China Seminar | 13 November 2014

Hong Kong and Macau: Beyond the Headlines

Cathryn H. Clayton

In recent weeks, both Hong Kong and Macau have been making headlines around the world: Hong Kong for unprecedented student protests that have shut down key parts of the city, and Macau for a sharp decline in casino revenues that reflect important changes in mainland China. This talk, based on the speaker’s decades-long acquaintance with the two cities and on her recent trip to the region, will take a look behind the headlines at the social, political and economic changes both cities have undergone in the past ten years, as well as the causes and potential long-term effects of these most newsworthy events.

Dr. Cathryn H. Clayton is a cultural anthropologist of China and Associate Professor in the Asian Studies Program at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa. She has lived in mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau for a total of more than nine years since the mid-1980s. Her first book, Sovereignty at the Edge: Macau and the Question of Chineseness (Harvard, 2010) won the 2010 Francis L. Hsu Award for Best New Book in East Asian Studies from the national Society of East Asian Anthropology. She is currently doing research for a new book on the legal, social and cultural position of interracial families in Guangzhou.