On Milk Formula and Diapers: The Entangled Mobilities of People and Objects within Chinese Transnational Spaces
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3986/dd.2018.1.09Keywords:
milk formula, diapers, Chinese migrants, transnationalism, informal tradeAbstract
The article addresses multiple mobilities within Chinese transnational spaces by highlighting the circulation of products for children between Chinese migrants and members of their social networks in China. It focuses on the buying, sending and/or selling of milk formula and diapers as a special type of commodity that brings light to the complex relationships of (im)mobile Chinese and draws attention to the role of objects in producing particular types of transnational subjects – migrants as intermediaries between producers outside China and consumers within China. The paper aims to add to the discussion on commodities consumed by children as well as to illustrat what specific objects tell us about diverse experiences of migration.
Downloads
References
Baldassar, Loretta (2007). Transnational Families and the Provision of Moral and Emotional Support: The Relationship between Truth and Distance. Identities 14/4, 385–409.
Baldassar, Loretta, Merla, Laura (2014). Introduction: Transnational Family Caregiving through the Lens of Circulation. Transnational Families, Migration and the Circulation of Care: Understanding Mobility and Absence in Family Life (eds. Loretta Baldassar, Laura Merla). New York, Abingdon: Routledge, 3–25.
BBC (2013). Baby Milk Rationed in UK over China Export Fear, http://www.bbc.com/news/business-22066243 (1. 7. 2015).
Bofulin, Martina (2016). Daleč doma: Migracije iz Ljudske republike Kitajske v Slovenijo. Ljubljana: Založba ZRC SAZU.
Bofulin, Martina, Coates, Jamie (2017). Bakugai! Explosive Shopping and Entangled Sino-Japanese Mobilities. AAA Anthropology news, http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2017/01/24/bakugai-explosive-shopping-and-entangled-sino-japanese-mobilities/ (12. 4. 2017).
Bryceson, Deborah, Vuorela, Ulla (2002). Transnational Families in the Twenty-First Century. The Transnational Family New European Frontiers and Global Networks (eds. Deborah Bryceson, Ulla Vuorela). Oxford: Berg, 3–30.
Burrell, Kathy (2008). Materializing the Border: Spaces of Mobility and Material Culture in Migration from Post-Socialist Poland. Mobilities 33, 353–373.
Camposano, Cecil C. (2012). Balikbayan Boxes and the Performance of Intimacy by Filipino Migrant Women in Hong Kong. Asian and Pacific Migration Journal 21/1, 83–103.
Can, Sungu (2015). Replaying Home. Smuggling Anthologies Reader (ed. Ana Peraica). Reka: MMSU, 240–244.
Business Insider (2016). China’s Obsession over these Japanese Diapers can Tell us a Lot about Emerging Markets, http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-craze-for-japanese-diapers-tells-us-about-emerging-markets-2016-7 (23. 11. 2017).
CBS Moneywatch (2010). How P&G Brought Diaper Revolution to China, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-pg-brought-the-diaper-revolution-to-china/ (1. 11. 2017).
Centre for Food Safety (2011). Abuse of Hydrolysed Leather Protein in Milk Products, http://www.cfs.gov.hk/english/multimedia/multimedia_pub/multimedia_pub_fsf_56_03.html (28. 10. 2017).
Chan, Yuk Wah (2006). Coming of Age of the Chinese Tourists: The Emergence of Non-Western Tourism and Host–Guest Interactions in Vietnam’s Border Tourism. Tourist Studies 6/3, 187–213.
China Daily (2016). Open-Crotch Pants Make Way for Disposable Diapers, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-07/16/content_349150.htm (13. 10. 2017).
Cook, Daniel Thomas (2008). The Missing Child in Consumption Theory. Journal of Consumer Culture 8/2, 219–243.
Cooke, Eduard, Hart, Imogen (2012). Material Culture and Mobility. Material Culture Review / Revue de la culture matérielle 74/75, 6–13.
Croll, Elisabeth (2006). China’s New Consumers: Social Development and Domestic Demand. New York, Abingdon: Routledge.
Davis, Deborah S. (2000). Introduction: A Revolution in Consumption. The Consumer Revolution in Urban China (ed. Deborah S. Davis). Berkeley: University of California Press, 1–23.
Faist, Thomas (2000). The Volume and Dynamics of International Migration and Transnational Social Spaces. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
The Guardian (2015). Coles Limits Baby Formula to Two Tins a Customer because of Shortage, https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/17/coles-limits-baby-formula-to-two-tins-a-customer-because-of-shortage (17. 12. 2016).
Guarnizo, Luis Eduardo, Smith, Michael Peter (1998). The Locations of Transnationalism: Transnationalism from Below, Comparative Urban and Community Research 6 (eds. Michael Peter Smith, Luis Eduardo Guarnizo). New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 3–34.
Hahn, Hans Peter, Weiss, Hadas (2013). Introduction: Biographies, Travels and Itineraries of Things. Mobility, Meaning & Transformations of Things (eds. Hans Peter Hahn, Hadas Weiss. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 1–14.
Japan Today (2014). 3 Chinese Men Arrested for Buying too many Diapers, https://japantoday.com/category/crime/3-chinese-men-arrested-for-buying-too-many-diapers (12. 11. 2017).
Kopytoff, Igor (1986). The Cultural Biography of Things: Commoditization as Process. The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (ed. Arjun Appadurai). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 64–91.
Liu-Farrer, Gracia (2011). Labour Migration from China to Japan: International Students, Transnational Migrants. London: Routledge.
Martin, Fran (2017). Rethinking Network Capital: Hospitality Work and Parallel Trading among Chinese Students in Melbourne. Mobilities 12/6, 890–907.
McKay, Deidre (2004). Everyday Places – Philippine Place-Making and the Translocal Quotidian, http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.465.4913&rep=rep1&type=pdf (12. 8. 2017).
Milwertz, Cecilia (1997). Accepting Population Control: Urban Chinese Women and One-Child Family Policy. London: Routledge Curzon.
Newsweek (2015). Harrods Takes ‘L1 in Every L5’ Spent by Chinese Tourists in UK, http://www.newsweek.com/harrods-takes-ps1-every-ps5-spent-chinese-tourists-uk-311349 (12. 11. 2017).
Nyíri, Pál (2010). Mobility and Cultural Authority in Contemporary China. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
Organizacija združenih narodov (2008). Key Public Health Issues, http://www.who.int/features/2008/year_review2008/photo_story/en/index6.html (1. 11. 2017).
Parrenas, Rhacel (2005). Long Distance Intimacy: Class, Gender and Intergenerational Relations between Mothers and Children in Filipino Transnational Families. Global Networks 5, 317–336.
Povrzanović Frykman, Maja (2009). Material Aspects of Transnational Social Fields: An introduction. Dve domovini / Two Homelands 29, 105–113.
Raspor, Andrej, Kobal, Tanja, Rodič, Blaž (2012). Chinese Tourists: Are they an Opportunity for the Slovene and Croatian Tourist Industry? Tourism and hospitality management 18/1, 111–125.
Reuters (2013). China Bans New Zealand Milk Powder Imports on Botulism Scare: NZ Trade Minister, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-newzealand-milk/china-bans-new-zealand-milk-powder-imports-on-botulism-scare-nz-trade-minister-idUSBRE97301K20130804 (12. 10. 2017).
Reuters (2014). Japan Diaper Shortage Shows how China Demand Can Relieve Tax Pain, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-tax-diapers/japan-diaper-shortage-shows-how-china-demand-can-relieve-tax-pain-idUSBREA2U1PF20140331 (12. 11. 2017).
Rocca, Jean-Louis (2017). The Making of the Chinese Middle Class: Small Comfort and Great Expectations. Basingstoke, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
South China Morning Post (2017). Lawmakers, District Councillors Rally against Review of Hong Kong’s Milk Powder Export Restrictions, http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/economy/article/2115384/lawmakers-district-councillors-rally-against-review-hong (11. 11. 2017).
Tang, Li, Binns, Colin W., Lee, Andy H. (2015). Infant Formula Crisis in China: A Cohort Study in Sichuan Province. The Journal of Health, Population and Nutrition 33/1, 117–122.
Tian, Kelly, Dong, Lily (2010). Consumer-Citizens of China: The Role of Foreign Brands in the Imagined Future China. London: Taylor & Francis.
Wang, Cangbai (2016). Introduction: The “Material Turn” in Migration Studies. Modern Languages Open, http://doi.org/10.3828/mlo.v0i0.88 (12. 8. 2017).
Wilding, Raelene (2006). “Virtual intimacies?” Families Communicating across Transnational Contexts. Global Networks: A Journal of Transnational Affairs 6/2, 125–142.
Xiang, Biao (2016). Emigration Trends and Policies in China: Movement of the Wealthy and Highly Skilled. Washington DC: Migration Policy Institute.
Xu, Fenglian, Qiu, Liqian, Binns, Colin W., Liu Xiaoxian (2009). Breastfeeding in China: A review. International Breastfeeding Journal 4/6, 1–15.
Zhang, Lin (2015) Fashioning the Feminine Self in “Prosumer Capitalism”. Journal of Consumer Culture 17/2, 184–204.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Authors guarantee that the work is their own original creation and does not infringe any statutory or common-law copyright or any proprietary right of any third party. In case of claims by third parties, authors commit their self to defend the interests of the publisher, and shall cover any potential costs.
More in: Submission chapter
