The Chinese cultural revolution as history / edited by Joseph W. Esherick, Paul G. Pickowicz, and Andrew G. Walder.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 351-368) and index.

The Chinese Cultural Revolution as history: an introduction / Joseph W. Esherick, Paul G. Pickowicz, Andrew G. Walder -- Passion, reflection and survival: political choices of Red Guards at Qinghua University, June 1966-July 1968 / Xiaowei Zheng -- To protect and preserve: resisting the Destroy the four olds campaign, 1966-1967 / Dahpon David Ho -- Mass killings in the Cultural Revolution: a study of three provinces / Yang Su -- The death of a landlord: moral predicament in rural China, 1968-1969 / Jiangsui He -- Staging xiaojinzhuang: the city in the countryside, 1974-1976 / Jeremy Brown -- Labor created humanity: Cultural Revolution science on its own terms / Sigrid Schmalzer -- To be somebody: Li Qinglin, run-of-the-mill Cultural Revolution showstopper / Elya J. Zhang -- The sublime and the profane: a comparative analysis of two fictional narratives about sent-down youth / Liyan Qin.

Based on a wide variety of unusual and only recently available sources, this book covers the entire Cultural Revolution decade (1966-76) and shows how the Cultural Revolution was experienced by ordinary Chinese at the base of urban and rural society. The contributors emphasize the comple interaction of state and society during this tumultuous period, exploring the way that events originating at the center of political power changed people's lives and how, in turn, people's responses took the Cultural Revolution in unplanned and unanticipated directions. This approach offers a more fruitful way to understand the Cultural Revolution and its historical legacies. The book provides a new look at the student Red Guard movements, the effort to identify and cultivate potential "revolutionary" leaders in outlying provinces, stubborn resistance to campaigns to destroy the old culture, and the violence and mass killings in rural China.