Cai Xiang is Professor of Chinese Literature and Director of the Research Institute for Contemporary Literature at Shanghai University.Rebecca E. Karl is Associate Professor of History at New York University and the author of
Youth, Love, “Natural Rights,” and Sex
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Published:February 2016
2016. "Youth, Love, “Natural Rights,” and Sex", Revolution and Its Narratives : China's Socialist Literary and Cultural Imaginaries, 1949-1966 , Xiang Cai, Rebecca E. Karl, Xueping Zhong
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How did revolutionary literature deal with issues of youth, love, sex/sexuality, and their various implications? This chapter argues that youth was in fact a key component in revolutionary literature, and that the imaginary of youth constituted a particular historical practice through which the Chinese revolution attracted the participation and sacrifices of youth. Situating youth in the context of the revolution and its narratives, Cai explores the ways in which representations of youth realized the formation of the modern subject/subjectivity and the extent to which the supposed private issues of love and sex/sexuality were also mobilized both as a revolutionary force and as revolutionary expressions.
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