Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
the massive Jiangnan Shipyard, the fi rst manufacturer of rifl es, cannons,
and hydraulic presses, and several ten-thousand-ton ships for the United
States. h e ecological future in these pavilions denied and actually subli-
mated any place for manufacturing and industry in its vision. Industry and
manufacturing were cast as vestiges of the archaic and polluted past that
must be removed in the clean new technological future. Of course, this dis-
course, ideology, and urban development praxis are not unique to Shanghai
but are ascendant in a number of “world” cities, including London and New
York, that are adjusting to transitions from their historical economies and
maritime pasts.
43
One of the most striking counternarratives against the rhetoric of har-
mony and inevitable change could be found in listening to the stories of
some of the eighteen thousand people relocated to make way for the expo
site, which reveal a fundamentally diff erent perspective. For instance, the
housing rights activist Feng Zhenghu was under house arrest for his attempt
to organize an “online expo” of judicial injustice for a six-month period to
coincide with the world expo.
44
Another counternarrative concerns the ideological centrality (or not) of
the peasant or the industrial worker at the world expo, the implicit target for
national improvement and betterment. At the same time as the expo, Cai
Guoqiang, a Chinese artist, staged an art show at the Rockbund Art Museum
titled “Peasant da Vincis.” He conceived the show as an artistic counterpoint
to the o' cial expo narratives by celebrating the ingenuity of peasant-built
inventions, including submarines, plywood airplanes, and robots. “h ese
peasants' objects are diff erent from the type of national, corporate power
connected with the Expo,” said Cai. “Until now, you only hear the collective
voice of Chinese, but this is about individuals' voices.”
45
Another of his slo-
gans was “Peasants make a better city, better life,” a play on the o' cial expo
slogan. He recounted that “this city's construction, its labor force, is all
made up of peasants. h
ese tall buildings, these roads, these subways, they
