Those who compete in the Gaokao, China's College Entrance Exam, are often referred to as Gaokao zhanshi, or warriors. Based on long-term ethnographic research, this article examines how Gaokao warriors combine two types of agency that are conventionally considered contradictory: the docile cultivation of virtue and the struggle against social…

While China embraces disability inclusion rhetorically, segregated special schools continue to proliferate in recent decades. What kind of space are special education schools? How do actors in such spaces negotiate stigma and marginality for a better future? This research pairs historical, policy and ethnographic research to examine special…

This article analyses the implications of recent policy changes for the portrayal of minority nationalities in the latest China's history textbooks published around 2017. We argue that ideological responses to the fierce ethnic clashes of the late 2000s and the leadership transition since 2012 have generated increasingly contradictory official…

This article engages in theoretical reflection on how to transcend the imposition of Eurocentric theories onto Southern and Eastern examples. Specifically, I reflect on the examination of educational issues faced by marginalized migrant communities within Chinese contexts and explore the application of an "Asia as Method" conceptual…

Drawing on the perspective of decolonizing methodology, this paper problematises the conventional interview technique of avoiding yes-or-no questions introduced by handbooks of research methods in applied linguistics. By demonstrating how this interview technique was found unsuitable in the first author's ethnographic study of multilingualism with…

Applying a Bourdieusian lens, this study seeks to explore the interactions between secondary and higher education and how these interactions impact marginalised students in an elite university in China. It presents accounts of the educational experiences of 13 marginalised students of rural origin. The findings suggest that for them educational…

To reclaim Indigenous epistemologies and Indigenous ways of producing knowledge (e.g., Shahjahan, 2005b; Smith, 2013), I use a series of vignettes, short biographical reflections, photographic narratives, poetry, journal entries, and memoir to explore what curriculum as embodied lived experiences (e.g., Au et al., 2016; Gonzales, 2015; He, 2003)…

In this paper, I made a historical and philosophical reflection on the social scientific categorization of "rural children" (nongcun ertong) in contemporary Chinese discourses of educational equality. The empowerment discourse about them as an educationally marginalized group based on scientific inquiry into their problems reflects a new…

Transnational migrant students have been found to experience marginalization in educational contexts around the world. This critical sociolinguistic ethnography explores the incorporation and learning outcomes of an as yet under-researched group: transnational migrant students from Myanmar in a border high school in China. This context is unique…

In recent years, alternative teacher preparation programmes are globally emerging to address teacher quality in 'hard-to-staff' schools. These programmes commonly attract graduates from prestigious universities to teach in disadvantaged schools for two years. One programme of this kind in China is the 'Exceptional Graduates as Rural Teachers'…

This paper proposes "perceptual multilingualism" as a research interest within the broader folk linguistic enterprise. By drawing on the geolinguistic mapping tasks popular in perceptual dialectology -- whereby participants are asked to draw and depict dialectal diversity in a given region -- we show that perceptual multilingualism can…

Studies in relation to working-class students at elite universities document on the one hand the role of 'mundane reflexivity' in dealing with class domination while on the other indicate a new form of domination and disadvantages working on these working-class 'exceptions' -- they may achieve academically at university but experience various…

This article focuses on authenticity of second language identity which has been at issue. Previous research of the authenticity of second language identity has revealed that second language identity may be inauthentic due to the impact from social context and the individual's competence and desires. The discussion in this article aims at exploring…

Current arguments on educational fairness for the children of migrant workers in cities primarily promote the opportunity to enroll in local public schools. Drawing on current research, as well as discussions of fairness and justice from Aristotle in the classical period to Rawls, Dworkin, Walzer, and the contemporary scholar Young, we investigate…

Since 2010, the number of urban Chinese high-school students applying to US universities has rapidly grown. Many of these students have chosen emerging international curriculum programs established by elite public high schools in China. These programs prepare wealthy Chinese students for the US college application process by exposing them to an…