Preface

Summary

The Chinese idiom zuo ma guan hua, ‘viewing the flowers from horseback,’ is used to describe superficial or hurried observations, and the conclusions they give rise to. Said with reference to anthropology, zuo ma guan hua would be a particularly telling criticism, because so much of life in China is rightly felt to reside beneath the surface, to be complex and hidden from view. But of course any perspective, ‘from horseback’ or otherwise, has strengths and weaknesses.

What follows is an account of childhood and learning based on fieldwork in the Taiwanese fishing community of Angang (with additional material from northeastern China). Rather than investigating in depth one aspect of the lives of children there, I have tried to hold many things in view: schools, families, money, food, spirit mediums, rituals and so on. Some may feel that this is an excellent example of ‘viewing flowers from horseback’. Each of these subjects could easily fill a book, and many have been discussed in greater detail by others (I will direct readers to this literature). But I wanted to present my own wide-ranging, if incomplete, account of childhood in Angang; and hopefully in doing so to show some connexions which others may not have seen.

Before beginning, however, I should raise several important issues, and ask readers to bear them in mind. First, Angang is in many ways not typical of Taiwan, much less of mainland China. It is an unusually isolated fishing community, with its own unique histories and traditions. Many of these are, of course, linked to broader patterns of Taiwanese and Chinese culture and history.