 Amy Hanser |
Amy Hanser, assistant professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia, will present a lecture titled “Service Encounters: Retail Work, Consumption, and Inequality in Urban China,” at 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 21, as part of the “Young Adult Identity and Consumption in Urban China,” exhibit at Drake University. The lecture, which is free and open to the public, will take place in Bulldog Theater on the lower level of Olmsted Center, 2875 University Ave.
“Hanser’s lecture takes the idea of looking at consumption and turns it around to look at the experience of the employees who serve these consumers,” said Darcie Vandegrift, associate professor of sociology and interim director of Drake’s Principal Financial Group Center for Global Citizenship.
Hanser is well versed in the social and economic changes affecting
Chinese society. She experienced the working conditions in China first
hand as she spent time working and living in three separate retail
locations. Her lecture will address how the social and economic changes create new cultural values and forms in inequality. She will also examine the changes to salesclerk work and the nature of the social interactions involved. She argues that marketplaces have become sites where social differences — and inequalities — based on gender and class are recognized and justified.
The cultural exhibit, continuing through Monday, Feb. 28, in the Collier Heritage Room of Drake University Cowles Library, provides an opportunity for the Des Moines community to learn about Chinese young adults as consumers and how they impact the global economy. More than 400 guests have visited the exhibit.
Thanks to a fellowship and research grant from the ASIANetwork, Vandegrift and her students spent four weeks last summer in Nanjing, China, studying the “ba ling hou” — Chinese urban young adults born in the 1980s. Members of this Generation 80åŽ grew up under the Chinese one-child policy in a society shaped by rapid economic transition, emergent global influences and shifting technology landscapes.
Vandegrift’s fall 2010 honors class, together with undergraduate curator Rachel Crown, created the exhibit with photos, artifacts and interviews collected during the Nanjing trip. The exhibit will be moving to DMACC Urban Campus after its run at Drake University is over.
“Service Encounters: Retail Work, Consumption, and Inequality in Urban China” Lecture
Amy Hanser, assistant professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia and interim director of the Center for Global Citizenship at Drake University is the author of “Service Encounters: Class, Gender, and the Market for Social Distinction in Urban China.” Her work explores the changes to salesclerk work and the nature of social interactions involved.
When: 7 p.m. Feb. 21, 2011
Where: Bulldog Theater, Olmsted Center, 2875 University Ave.
Cost: Free and open to the public
Co-sponsors: Drake affiliates: Women’s Studies, the Chinese Cultural Exchange Program, Department for the Study of Culture & Society, and the Principal Financial Group Center for Global Citizenship