Synopses & Reviews
The pulsing beat of its nightlife has long drawn travelers to the streets of Shanghai, where the night scene is a crucial component of the cityandrsquo;s image as a global metropolis. In
Shanghai Nightscapes, sociologist James Farrer and historian Andrew David Field examine the cosmopolitan nightlife culture that first arose in Shanghai in the 1920s and that has been experiencing a revival since the 1980s. Drawing on over twenty years of fieldwork and hundreds of interviews, the authors spotlight a largely hidden world of nighttime pleasuresandmdash;the dancing, drinking, and socializing going on in dance clubs and bars that have flourished in Shanghai over the last century.
and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The book begins by examining the history of the jazz-age dance scenes that arose in the ballrooms and nightclubs of Shanghaiandrsquo;s foreign settlements. During its heyday in the 1930s, Shanghai was known worldwide for its jazz cabarets that fused Chinese and Western cultures. The 1990s have seen the proliferation of a drinking, music, and sexual culture collectively constructed to create new contact zones between the local and tourist populations. Todayandrsquo;s Shanghai night scenes are simultaneously spaces of inequality and friction, where men and women from many different walks of life compete for status and attention, and spaces of sociability, in which intercultural communities are formed. Shanghai Nightscapes highlights the continuities in the cityandrsquo;s nightlife across a turbulent century, as well as the importance of the multicultural agents of nightlife in shaping cosmopolitan urban culture in Chinaandrsquo;s greatest global city.
Review
andldquo;In Shanghai Nightscapes, Farrer and Field use historical and ethnographic methods to shed new light on a question that has intrigued many scholars, novelists, journalists, and travel writers. Namely, to what extent have patterns from Shanghaiandrsquo;s celebrated and notorious jazz age past reemerged in the contemporary era, as the protean city has become once again a hub for flows into China of foreign ideas, fashions, and lifestyles.and#160;Drawing on fiction, archival documents, interviews, and personal observations, they provide a vivid account of nocturnal life in two eras.and#160;They also demonstrate how much can be learned about continuity and change in a cosmopolitan metropolis by zeroing in on how residents of different nationalities disport themselves in dance halls, discos, clubs, and bars.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;Farrer and Field, two long-time observers of Shanghaiandrsquo;s cultural scene, have written a compelling new book on the history of the nightlife in Shanghai from the Jazz Age to the market reform. With intimate knowledge on Shanghaiandrsquo;s clubbing scenes, the book tells a story of both continuity and change in the sexual culture and nightlife of Chinaandrsquo;s most cosmopolitan city. Shanghai emerges in the book as a nodal andlsquo;global cityandrsquo; at the crossroad of the transnational nightclub cultures. Itandrsquo;s a must-read for students interested in urban China, cultural studies, sexuality, and globalization.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;Aandnbsp; unique exploration of Shanghaiandrsquo;s clubs, bars, and dance hallsandnbsp;that explains how and why Shanghai has once again become an epicenter of cosmopolitan nightlife. Drawing on a rich array ofandnbsp;magazines, films, and many nights interviewing Shanghai entrepreneurs, performers, and club hoppers, Farrer and Field expertly ground their brilliant introduction toandnbsp;contemporary night life in a superb social history of Shanghai in the Jazz Age.andrdquo;
Synopsis
It's nighttime in the city and everybody's working a hustle. Winking bartenders and smiling waitresses flirt their way to bigger tips. Hostesses and bouncers hit up the crowd of would-be customers for bribes. And on the other side of the velvet rope, single men and women are on a perpetual hunt to score--or at least pick up a phone number. Every night of the week they all play the same game, relentlessly competing for money, sex, self-esteem, and status.
David Grazian's riveting tour of downtown Philadelphia and its newly bustling nightlife scene reveals the city as an urban playground where everyone dabbles in games of chance and perpetrates elaborate cons. Entertainment in the city has evolved into a professional industry replete with set designers, stage directors, and method actors whose dazzling illusions tempt even the shrewdest of customers. Public relations consultants, event planners, and a new breed of urban hustler--the so-called reality marketer who gets paid to party--all walk a fine line between spinning hype and outright duplicity. For the young and affluent, nightlife is a sport--a combative game of deception and risk complete with pregame drinking rituals and trendy uniforms. They navigate the dangers and delights of the city with a combination of wide-eyed optimism and streetwise savvy, drawing from their own bag of tricks that include everything from the right makeup and costume to fake IDs, counterfeit phone numbers, and wingmen.
As entertaining and illuminating as the confessional stories it recounts, David Grazian's On the Make is a fascinating expose of the smoke and mirrors employed in the city at night.
Synopsis
David Grazians riveting tour of downtown Philadelphia and its newly bustling nightlife scene reveals the city as an urban playground where everyone dabbles in games of chance and perpetrates elaborate cons. Entertainment in the city has evolved into a professional industry replete with set designers, stage directors, and method actors whose dazzling illusions tempt even the shrewdest of customers. As entertaining and illuminating as the confessional stories it recounts, On the Make is a fascinating exposé of the smoke and mirrors employed in the city at night.
Synopsis
Night life in Shanghai, at least since the 1990s, has become an important sexual contact zone.and#160; This history of Shanghai nocturnal culture tracks the way the scene has evolved, from the 1920s and 30s, when the action took place between professional hostesses and their male customers, to the 1980s and beyond, when Chinese women became key patrons of the cityand#8217;s nightlife, part of a growing sexual revolution in China.and#160;and#160; Before the and#145;90s, social interactions between Chinese and foreigners were somewhat restricted (and sex between them was taboo), but now barriers to Sino-foreign social and sexual relations have been mostly removed.and#160;and#160; Farrer and Fieldand#8217;s ethno-history includes closes looks at the musical subcultures of Shanghai clubs (jazz and rock, mostly, going back to 1920s Jazz Age), and sketches the ways in which nightlife neighborhoods have become erotic fantasy zones, with massage parlors, and#147;hair salons,and#8221; and hostess clubs.and#160; Because the clubs attract sex workers, people from all over the world come to explore their sexual desires and fantasies in Shanghai.and#160;and#160; More broadly, the authors treat the cityand#8217;s connections to policing, governance, and prostitution to illuminate the processes of social transformation and globalization that flourish in this model post-colonial urb.and#160; With its increasingly complex subcultures, Shanghai has come to resemble New York, London, and Tokyo, with their mature nightlife industries,
About the Author
James Farrer is professor of sociology and global studies at Sophia University, Tokyo.Andrew David Field is the author of Shanghai's Dancing World: Cabaret Culture and Urban Politics, 1919-1954 and Mu Shiying: China's Lost Modernist.
Table of Contents
Preface
1and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Scenes and Nightscapesand#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;
2and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Golden Age of the Jazz Cabaret
3and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; The Fall and Rise of Social Dance
4and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Transnational Club Cultures
5and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Imbibing Cosmopolitanism
6and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Jazz Metropolis
7and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Nightlife Sexual Scenes
8and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; From Interzones to Transzones
9and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160;and#160; Nightlife Neighborhoods
Notes
Index