Eye On Dongbei Series

[Comic] Eat the fruit of your actions in northeast China [Eye on Dongbei series]

The television drama The Long Season has brought renewed attention to northeast China, or Dongbei. This surge isn’t by chance but the result of persistent efforts. While Dongbei is often associated with cotton-padded jackets, heavy industry and bleak winters, its rich cultural diversity and historical significance are frequently overlooked. As the birthplace of the Qing dynasty, Dongbei holds Manchu culture and a complex colonial past. The industrialisation and modernisation of “new China” have also given it a unique identity and mission. Dongbei differs from the perceived “traditional Chinese heritage”. Each space reveals a profound interplay between human emotions and the environment, sparking deep reflections on realism and romanticism. Cultural confidence, it becomes clear, is not merely superficial scenes from short videos but a deep, enduring strength shaped by years and destiny. — Bai Yi, a Dongbei native

Bai Yi

20 Sep 2024

Art imitates life: The depressive soundscape of northeast China [Eye on Dongbei series]

Hong Kong academic Dino Ge Zhang explores the regional soundscape shaped by art forms like errenzhuan (二人转) and hanmai (喊麦) in northeast China. He discusses how a sense of ambiguous nostalgia emerged from the tension between declining folk culture and the perceived inertia of a population struggling to adapt to the rise of capitalism since the 1990s.

Dino Ge Zhang

19 Sep 2024

Northeast China in literature and film: Between suffering and salvation [Eye on Dongbei series]

US academic Weijie Song examines post-1980s Dongbei novelists and avant-garde post-Fifth Generation filmmakers from mainland China. Their works vividly portray the northeast China landscape, focusing on the “son generation” and their experiences, both of their parents and themselves, amid abandoned factories and industrial decay.

Weijie Song

13 Sep 2024

Bright spots amid northeast China’s economic gloom [Eye on Dongbei series]

Chinese academic Bo Chen explains why it has been especially hard for northeast China, also known as Dongbei, to transition from a planned economy to a market-oriented economy. While Dongbei’s economic growth still lags behind the faster-growing regions, all is not lost.

Bo Chen

12 Sep 2024

[Photos] Collapse of the Japanese empire’s ‘Manchu dream’ in northeast China [Eye on Dongbei series]

Northeast China, also known as Dongbei, has always been a crucial region for China’s development, with every move affecting the entire Northeast Asia. Historical photo collector Hsu Chung-mao shares the historical events that impact us even today. This article may contain some visually disturbing images.

Hsu Chung-mao

06 Sep 2024

Can youths transform struggling northeast China? [Eye on Dongbei series]

In China’s northeast, the “transition generation” (those born between 1950 and the 1960s) faced major challenges in the shift from a planned to a market economy, which disrupted their careers and fostered feelings of powerlessness and fatalism. As demographics shift and the needs of young people grow, how will the region adapt? Wen Xie, an academic and Dongbei native, explores this question.

Wen Xie

06 Sep 2024