This article explores the methodological and ethical challenges of doing qualitative fieldwork in an authoritarian state. Drawing on a long-term project conducted in China, I discuss how my interaction with the participants was mediated by the pervasive state power. This phenomenon adds a new layer to the question "can the subaltern…

This paper explores ethnographic fieldwork as moral laboratories. Drawing upon two episodes in my field encounters in Southwest China, I illustrate the nature of our method as a form of moral striving and experimentation. Fieldwork is a stage where practical actions become vulnerable ethical dramas in search for the situated good. Fieldwork…

This study used a qualitative research methodology to classify and examine the large amount of information which was collected through field research. The research objective was to (1) An investigation of Hua'er song development in Gansu and Ningxia, China; and (2) Examine the characteristics of Hua'er song in Gansu and Ningxia, China. The…

This paper reports the practice of using the Mobile QQ and Oruxmaps mobile apps to assist in teaching general geology field practice and the results of evaluation experiments. A student subjective judgment questionnaire and a field test were used to obtain the experimental results. The key findings suggest that the proposed method has a…

In qualitative methods, there are various approaches that can be used to answer particular social questions, for example ethnography and case study. Two studies conducted by different researchers in China and Australia using these approaches were described and analysed in order to find out their similarities and differences in terms of…

Being a good teacher depends on many cultural and linguistic assumptions. Dominant definitions of a good teacher are often based on these implicit assumptions. Probing notions of a good teacher, we examine the endeavors of a Chinese international pre-service teacher, Ling, to become a "good teacher" through her encounters with…

Research on engineering practice is scarce and sharing of qualitative research data can reduce the effort required for an aspiring researcher to obtain enough data from engineering workplaces to draw generalizable conclusions, both qualitative and quantitative. This paper describes how a large shareable qualitative data set on engineering…

Location, where geographic elements interwork spatially and dynamically, has been one of the enduring themes in geographic studies. There are a number of location theories to explain why things are located where they are. Alfred Weber's location theory stresses that the least cost of delivering products is a key factor in location selection, and…

Education in schools that serve nationalities consisting of comparatively small populations is currently a focal topic in relation to academia and international organizations. The issue of cultural choice in the schools--whether the function of education in these schools is ultimately dissemination of modern mainstream culture or transmission of…

Conducting collaborative fieldwork between American researchers and foreign scholars in developing countries is a difficult prospect for political scientists. Yet, we can use our knowledge and position at an American university to contribute to the academic community in our areas of study and establish lasting personal and institutional ties with…

Eight papers from a two-day workshop to help librarians answer patrons' questions about China are summarized. Topics include women and child care in China, trends in the arts, China as seen in United States government documents, book publishing in China, building a Chinese resource collection, and teaching about China. The attached kit of…

The study attempts to redefine the objectives of Asian development in terms of rapid social change and the redistribution of political power to the rural masses via collectivism. Part I, "The Perspective", describes the largely "anti" rural development experiences of four Asian countries (India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, China) in…