This pivot considers the use of porcelain vessels within multi-dialect cultural spaces in the consumption of cooked food in Singapore. In a place of ubiquitous hawker centres and kopitiams (coffee shops), the potteries used to serve hawker foods have a strong presence in the culinary culture of Singaporeans. The book looks at the relationship between those utensils, the food/drinks that are served as well as the symbolic, historical, socio-cultural and socioeconomic implications of using different kinds of porcelain/pottery wares. It also examines the indigenization of foreign foods in Singapore, using two case studies of hipster food – Japanese and Korean. While authentic Japanese and Korean cuisines find resonance amongst the youths of East Asia, some of them have adapted hybrid local features in terms of sourcing for local ingredients due to costs and availability factors. The book considers how these foods are hybridized and indigenized to suit local tastes, fashion and trends, and offers a key read for East Asian specialists, anthropologists and sociologists interested in East Asian societies.
This book looks at the case study of Hachioji as a major transit hub with a world-class public transportation system in Japan. It tracks how Tokyo slowly expands into its suburban, rural or sub-rural districts. It also wants to profile the multiple identities of a city that is simultaneously an ecological asset, a heritage locale in addition to a logistics hub. The volume is probably the first of its kind to analyze the western sector of the largest city in the world.
This volume focuses on the topic of energy transitions in the coal mining industries of China and Japan by adopting a Sino-Japanese comparative approach in area studies to examine the experiences between the two major East Asian economies. In China, rapid industrialization led to dramatic growth in energy demand and much of this energy demand was fueled by affordable coal energy. With growing social concerns about the environment and an increasingly vocal middle class in contemporary China, the authorities and state-owned enterprises are studying the use of coal fuels for its future development. In Japan, coal was also an affordable main source of energy for Japan’s early post-war heavy industrialization until it was gradually replaced by oil in the 1960s. The oil shocks of the 1970s compelled Japan to look for cleaner and cheaper fuels, including nuclear power. In these energy transitions from coal to oil and then onto non-fossil fuels, the story of coal power in both countries is highlighted in this publication as a comparative study. This volume is a crucial contribution to the discussion of China's energy reforms, and required reading for scholars of climate change and society.
Industry 4.0 explores the emergence of disruptive digital technologies such as robotics, blockchain, nanotechnology and 3D printing and their impact on human lives and jobs in globalized 21st century societies. Incorporating a cutting edge area studies perspective, it considers the challenges and long term implications of the rise of ‘Tech Giants’ such as Alibaba, Google and Baidu through the lens of past industrial revolutions, looking back at the transformative technologies and industrial developments - the steam engine, electrification, telegraph, mass production, and the rise of digital technology - upon which the modern world was built. It investigates the mirror profiles of the world’s largest tech companies in the US and China (Baidu and Google, Alibaba and Amazon, Wechat and Facebook) and provides a unique comparison of Tech Giants with 19th century colonial empires and monopolistic trading companies in terms of political-economic dominance. A key tool for instructors and students focused on courses on Technological History, Digital Technology and Cultures, New Media, Digital Ethics and China studies, this book provides practical guidance on how readers can equip themselves to face key workplace and societal challenges in a virtually interconnected world shaped by Tech Giant monopoly.
This book documents through first-hand experience and academic research the historical, cultural and economic interactions affecting land use in Singapore. Offering a unique study of nostalgia in Singaporean heritage, it discusses the subjective nostalgic meanings and interpretations that users of peripheral, heritage and green spaces in Singapore create and maintain, through a combination of informal observations and interactions combined with research into local history and heritage. It addresses the subjective meaning-making processes of individuals within the larger theoretical frameworks that structure understandings of changing land use and economical changes which impact on contemporary cityscapes, centered around peripheral and de-privileged areas of Singapore’s economic development.
Fired Clay in Four Porcelain Clusters examines how energy use in the ceramics-making industry has evolved as a result of technological advancements and changing social norms and ideas in environmental conservation. Three main research themes are highlighted. First, the book examines how the evolving use of energy fuels has impacted the developmental history of the ceramics-making industry, especially with regard to productive output. The second theme focuses on energy use by networks of specialists and technicians in ceramics-making artistic clusters and how ceramicist communities in the world organize themselves institutionally to maximize resource-sharing. Third, at a cognitive level, the volume studies changes in production and design, environmental thinking, energy use, and aesthetic trends among ceramicists and consumers. The four cities or towns of Arita, Hong Kong, Jingdezhen, and Yingge are the settings for this research.
Chinese President Xi Jinping launched the Silk Road Economic Belt component of the One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative at Kazakhstan in 2013. OBOR is a development strategy and framework that focuses on connectivity and cooperation among countries primarily in Eurasia. It consists of two main components, the land-based 'Silk Road Economic Belt' (SREB) and ocean-going 'Maritime Silk Road' (MSR). This book studies the equilibrium or balance between overland and maritime trade routes of OBOR.This book has two major sections. The interpretive section examines contemporary media narratives related to the OBOR initiative and how contemporary commentators appropriate narratives about historical events related to the maritime Silk Road to interpret current policy agendas and legitimize diplomatic or economic exchanges. In terms of institutional studies, the chapters related to Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) will look at the issues facing the Bank in its quest in forming a new world platform for multilateral development financing.The other section, the empirical case study of the publication highlights the fact that Euro-China High Speed Rail (HSR) and Central Asia-China HSR are not viable at the moment as passenger volume is not sufficient to justify the HSR line. This section examines the overland route of the OBOR and looks at recent Chinese HSR history and conventional sub-high speed rail technology development, and identifies technical & economic criteria determining the appropriate technology for a certain line. The chapter in this section will use the developed criteria to analyze the various rail linkage projects currently under study in the OBOR framework, highlight the economic, bureaucratic and geo-political challenges that these projects likely face and lay down conditions that will determine the outcome of these projects.
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