled “Personal Reading of Educated Youth Generation: History and Memory of the Cultural Revolution.”

Peidong Sun is an associate professor in the Department of History at Fudan University. She received her BA in French and MA in French literature from Zhongshan University and a joint PhD in sociology from L’Observatoire Sociologique du Changement, Sciences-Po Paris, and Zhongshan University.

Her main areas of research focus on China, Communism, and Contemporary History. She has published twenty articles in the China Quarterly and other peer-reviewed journals.

She is co-editor of a special issue of the China Quarterly (September 2016) entitled “The Cultural Revolution: Memories and Legacies 50 Years On,” which became also an edited volume entitled Red Shadows: Memories and Legacies of the Chinese Cultural Revolution (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Her other publications include a book chapter titled “‘When Are You Going to Get Married?’ Parental Matchmaking and Middle-Class Women in Contemporary Urban China,” in Deborah Davis and Sara Friedman, eds., Wives, Husbands and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China (Stanford University Press, 2014).

Her latest books include Fashion and Politics: Everyday Clothing Fashion in Guangdong Province during the Cultural Revolution(People’s Publishing House,2013); Who Will Marry My Daughter? The Parental  Matchmaking Corner in the People’s Square of Shanghai (Chinese Social Sciences Press, 2012; 2013).

Recent Publications

PUBLICATIONS IN ENGLISH

EDITED BOOKS

Patricia Thornton, Peidong Sun & Chris Berry eds., 2017. Red Shadows: Memories and Legacies of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Book review

Wasserstrom, Jeffrey. “THE RED GUARD GENERATION REVISITED.” Journal of Chinese History 1, no. 2 (2017): 365-368.

PEER-REVIEWED JOURNAL ARTICLES

[1] Peidong Sun, 2016, “The Collar Revolution: Everyday Clothing in Guangdong as Resistance in the Cultural Revolution.” The China Quarterly 227:773-795.

[2] Chris Berry, Patricia Thornton and Peidong Sun, 2016, “Introduction: the Cultural Revolution: memories and legacies 50 Years on,” The China Quarterly 227:604-612.

[3] Peidong Sun, Aminda Smith, 2019, “Constructing ‘New Shanghai’: Political rhetoric in space transformation of the Shanghai Race Club (1949-1965)” Chinese Historical Review (Forthcoming in May 2019).

BOOK CHAPTERS

[1] Antonia Finnane, Peidong Sun, 2018, “Textiles and apparel in the Mao years: uniformity, variety, and the limits of autarchy,” in Wessie Ling & Simone Segre-Reinach eds., Making Fashion in Multiple Chinas: Chinese Styles in the Transglobal Landscape. London: I.B. Tauris Press.

[2] Patricia Thornton, Chris Berry and Peidong Sun, 2016, “Introduction: the Cultural Revolution: memories and legacies 50 Year on,” in Patricia Thornton, Peidong. Sun & Chris Berry eds., Red Shadows: Memories and Legacies of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 604-612.

[3] Jun Zhang, Peidong Sun, 2014, “When Are You Going to Get Married? Parental Matchmaking and Middle-class Women in Contemporary Urban China,” in Deborah. Davis & Sara. Friedman eds., Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China. Stanford: Stanford University Press.118-146.

ADDITIONAL PUBLICATIONS IN ENGLISH

Peidong Sun, 2018, “Governance, Diversity and China since the 1950s—An interview with George P. Shultz,” Chinese Historical Review, 25:67-80.

PUBLICATIONS IN FRENCH

JOURNAL ARTICLES

Peidong Sun, 2017, “Abolir la mode: Enquête sur la Révolution culturelle chinoise et la répression des «tenues extravagantes».”Modes pratiques: Revue d’histoire du vêtement et de la mode 2(2017):125-170.

BOOK CHAPTERS

Peidong Sun, 2017, “La profondeur sait rester discrete: Les Lectures personnelles des jeunes instruits de Pékin et de Shanghai durant la Révolution culturelle.” In: CHI, Miao, DARD, Olivier, FLEURY, Béatrice, WALTER, Jacques, La Révolution Culturelle en Chine et en France. Expériences, savoirs, mémoires, Paris: Riveneuve Éd. 69-83.

PUBLICATIONS IN CHINESE

BOOKS

[1] Peidong Sun, 2013, Fashion and Politics: Clothes Fashion in Everyday life of Guangdong Province during the Cultural Revolution, Beijing: People’s Publishing House.

Reviews in English:

Karl Gerth, 2016, Review of ‘Shishang yu zhengzhi: Guangdong minzhong richang zhuozhuang shishang’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 75, 515-517.

Haiyun Wu, 2015, Review of ‘Fashion and Politics: Everyday Clothing Fashion of Cantonese People (1966-1976)’, New Frontiers in Asian Scholarship of Harvard-Yenching Institute.

[2] Peidong Sun, 2012; 2013. Who will Marry My Daughter? Parental Matchmaking Corner in Shanghai’s People Square, Beijing: Chinese Social Sciences Press.

Interviews in English:

  The Wall Street Journal, In China, Couples Wear Matching Outfits, October 9, 2013.

Los Angeles Times, China’s shengnu, or ‘leftover women,’ July 13, 2013.

Daily Mail, The meddling parents who go shopping for their child’s spouse at world’s weirdest marriage market in Shanghai, January 25, 2016.

News China, Out of Love and Fear: Parents Panic Over Unmarried Kids, November 12, 2016.

Open Democracy, The first transgender celebrity in China and her sexist dating show, January 13, 2017.

The Southland Times, Playing the dating game, June 2, 2013.

The Star Online, Happy on their own, August 2, 2013

Global Times, The suitor that never was, March 4, 2013.

China Daily, Eager parents quick to learn marriage lines, May 22, 2013.

China Daily, “Leftover women” or “triumphant women”? May 7, 2014.

Media Coverage

Social Media

Country Focus

China

Expertise by Geography

Asia, China, East Asia

Expertise by Chronology

20th century, 21st century

Expertise by Topic

Book History, Family, Gender, Politics, Rebellion & Revolution, Women