Volume CXXXIII, Number 3 September 21, 2001 f

A journey to the Far East
HAI ANH VU
Staff Writer

This summer, while most students at Bowdoin spent their vacation across the country, enjoying the homey atmosphere, going south, heading to beaches, or mountains, nine sophomores of Bowdoin had a wonderful chance to spent a summer month together in China for an intensive study program led by Professor Nancy Riley, Associate Professor and Chair of the Sociology and Anthropology Department.

Bowdoin students on the Great Wall of China.

Starting in spring 2001, Prof. Riley selected nine outstanding sophomores from a pool of applicants to attend her intensive sociology course on contemporary Chinese society. During the whole semester, Colin Thibade, Sydney Asbury, Hannah Curtis, Erica Bellamy, Mara Caruso, Andrew Dunn, Abbie Klein, Matt Norcia and Emilie Schlegel worked with professor Riley not only on studying academically the issues of current Chinese society, but also on preparing mentally for a trip to China at the end of the course. Two days after the final, with Professor Riley, they went out of New York City on a 14 hour-flight to Beijing, China, launching an exciting month of study and travel in Southeast Asia.

The group traveled to five main cities: Dalian, Beijing, Shanghai, Shanxi, and Kunming. During this time, the students continued their study with reading assignments given by professor Riley on Chinese social structures and their problems. They also held regular classes to bring up discussions and book reports under the professor's instructions.

Their main intellectual gains, however, occurred out on the streets, where they had direct contact with Chinese people and real opportunities to observe their lifestyles and behaviors.

As part of their course requirement, the students made significant efforts to learn about the modern Chinese culture from daily observations and sometimes conversations with Chinese people, despite the language barrier (all but one spoke fluent Chinese; the others only took a required basic Chinese course in spring). Some interesting projects that they adopted include studying political implications in dressing styles, the growing popularity of Caucasian images in advertisements, environment preservations in the streets of China, etc. These observations were also shared among the group at every class meeting.

All these direct experiences with Chinese people and culture brought invaluable insights into their perception of China. Although they had spent time learning as comprehensively as possible about this country at Bowdoin, the knowledge gained from trip was still extremely refreshing and eye-opening.

Travel broadens the mind. To these students, being exposed to new culture, having opportunities to reflect on the knowledge learned with the real-life experiences, and being able to travel with each other to many different places are just few of the privileges they were grateful for.

As one of them confided, living in many neighborhoods less prestigious, in economic as well as educational resources, helped them fully realized how valuable are the opportunities they have at Bowdoin.

Equally important were the close bonds among the group and the strengthened professor-student relationships. "By the end of the trip, I had extremely high respect for the solid discipline that these students demonstrated. This is an amazing group," remarked Professor Riley about her students.

Professor Riley has spent a great deal of time in different countries in Asia. Guiding the trip this time to China, she hoped not only to give them a chance to gain hands-on experiences of what they have studied at Bowdoin, but also to broaden their view of the world outside Bowdoin, outside the country. The trip, as she described, was a great success in its both goals.

"Now that they've known of "another place" that is completely different from where they've been previously exposed to, the new awareness they gained made them think and act much differently in many situations. Their mindsets also changed enormously, which I found to be the most successful and rewarding thing about the trip," Riley said.

Coming back to Bowdoin at the end of summer, these students have brought back a lot of exciting experiences to share with other Bowdoin peers, stimulating more students to break away from the Bowdoin bubble and explore other parts of the world.

This trip to China was sponsored by the Freeman Foundation-one dynamic organization who has been providing numerous fellowships for Bowdoin students who are interested in doing research in Asia. With the approval of the Sociology and Anthropology Department, Professor Riley, who filed direct applications to the Freeman Foundation, will organize another trip this year with the same format and timing.