THE HONG KONG ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY
AND THE HONG KONG MUSEUM OF HISTORY
PRESENT
An Anthropological Talk by Andrew Kipnis
Ghosts, Urbanization, and Strangers in China & Hong Kong
Friday 11 December 2020, 7:00pm
Hong Kong Museum of History
Lecture Hall, Ground Floor, 100 Chatham Road, Tsim Sha Tsui
Due to COVID-19, space is limited to 100 seats. You MUST RSVP by filling out this online form (one reserved seat per email address).
Belief in ghosts is often thought of as a thing of the past-an outmoded belief linked to the traditional cultures of rural China. But ghost stories are commonplace in Hong Kong and other large Chinese cities and evidence of the fear of ghosts can be found in the ways that modern urban people treat death, funeral homes, and cemeteries. This talk analyzes belief in ghosts as a facet of modern, urban living. Kipnes suggests that traditional Chinese beliefs about ghosts have transformed rather than diminished as China has urbanized, and modern urbanites may harbor more fear of ghosts than anyone did in the past.
Andrew B. Kipnis is a professor of anthropology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and co-editor of Hau: Journal of Ethnographic Theory. His last book is From Village to City: Social Transformation in a Chinese County Seat (U. of California Press, 2016). His talk draws from his forthcoming book, The Funeral of Mr. Wang: Life, Death, and Ghosts in Urbanizing China (U. of California Press, 2021).
The HKAS is a member of the World Council of Anthropological Associations