This is a best-seller in China and a geopolitical book for our times. As a leading thinker from China, Zhang Weiwei provides an original, comprehensive and engrossing study on the rise of China and its effective yet controversial model of development, and the book has become a centerpiece of an unfolding debate within China on the nature and future of the world's most populous nation and its possible global impact. China's rise, according to Zhang, is not the rise of an ordinary country, but the rise of a different type of country, a country sui generis, a civilizational state, a new model of development and a new political discourse which indeed questions many of the Western assumptions about democracy, good governance and human rights. The book is as analytical as it is provocative, and should be required reading for everyone concerned with the rise of China and its global implications.
This is a book of China's own political narrative written by one of China's leading and best-known thinkers. It is the last part of the author's 'China Trilogy', which is a best-seller in China, with over one million copies sold. The book in itself is a centerpiece of the unfolding debate within China on the nature and future of the country and how it compares with the West. It addresses a hugely important issue of the day, i.e., in what way China is overtaking or may overtake the United States as the world's preeminent power. The author provides an original and thought-provoking study on how China has managed, through its own development model, to catch up and even surpass, to various extents, the United States, in terms of gross GDP, net household assets and social protection.The book elaborates on how China has engaged itself in reshaping its institutions to ensure its smooth rise, drawing on the strengths of its own traditions, socialist legacies and elements from the West. It analyzes the weakness of the Western political institutions and discusses how China has developed its own institutional edge over the West. The author argues that as a civilizational state, China has evolved a logic of its own for development and its own political discourse which questions seriously many Western assumptions about democracy, good governance and universal values.The book recaptures the essence of China's past glory and discusses the horizon of the Chinese dream as well as how China should meet the various challenges ahead. It offers a unique and original perspective on the future of this coming superpower. Like The China Wave, this book is both discerning and provocative, and serves as a required reading for everyone concerned with the rise of China and its global implications.
This collection of quotes demonstrates the elegant simplicity of Ai Weiwei's thoughts on key aspects of his art, politics, and life. A master at communicating powerful ideas in astonishingly few words, Ai Weiwei is known for his innovative use of social media to disseminate his views. The book is organized into six categories: freedom of expression; art and activism; government, power, and moral choices; the digital world; history, the historical moment, and the future; and personal reflections. Together, these quotes span some of the most revealing moments of Ai Weiwei's eventful career-from his risky investigation into student deaths in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake to his arbitrary arrest in 2011-providing a window into the mind of one of the world's most electrifying and courageous contemporary artists. Ai Weiwei is one of China's most influential and inspiring figures. Artist, architect, curator, and activist, he has been an outspoken critic of the Chinese government's stance on human rights and democracy.
Manifestos and immodest proposals from China's most famous artist and activist, culled from his popular blog, shut down by Chinese authorities in 2009. In 2006, even though he could barely type, China's most famous artist started blogging. For more than three years, Ai Weiwei turned out a steady stream of scathing social commentary, criticism of government policy, thoughts on art and architecture, and autobiographical writings. He wrote about the Sichuan earthquake (and posted a list of the schoolchildren who died because of the government's “tofu-dregs engineering”), reminisced about Andy Warhol and the East Village art scene, described the irony of being investigated for “fraud” by the Ministry of Public Security, made a modest proposal for tax collection. Then, on June 1, 2009, Chinese authorities shut down the blog. This book offers a collection of Ai's notorious online writings translated into English—the most complete, public documentation of the original Chinese blog available in any language. The New York Times called Ai “a figure of Warholian celebrity.” He is a leading figure on the international art scene, a regular in museums and biennials, but in China he is a manifold and controversial presence: artist, architect, curator, social critic, justice-seeker. He was a consultant on the design of the famous “Bird's Nest” stadium but called for an Olympic boycott; he received a Chinese Contemporary Art “lifetime achievement award” in 2008 but was beaten by the police in connection with his “citizen investigation” of earthquake casualties in 2009. Ai Weiwei's Blog documents Ai's passion, his genius, his hubris, his righteous anger, and his vision for China.
Writings on human life and the refugee crisis by the most important political artist of our time Ai Weiwei (b. 1957) is widely known as an artist across media: sculpture, installation, photography, performance, and architecture. He is also one of the world's most important artist-activists and a powerful documentary filmmaker. His work and art call attention to attacks on democracy and free speech, abuses of human rights, and human displacement--often on an epic, international scale. This collection of quotations demonstrates the range of Ai Weiwei's thinking on humanity and mass migration, issues that have occupied him for decades. Selected from articles, interviews, and conversations, Ai Weiwei's words speak to the profound urgency of the global refugee crisis, the resilience and vulnerability of the human condition, and the role of art in providing a voice for the voiceless. Select quotations from the book: "This problem has such a long history, a human history. We are all refugees somehow, somewhere, and at some moment." "Allowing borders to determine your thinking is incompatible with the modern era." "Art is about aesthetics, about morals, about our beliefs in humanity. Without that there is simply no art." "I don't care what all people think. My work belongs to the people who have no voice.
The “intimate and expansive” (Time) memoir of “one of the most important artists working in the world today” (Financial Times), telling a remarkable history of China over the last hundred years while also illuminating his artistic process “Poignant . . . An illuminating through-line emerges in the many parallels Ai traces between his life and his father’s.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice) ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Time, BookPage, Booklist, Kirkus Reviews Once a close associate of Mao Zedong and the nation’s most celebrated poet, Ai Weiwei’s father, Ai Qing, was branded a rightist during the Cultural Revolution, and he and his family were banished to a desolate place known as “Little Siberia,” where Ai Qing was sentenced to hard labor cleaning public toilets. Ai Weiwei recounts his childhood in exile, and his difficult decision to leave his family to study art in America, where he befriended Allen Ginsberg and was inspired by Andy Warhol and the artworks of Marcel Duchamp. With candor and wit, he details his return to China and his rise from artistic unknown to art world superstar and international human rights activist—and how his work has been shaped by living under a totalitarian regime. Ai Weiwei’s sculptures and installations have been viewed by millions around the globe, and his architectural achievements include helping to design the iconic Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing. His political activism has long made him a target of the Chinese authorities, which culminated in months of secret detention without charge in 2011. Here, for the first time, Ai Weiwei explores the origins of his exceptional creativity and passionate political beliefs through his life story and that of his father, whose creativity was stifled. At once ambitious and intimate, Ai Weiwei’s 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows offers a deep understanding of the myriad forces that have shaped modern China, and serves as a timely reminder of the urgent need to protect freedom of expression.
The monograph presents new findings and perspectives in the study of variation in metonymy, both theoretical and methodological. Theoretically, it sheds light on metonymy from an onomasiological perspective, which helps to discover the different conceptual or lexical "pathways" through which a concept or a group of concepts has been designated by going back to the source concepts. In addition, it broadens the perspective of Cognitive Linguistics research on metonymy by looking into how metonymic conceptualization and usage may vary along various dimensions. Three case studies explore significant variation in metonymy across different languages, time periods, genres and social lects. Methodologically, the monograph responds to the call in Cognitive Linguistics to adopt usage-based empirical methodologies. The case studies show that quantification and statistical techniques constitute essential parts of an empirical analysis based on corpus data. The empirical findings demonstrate the essential need to extend research on metonymy in a variationist Cognitive Linguistics direction by studying metonymy’s cultural, historical and social-lectal variation.
Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei is recognized around the globe for his conceptual installations catalyzing dialogue between the contemporary world and traditional Chinese modes of thought and production. Ai Weiwei: Life Cycle accompanies Ai's multifaceted installation at the Marciano Art Foundation, the culmination of 10 years of effort, featuring works related to his interests in mass production, antiquity and mythology. Enduring issues of political and social justice are given renewed potency through Ai's thoughtful and powerful installations. These include Life Cycle, a sculptural response to the global refugee crisis, and a series of figures based on mythic creatures from the Shanhaijing, or Classic of Mountains and Seas, crafted from bamboo and silk.
How did ancestral arthropods successfully diversify to colonize the land? How do insects use their wings to exploit terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems by metamorphosis? The causes and consequences of metamorphosis are still poorly understood in biology. This collection of essays examines the molecular basis underlying the metamorphosis regulation of the white wax scale insect (WWS), a fascinating insect that undergoes different metamorphoses between males and females. It shows that the WWS has produced great economic or medical benefits for human beings for thousands of years. This book provides interesting information for scientific and technical personnel, as well as undergraduate and graduate students engaged in entomology, molecular biology and biogeography.
Marcat per les experiències personals més doloroses de l'exili, Ai Weiwei sempre s'ha sentit un estranger, i és a partir de la seva experiència artística que aconsegueix donar a aquest estat singular una dimensió universal. «Les persones sempre han fugit, des dels primers compassos de la humanitat. És un procés pràcticament tan natural com el moviment de l'aigua, el vent o la gespa». A Manifest sense fronteres ens ajuda a entendre que l'exili és sobretot un problema de ser, no un problema de tenir, tot i la indefensió de les persones que han hagut d'abandonar casa seva. I ens il·lumina transmetent-nos el seu compromís amb la humanitat i l'arrel de les motivacions de la seva esplendorosa creativitat. Ai Weiwei és l'artista xinès més destacat de l'art contemporani, i és conegut per centrar les seves creacions en temes polítics i socials, i per la defensa dels drets humans i la llibertat d'expressió.
This book presents both the fundamental theory and numerical calculations and field experiments used in a range of practical engineering projects. It not only provides theoretical formulations and various solutions, but also offers concrete methods to extend the life of existing bridge structures and presents a guide to the rational design of new bridges, such as high-speed railway bridges and long-span bridges. Further, it offers a reference resource for solving vehicle–structure dynamic interaction problems in the research on and design of all types of highways, railways and other transport structures.
The book focuses on visual object tracking systems and approaches based on correlation filter and deep learning. Both foundations and implementations have been addressed. The algorithm, system design and performance evaluation have been explored for three kinds of tracking methods including correlation filter based methods, correlation filter with deep feature based methods, and deep learning based methods. Firstly, context aware and multi-scale strategy are presented in correlation filter based trackers; then, long-short term correlation filter, context aware correlation filter and auxiliary relocation in SiamFC framework are proposed for combining correlation filter and deep learning in visual object tracking; finally, improvements in deep learning based trackers including Siamese network, GAN and reinforcement learning are designed. The goal of this book is to bring, in a timely fashion, the latest advances and developments in visual object tracking, especially correlation filter and deep learning based methods, which is particularly suited for readers who are interested in the research and technology innovation in visual object tracking and related fields.
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