Ghetto at the center of the world
Subtitle: Chungking Mansions, Hong Kong
By: Gordon Mathews
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2011
Place of publication: Chicago; London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 241
ISBN-13: 9780226510194; 9780226510200
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Note on Hong Kong; title: Place. Introducing Chungking Mansions ; "Ghetto at the center of the world" ; Why Chungking Mansions exists and why it matters ; The building ; History ; Owners' association ; Business ; My own involvement; title: People. Traders ; Owners and managers ; Temporary workers ; Asylum seekers ; Domestic helpers ; Sex workers ; Heroin addicts ; Tourists ; How these different groups interact; title: Goods. The passage of goods in Chungking Mansions ; Selling goods ; Taking advantage of buyers ; Copy goods ; Manufacturers and middlemen ; Tricks and travails of a phone stall ; Varieties of traders ; The generation gap among traders ; Techniques of traders ; The lure of China ; The perils of customs ; The significance of goods and traders; title: Laws. The omnipresent shadow of the law ; Conflicts within and beyond the law ; The role of police ; Visas and residence rights ; Asylum seekers and the law ; "Real" and "fake" asylum seekers ; The lives of asylum seekers ; The changing treatment of asylum seekers ; Future. Changing imaginations of Chungking Mansions ; How Chungking Mansions transforms people ; Cultural identity ; Global significance ; The future of Chungking Mansions / the future of the world.