Knowra Fei Xiaotong Fei Xiaotong Fei Xiaotong was a Chinese sociologist and anthropologist whose studies of rural communities and ethnic relations shaped modern Chinese social science.
Peasant Life in China : Fei Xiaotong’s ethnographic study of a Chinese village, first published in English in 1939. This early study established his account of how family organization and local economy shaped village life.
Differential mode of association : Fei Xiaotong’s model of Chinese social relations radiating outward from the self in unequal degrees of closeness. The model captures his account of relational, rather than uniformly group-based, social organization.
Yenching University : A Christian university in Beijing that operated from 1919 until 1952. Fei studied sociology there before undertaking graduate training and village fieldwork.
Rural reconstruction movement : A movement in early twentieth-century China seeking to address rural poverty through education and community reform. Fei’s research informed practical discussions about improving village economies and institutions.
Jiangcun Economy : Fei Xiaotong’s study of economic change in Kaixiangong village, published in 1939. It documents silk production and household livelihoods in the village that Peasant Life in China describes.
Family system : The rules and practices organizing kinship, household authority, inheritance, and family life. Fei treated family ties as central to the organization of Chinese village society.
London School of Economics : A London university specializing in the social sciences, founded in 1895. Fei completed doctoral research there under Bronisław Malinowski.
Chinese ethnic policy : Government policies governing the recognition, administration, and rights of ethnic groups in China. His research and advisory work contributed to debates over ethnic classification and national unity.
Kaixiangong : A village in Jiangsu Province that Fei Xiaotong studied as a field site. Its households and silk economy became a sustained empirical foundation for his rural sociology.
Ethnic classification : The processes by which people and institutions define, name, and distinguish ethnic groups. His later work examined how China’s many ethnic communities were identified and understood.
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