"In the face of a very unstable and not very good world, you have to be determined and brave to build your neighborhood, and not sacrifice your daily life. Courage is a kind of trust, it can be very specific, to what extent, you can observe for yourself and constantly adjust. But if you don't have that neighborhood, you can't have trust in the world, and your trust in the world comes from your trust in your surroundings, and it has to be. 」
Text | Wang Qing
Edit | Acacia poplar
Photography | Li Xiaoliang
At the age of 51, Xiang Biao has made a lot of new self-discoveries. The first is the aging of the body. His eyes began to be presbyopia, riding a bicycle in winter, when he was unfamiliar with the road, he had to stop first, took out his mobile phone and tried to find navigation, but put on reading glasses, the air conditioner turned into another blur in front of him; unwarranted worries have also become more, before going out, he will always unconsciously think about a few more steps, how to walk, whether there will be an accident. He chatted with friends of the same age, and everyone had similar feelings, at this age, people have indeed become vulnerable.
Aside from the physiological changes, he felt that age had no effect on him. In the past 2023, Xiang Biao's itinerary is very full, especially in the second half of the year, this is the first time he has returned to China after the outbreak of the epidemic, frequently appearing in various public places, accepting media interviews, communicating with young readers, and taking time to return to "Zhejiang Village". He doesn't feel tired, dialogue is his research method, and it's how he feels the world.
In the past two years, he has been more determined to take "feelings" as the starting point of thinking, proposing that anthropologists should capture and present people's "common anxieties", to care about people's lives, and to make knowledge directly related to people's practices, feelings and confusions, "For most people, life is a cloud of stars, and life becomes narrated or worth telling because there are problems in life, and you have to consciously deal with them. This is when you need to think about tools. Many systematic theories may have a function of knowledge education, but they may not be able to be transformed into an analytical tool for readers, or even into a part of their emotional structure. And some of the analysis is not systematic, but in the hands of the public, he can use it. Such a tool is what he is looking for.
When he returned to Germany, he devoted most of his time to thinking, in the form of reading and writing. During the week we interviewed, he was thinking about at least four or five issues at the same time, and in order to protect the coherence of his thinking, he said that his email management was very poor, he could not promise deadlines, and his life was often in a state of "chaos". But he felt that this kind of "chaos" was not consumable chaos, but could still stimulate him and give him a kind of motivation, like chasing the light in the nebula.
Xiang Biao still retains the "innocence" of a teenager. When we talked about age and youthfulness, he didn't understand what "a man is a teenager until he died", and even after getting the answer, he still smiled and said, "Immature, there is still a sense of cuteness." And his interpretation of "juvenile feeling" is direct and straightforward - he can do learning more happily.
In the interview, he showed a strong and rare sincerity, repeatedly emphasizing his "luck", which is also one of his self-discoveries last year, "If I am not lucky, I have to continue to perform and work in the academy, and at this age, I will be really tired, because I have to grit my teeth to do it". But this kind of luck is solid, neither humble nor arrogant. He felt that since he was lucky, history had pushed him to this position, and he was not responsible for such a position, he had no burden, but when luck had come, he needed to be responsible for what happened after the luck. He thinks that he is doing things out of a sense of responsibility, and he is reluctant to define it as a sense of mission, "The sense of mission is a bit of a feeling of doing the right thing for heaven, I don't have it at all, I think it is entrusted by people, by young people in China, to do a good job." 」
Talking to Xiang Biao, young people are a topic that can't be avoided. In the past two years, Xiang Biao has increasingly become an important ideological resource among young people. He proposed "involution", advocating that people rebuild the "neighborhood" in their lives, every time he appeared, he always grinned, looked non-aggressive, would listen carefully and patiently to the words of the person opposite, and his speech could always hit the hearts of young people. When we talk about his relationship with young people, he says very bluntly: "Young people are my food and clothing. 」
He said he had no worries about the collapse of his design. For him, such conversations and conversations have become his way of being since he was first interviewed by Chinese media in 2014, and he knows that one day he may and even will quit the stage of history, but he is not anxious, and before the end of his natural life, he feels that he can be an old man standing by the window and watching the children play downstairs.
There are also some critical voices. In the face of a turbulent and unstable world, people expect intellectuals to stand in a higher position and provide new directions, but Xiang Biao always seems to be avoiding the "big" questions, returning to the present, to the experience, confusion and anxiety of ordinary people, so some people think that he lacks a "sense of history". When we asked Xiang Biao this question, his answer was, "I think what really gives us a sense of direction is the surge of individual vitality. 」
He gave the example of Lu Xun writing "The True Story of Ah Q", "Lu Xun wrote a very personal experience, he was looking for the vitality of Ah Q, which is purely individual, all kinds of illusions, all kinds of disillusionment, which can give you a sense of direction, it is not necessarily about how history will go, but how we should preserve our strength and how to face the darkness of the sense of direction." 」
He felt that it was a kind of trust, and trusting ordinary people had a lot of power.
This is also our curiosity about Xiang Biao. Judging from his experience alone, it seems difficult for us to connect him with ordinary people: he was sent to Peking University at the age of 18, became a legend in Chinese sociology at the age of 26 with his research on "Zhejiang Village", and then was admitted to the Department of Anthropology at the University of Oxford, stayed on to teach after graduating with a doctorate, and in 2021, he became the director of the internationally renowned Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Germany.
But Xiang Biao himself has a different version of interpretation: he has lived in Wenzhou since he was a child, surrounded by ordinary people, and has always had a sense of distance from elite discourse; he went to "Zhejiang Village" to do research because reading books is not his forte, but reading stories is; his days in Oxford were very painful, and he came across the interview of "Noon" in the gloom and gloom, and for the first time received positive encouragement from outside the academic world. That visit thus became the starting point for his subsequent existence.
This self-orientation can also be traced back to a childhood memory of seeing the legs of many dock workers near his home, whose calves looked like bunches of black and purple grapes after the age of forty or fifty. To this day, this image remains in his heart.
"The ordinary people I'm talking about are a kind of self-orientation in life experience. In their experience, what the elite finds serious may find boring, while the intellectuals find trivial things to be trivial. Xiang Biao said.
Although he has lived abroad for decades, when talking about the changes as a father, he presents an "old-fashioned" Chinese. My daughter is 12 years old, and her schoolwork in Germany is not heavy, Xiang Biao has always wanted her to practice writing more, thinking that it will help her to grow her thinking, but her daughter refuses, Xiang Biao can only follow her and nag, "Writing essays, writing essays." Xiang Biao also heard the story of his daughter starting to date, and he used the word "romantic emotion" to refer to the budding love at this age, and when talking about dating, he also specially emphasized to me that it was not the "formal" kind.
This year, Xiang Biao's most important self-discovery occurred in October, and he used four words - "I felt love". This kind of love in the political sense was the first time in his life. For a long time, he felt that he was an emotionally unfilled person, and when he went to "Zhejiang Village" to do research when he was young, he always saw people's behaviors, strategies, and calculations, but he couldn't really see the other party's feelings. "It's a matter of character. He said.
But this time back home, this feeling of "love" is direct and concrete, "For me, love must be nourishing, when you love someone, it's not that you're giving, it's that you gain strength, because you see yourself there, you magnify yourself, or you see what you don't have. This feeling for me is that when I meet those young people, they tell me about their life experiences and feelings, and I really feel moved, infected, inspired, sometimes amazed, their ideas are so interesting. 」
Later, when reading Arendt, he was surprised to find that Arendt also felt love for the world for the first time at about his age. In the past two years, Arendt has had a great influence on Xiang Biao, and it can almost be said that he is an idol. In a 1955 letter to her mentor, Arendt wrote: "I was surprised that I realized so late to love the world. Xiang Biao felt that Arendt's greatest influence on him was this, "Her philosophical thinking was out of love for the world. 」
At the end of 2023, "People" interviewed Xiang Biao twice, chatted for a total of eight hours, and when it came to "feeling love", we all choked up. In an era when love and concern are so scarce, Xiang Biao once again reminds us to see it, and continue to look forward to and give back to it. "In the face of a very unstable and not very good world, you have to be determined and brave to build your neighborhood, and not sacrifice your daily life. Courage is a kind of trust, very specific trust, because it is concrete, to what extent of trust you can observe for yourself, and constantly adjust. But if you don't have that neighborhood, you can't have trust in the world, and your trust in the world comes from your trust in your surroundings, and it has to be. 」
人物PORTRAIT=P
Xiang Biao = X
Love and think
P: 2023 should be your first time returning to China after the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia, the past three years have been turbulent, shaky and uneasy, how do you feel about returning to China this time?
X: I don't know if it sounds too literate, but the word in general is "love".
There are some very specific scenarios. The night before I returned to Germany from Beijing, I stayed at a hotel near the airport. After entering, I found that the windows of the whole room were sealed, completely dark, I was very strange, I ran downstairs to the main desk and asked, the other party said, because of some special reasons, you can't open it.
I asked if there was a room that wasn't sealed, and he said yes, on the other side, I said if I could change it, I could add more money, I couldn't stand the complete black, and he said it was okay. Then a young man came to help me with my luggage, I walked with him, the two of us chatted all the way, he just graduated from vocational high school, studied tourism, Hebei people, came here for internship, he didn't have a special concern for me, just helped me move my luggage over. Later, I met the other waiters in the hallway, and they were all smiling like normal, doing their jobs.
I suddenly had the feeling that I couldn't live in this place, but I loved the people here. I didn't even know the names of the waiters, but I suddenly had an emotional connection with them, and I didn't know how they were going to live here. It's not a natural emotion, like family or friendship, it's not a worry, it's a concern, and I keep thinking about them, and the many young people I met during that time.
P: How would you describe this concern?
X: It's not that I'm looking for a peach blossom source, but it's because of this love and concern that I feel that in the face of oppression, we are not only completely powerless and give up.
My perception of the world is that you have to face a very unstable and not very good world, but you have to be determined and brave to build your own neighborhood, and don't sacrifice the everyday. Courage is a kind of trust, very specific trust, because it is concrete, to what extent of trust you can observe for yourself, and constantly adjust. But if you don't have that neighborhood, you can't have trust in the world, and your trust in the world comes from your trust in your surroundings, and it has to be.
This was inspired by a friend from the "First 500 Meters" workshop, who said, we can't change the world, it's a nonsense, and when people say that, it means they can't change their surroundings. I think this sentence is very profound. It's the other way around, to build trust in the world, it's to build trust in our neighbors, and trust in the world is something that we can't control.
P: I was very touched and surprised. For me, it's hard to describe the feelings of the last three years as "love", but after listening to you, I feel that it exists, because without love, I wouldn't have so many rich feelings.
X: I'm also impressed. The reason why we feel that the existence of violence is so terrible, and why we feel so strongly about the misery of others, is because of love. If there is no feeling of love, there will be no such feeling. Repression and pain can also be understood as the need to love and be loved.
We can't imagine people to be too passive. My understanding of depression is a loss of initiative, but it can also be understood as a defense of principles. For example, people with political depression are more thoughtful, principled, and judgmental, so there is also a force behind depression, which is that I don't want to compromise easily, and I want to defend this little bit of fire, but this power is not nourished now. Depression is the last maintenance of that power, if you don't have this desire, say okay, I will become the same as you, then there is no need to be depressed.
P: Did you feel that much about "love" before?
X: I've always been a person who doesn't have a lot of emotions, it's a personality issue. In the past, when I did surveys in Zhejiang Village and India, I looked at the behavior, strategy, how to calculate, understand, and look at it in detail, but I can't see how that person feels humiliation, feels a kind of secret pleasure, and feels a kind of stimulation and excitement. This is one of my general tendencies.
But when I went back to China this time, I really felt a kind of love, not personal, a kind of love in the political sense, or in the social sense, and I couldn't define it...... Love is a strong trust, and without strong trust, there would be no such love. Love is also a mobilization.
P: It sounds like this feeling of love is also related to the way you think about it.
X: Yes. You see, Plato's definition of love is that love has a strong relationship with the self, and you love someone because you see yourself in that person, or you see what you don't have, and no matter what, you have to see in that person the strength and nourishment that you can get.
So Plato said, love is the other half of me. When I love, I become richer and more whole. He also said that in fact, people are not individuals, we are all half, and love is to find the other half. The meaning behind it is that love is a kind of self-nourishment, self-enrichment, and self-mobilization.
The love I felt this time was a two-way reward, I was nourished in them, and when they saw me, they felt that I had given them a nourishment.
This involves Arendt's understanding of thinking, which, she argues, is solitude. She actually turned Plato's statement upside down, when you are alone/thinking, you divide yourself in two, because thinking is a dialogue between yourself and yourself, and there is an expression in English, I have to live with myself, I must get along with myself. It means that if I want to survive, I can't give up too many principles, and I can't be dishonest all day long. The main reason for the evil of mediocrity is that because he does not think, Aikman does not have the ability to divide himself into two people, and then he and himself are constantly in dialogue. Arendt said that talking to oneself may not be able to give oneself the direction of progress, but it will draw a bottom line for oneself, which is morality. Morality does not mean taking the initiative to do good, but it means that you have a bottom line that you can hold onto.
Therefore, the relationship between thinking and love can also be connected. Thinking is the interaction that divides oneself into two, love is the outside, you go to the other side of yourself, let life be nourished.
P: Compared with the time you returned to China in 2023, has your perception of young people changed compared to the time you returned to China in 2019?
X: Ha, that's an interesting question. Young people have been anxious about the disappearance of the neighborhood and the exhaustion of involution, but it has not yet become a big trend, and after a few years, I feel that young people have been thinking more deeply about these issues. From a simple criticism of the outside world, to a reflection on a way of being. This is not an escape, criticism is external, now it comes to how I respond, not to change myself to adapt to change, but how to resist, where the power of resistance comes from, to this level, to you, me, him, specific individuals, to introduce specific emotions, feelings, action strategies and expectations for the future, the richness of life suddenly returns, becomes the basis of thinking.
P: You've been talking about "feelings", how did this way of thinking about feelings come to be for you?
X: I'm struggling through it too. Reading and writing have always been my shortcomings, when I was studying in China, because I mainly did social research, I didn't have to read so many books, and the things I studied were closer to my feelings, and it was okay to talk about them in the vernacular. When I went abroad, my shortcomings became apparent. I was only forced to learn English at the age of 26, very stylized academic language, what I learned has little to do with my life experience, when you don't understand the author's expression, you will only look at the superficial framework, learning is very painful, although you can also mix and publish, but the feeling is unhappy, it has lasted for many years.
Until 2014, Guo Yujie interviewed me (Note: "Xiang Biao: Chinese are like hummingbirds, vibrating their wings hanging in the air"). Now I don't even know why she wanted to interview me back then, but I was already very quiet at that time, maybe because we were both from Peking University, or because of the research in Zhejiang Village. I didn't expect it to provoke such a big reaction.
When we talked, I talked about the concept of "levitation". Why am I telling it well? Because it happens to be my own situation. During that time, I was learning to write English papers all day long, obviously insensitive to what I wrote, but I still worked hard, gritted my teeth and persevered, thinking that if I learned it, I would be able to transcend it. It's really like a hummingbird, vibrating its wings with a lot of force, pulling itself up, hanging in the air, in order not to let itself fall, dreaming of one day suddenly having a gorgeous turn, and the hummingbird will become a phoenix.
Of course, it also combined with the reality of China at the time, such as the factory system, urban planning, and so on. From the conventional framework, it is very inappropriate to analyze these things together, but in such a historical environment, our feelings are common, and the structural factors behind the analysis of the political economy behind these feelings are also common. And everyone felt rewarded after reading it.
It was very hard at the time, but all of a sudden, people who were not academics gave me positive encouragement, and what I said was in line with my feelings, and I should say that it was the first time I felt that I could think and speak like this.
P: Outside of the interviews, what else has had a big impact on your way of thinking?
X: There's a big jump in the back, which is the public dialogue and communication with young people, you have to communicate with others, it's useless to just talk about feelings, everyone has their own feelings, so you have to have analysis, bring in historical, philosophical, anthropological observations, see what they don't see, so that you can stimulate thinking. In fact, up to now, these expressions of mine have been ignored by the academic community, and my positive feedback has basically come from readers.
I would also like to emphasize that in the process of thinking, you must treat your imaginary audience as thinkers who are as capable of thinking as you are. There's a kind of text in anthropology that gives Madonna praise to the subject of the survey, and I find that boring.
Ordinary people, especially young people, don't need praise, what they need is empowerment, empowerment, you need to give them a new perspective, they need to be stimulated, they need to be mobilized. I also hope that someone else will mobilize me every day. The first thing is to treat the other person as someone who has the same ability to think as you, and if you tell him what you think, he can be transferred. It's such an equal dialogue.
So I'm really special thanks to my readers, who are my food and clothing parents.
P: I suddenly had the feeling that I had entered the live broadcast room, you are the anchor, and the reader is the number one brother.
X: (laughs) That's how I feel, that's what I say. The anchor relies on tipping, and no one gives me a tip, but they give me an existential stimulus. The meaning of existence is to say, I know that I exist in this world, I have an effective relationship with this world, when I output a sincere idea, the world will respond to you, and the world's response can be understood by me, it has content, and it is also sincere.
At the same time, this deep response forced me to think about more questions, which was also a kind of mobilization and a pleasure for me. In this sense, this response allows me to have an effective and continuous interaction with the world, and my vitality is constantly extended, which is an expansion and cultivation of vitality.
Why are they my food and clothing parents? Because they give me the most nutrition in the interaction.
Ordinary people
P: You have been paying attention to the anxiety and frustration of ordinary people, and you have always said that you are an ordinary person. But judging by your experience – becoming famous at a young age, getting a faculty position at a top university, having a large readership...... It's hard to associate you with ordinary people. So I'm curious, how do you understand the identity of "ordinary people"?
X: That's a very deep question. Why deep? It jumps away from the surface and leads to new questions. Ordinary people are not only a research perspective for me, but also a self-declaration, that is, I consciously call myself an ordinary person. This leads to two minor problems. First, I understand the perspective of ordinary people on the basis of what I say, and second, why do I need to make such claims?
What is certain is that ordinary people are a kind of claim, my label and confession of self, what kind of way I want to stand in this world. This claim is somewhat similar to the psychoanalytic fantasy (imagination), which is not necessarily directly related to reality, but defines your behavior in reverse.
As an example, imagine how it affects a person's position. Some time ago, I was very interested in the term "greasy man", and I wondered, when I was young, why there were no greasy men, and when I reached the age of greasy men, how did greasy men become a label and become a designation for young people to men of my generation? My hypothesis is that greasy men and reading obscene novels are psychologically isomorphic, both are a projection, a projection of unfulfilled desires. One is the desire for sex, and the other is the desire for power and dignity. Through such projections, such as through greasy arguments, he feels that he has a relationship with the mainstream power. His self-imagination is fulfilled and further strengthened, and this imagination obviously influences his cognition and behavior.
P: I don't think you're in the category of greasy guys.
X: Haha, I see some of my friends now, and I think they are greasy, but the problem is that they used to be not greasy, and they didn't see so many greasy men when they were young, where did this greasy come from? I feel the responsibility to answer this question, because this is a matter of my generation. The appearance of greasy men is also related to involution to a certain extent. Approaching middle age, the involution will not move, and seeing that you are going to be marginalized in the competition, you will strengthen the imagination that "I am the mainstream, I can represent the center". How do you maintain this imagination? Everywhere we represent the center to teach young people. Now the involution is more serious, and it seems that greasy men are also getting younger. If you're stuck in such an imagination, you're greasy. So it's important to choose what kind of self-imagination you have.
P: So you can say that "ordinary people" is an imagination of yourself?
X: Yes, I have a strong feeling about the idea that ordinary people give me a kind of power, which is a very direct psychological reason.
P: Why do you have a strong sense of this statement?
X: It has something to do with my upbringing in the '80s. When I was a child, I lived with my grandparents, surrounded by dock workers and rickshaw pullers, who were at the bottom of the urban society. The clearest memory in my mind about when I was a child is the calf of an adult, because the person who pulls the cart has a perennial calf and excessive expansion of the aorta, and after the age of forty or fifty, the calf looks like a whole bunch of black and purple grapes, which is very visually shocking, and children are very afraid. I remember when I was a kid we used to say that those people's legs were "grape legs." This image has remained in my heart ever since.
Some of my relatives were laid off ahead of schedule, and they opened small workshops at home, and some drove taxis. My parents were slightly superior and were middle school teachers. When I was a child, my grandfather's house was next door to a secret prostitute, and the other family had very serious domestic violence. Since I was a child, I have heard a lot of stories from them, seen the good and bad in life, strange things, and these ordinary people have given me a lot of interesting nourishment.
Perhaps because of this, when I heard elitist words in high school, I had a sense of distance, coupled with the rebellion of teenagers, "ordinary people" became a symbol of my "rebellion". After I went to Peking University, all I could say at that time was that kind of literati language, this is a holy place or something, I don't feel anything, I listen to it too much and am a little disgusted. Later, I went to "Zhejiang Village" to do research, also because reading books is not my forte, but reading stories there is my forte. Back at school, people have never heard of these things, and it seems that I am more powerful.
What I said was that these are my mental processes, and I haven't systematically organized them, but looking back, I feel that I have seen ordinary people more easily along the way, and ordinary people can also bring me strength.
P: How do you define "ordinary people"?
X: An ordinary person is a positioning, not a descriptive object. For example, criminals are also ordinary people in the descriptive sense, and people who live in dreams all day long are also ordinary people, which is not what I emphasize.
One of the most important characteristics of the common person I am talking about is the relationship between them and systemic power. A person is a person who is controlled by systemic power but is unable to exercise it. He can't jump out of the systemic power, he can only find the cracks in the systemic power, sometimes he has to be cunning, sometimes he has to betray, but he is always controlled by the systemic power. If Mark Twain is quoted, he is a person who can be evaluated by neighbors and colleagues, his existence is very concrete, his feelings come from the specific relationship with specific people, and the "neighborhood" can basically see him clearly.
The feelings, goals, and desires of people who hold systemic power are often unrelated to specific people and specific relationships, for example, Napoleon's neighbors have no way to evaluate Napoleon. Of course, I don't say this to deny the importance of non-ordinary people, it is just my self-positioning as an ordinary person.
P: You mentioned that ordinary people are a kind of self-positioning, and I am very touched. Some time ago, I made a manuscript of "45 years old, the way out of life", interviewed six or seven people, before they have achieved a relatively high position in the workplace, to the 40s, due to various reasons, suddenly no job, can not find a job, after anxiety, everyone will have a change of mentality, they will say, "It turns out that I am not as good as I think I am, I am just an ordinary person." Over the past few years, many people have had this shift in positioning.
X: That's interesting. The meaning of many people's lives does come from the imagination that I am not an ordinary person, and I am beyond ordinary people. For them, the positioning of ordinary people cannot bring nourishment, it is a kind of bondage and fetters. I'm upside down, and I have to rely on ordinary people to show that I'm good.
So for me, a very important task is how to make ordinary people a nourishing position. Don't always feel like you need to surpass yourself, but try to move forward by denying your current self. This is where the meaning of proximity comes in, and you have to actively interact with your present surroundings and make it a motivation and a resource.
P: I'm curious, you live abroad all the year round, and there is a certain distance from the reality at home, why can you still maintain such accuracy?
X: It's actually easier than I thought, social media will still give me a lot of clues and resources, but it's also important to come back and communicate face-to-face, because social media can't be trusted, what phenomenon does a clue represent, how to analyze it, social media is not enough.
Secondly, I think remote communication can also be very deep, in the past, everyone thought that online communication, no one knew anyone, it was impossible to be deep. But if the question is set up in place and sincere as an equal interlocutor from the beginning, everyone is willing to open up. And many times, in the case of anonymity, people are willing to tell their very private things directly.
Third, when it comes to accuracy, it is actually helpful overseas, on the one hand, it is clear to the bystander, a little detached, and able to understand it more comprehensively, and the other is related to feelings, if you are in the involution, anxiety, it is often a shrouded or even crushing state, and it is difficult for people to have the energy to think about this matter again. Therefore, you need another kind of emotional space, so that your life is somewhat isolated from these, not because the distance produces precision, but because after isolation, you have another kind of nourishment, so that you have the energy and energy to face all these things that are not easy to face.
Why so many thinkers in the twentieth century were exiles, and the place where the ideas took place was far away from the places to which the ideas were directed. Interestingly, when these people came back, like Adorno, they were caught up in the Red Storm of '68, and he was in a state of aphasia at that time.
Where is the world going?
P: It's been 3 years since you proposed "involution", and you just mentioned that you have observed changes in young people when you returned to China this time, what are your new observations on the issue of involution?
X: On the whole, there may not be a particularly clear change, but individuals are becoming more and more conflicted about their subjective feelings about "involution". There are fewer and fewer people who think that "involution" is still reasonable, and they feel more and more deeply about the fatigue and meaninglessness brought about by involution. So a contradiction now is that everyone may roll a little slower, but the degree of tiredness and meaninglessness may be increasing. So for me, it's a very important issue, and it's also related to the political economy that drives people, which is how people persuade themselves, how they maintain the daily consumption of labor.
Another question is, what about the current group of young people who are not working, how many of them are, and what is the state of existence? From the perspective of vitality, so much vitality is there, it will not be simply consumed, people are not an object, and in the process of vitality consumption, there will be various social consequences.
Generally speaking, our involution was very integrated, but now it is slowly differentiating, and the number of people who are forced to quit is increasing, but we don't know where they will go.
P: Another question about "nearby". In the beginning, I felt that it brought some vivid imagination and action, but in recent years, people will also wonder how to deal with contradictions, conflicts and differences between people in an increasingly divided environment.
X: Let me give you an example of what "nearby" means to me. Since the attack of Hamas on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent response of Israel, the new round of Palestinian-Israeli conflict has caused a huge rift in European society. Especially in Germany, which generally does not criticize Israel because of its historical guilt for the massacre, this is also the case this time. But the German people have a different idea, and the conflict is very large.
The people in our institute come from all over the world, and there are very strong opinions on the part of the group, and as the director, I need to make decisions on some things. For example, whether this meeting should be held, whether this person should be invited, and whether a colleague's remarks should be reminded. So what criteria did you use to make this decision?
On the one hand, this matter is indeed too complicated, and no one can come up with a correct conclusion, and at the same time, everyone's emotions are very engaged, and simply shelving and diluting the mud will not have a good effect. My final solution was "nearby". I transform distant geopolitical and moral issues into "nearby" communication issues. Instead of arguing about who is right and who is wrong, be open to why everyone feels and understands the way they do. After listening to the feelings of others, each person does not absolutize his or her own point of view, and then the focus of the conversation is no longer on who is right and who is wrong, but on how we can protect such an environment for continued communication, and according to this principle, we decide which transactional issues are ahead. Of course, this is not to say that all the problems have been solved, but at least the focus is different, and this is an inspiration from "Nearby".
P: In addition to ideological conflicts, how should we deal with conflicts and differences in daily life? For example, conflicts in family relationships, "severance" has become a popular word in recent years.
X: This is the most important point of "neighborhood", which is not about creating a fandom, but about how you deal with a neighbor who can't move away. On the one hand, you can't moralize and ideologize differences. Again, it is not possible to generalize different perspectives and consciousnesses. Many opinions are just a small part of the life of ordinary people, because he is more emotional for a while, and sometimes his expression is more extreme. But you can't be taken away by him because of his extreme expression, and make yourself extreme.
The proximity itself is a set of relationships. For example, the neighbor relationship may seem boring, but you have to take that relationship more seriously. Another example is the parent-child relationship, which cannot be easily severed just because there are some differences of opinion. A lot of people will say that I can't choose paternity, so I should have the right to give it up. Severing ties is to defend one's own principles, which sounds noble, but human society does not progress by this. Now there are many crises in the world that say I don't like it, I'll bomb, I don't like it, you are my enemy. Of course, when it comes to crime, for example, or domestic violence, that's another issue.
So at the end of the day, it's not about asking you to dissolve the unpleasantness itself, but about putting the unpleasantness and conflict into the relationship, relativizing it, and seeing how the difference came about. Of course, you still have your own principles and don't compromise easily, and at the same time you feel that it is also your responsibility to maintain the relationship.
P: Whether it is "involution" or "establishment nearby", the problem behind it may be the same, that is, young people's dissatisfaction with the general environment and internal depression, what do you think of this problem?
X: I've been thinking about several issues lately, one of which is the disappearance of arrogance and admiration. In October 2023, when I was doing research in China, I found that there is less and less arrogance and arrogance in our Chinese society. A teacher at a key middle school told me that ten years ago, teachers at their school would not have called students to the office to memorize texts, and if they couldn't memorize them, they would be punished for writing them five, ten, or even fifty times. But ten years later, every teacher is doing this, and there is no longer a price drop, and there is no such high price. My middle school teacher also told me that the "master" teachers in the school used to teach so well that they could argue with the principal, but now there are basically no more.
A similar finding was made during this revisit to Zhejiang Village. In the past, there was a kind of "fame" there, for example, Liu Zebo, who I wrote about in the book, he was one of the first "Zhejiang Village" people to come to Beijing, he was in the clothing wholesale business, he had a good eye, but he behaved a little strangely, he never invited people to dinner, and he didn't allow others to smoke in front of him, which was very strange at the time, but he said, I am like this. He has this arrogance.
In the new generation of "Zhejiang Village" people, this arrogance is basically gone, and now everyone is pursuing "decency", decency is not about how your own behavior is, so that everyone admires, but what kind of identity you have, what kind of status, what kind of lifestyle, in fact, it means how close you are to the mainstream system.
One thing related to arrogance is "admiration". In the past few years, there have been more and more awards, and in the circle of friends, whoever wins the award is neatly lined up with a bunch of flowers, thumbs, and applause, but how many people are really "admired"? I want to know, why are there so many awards, but no one admires them, what does this award mean? Why do you have so many awards? Why do others not admire you, but you still have to fight for it, and so on.
P: "Arrogance" and "admiration" are very new, why do you think like this?
X: The fulcrum is how I feel about life. Something that makes me feel a little awkward or strange, I'll just go and see it. In this respect, my way of thinking is no different from that of a 3-year-old (laughs).
For example, the disappearance of arrogance and admiration, I was first interested in this issue because I found that after talking to those arrogant people, my vitality grew. What they talk about is very interesting, they will naturally talk about a lot of details, and the details and details can be threaded together, and there is logic. The criticism behind arrogance is also very energetic and confident.
This is not the same as many young people's dissatisfaction with the status quo, some of which are of course critical, but without vitality, they often make themselves miserable and weak. People who pursue decency do not have this kind of vitality, or even a state of paralysis, and rely on the energy of others to maintain themselves.
This feeling is more important to me, and I am now pondering the political economy of the driving force, which in the vernacular, is the political economy of "spirit". We know that in political economy, labor is very important, but labor is a way of being, and there must be will and hope behind it, these are all spiritual questions, such as where are you willing to invest your experience, time, love, and so on. They are also the most important resource in human society.
P: Because of the concepts of "involution" and "nearby", you have been very "popular" in recent years, and young people will say "ask Xiang Biao when you are in trouble", how do you understand this? In an image similar to "life coach", do you worry that you can't provide better things?
X: Am I afraid that I won't be able to provide more things? Yes, this fear mainly comes from a sense of responsibility, on the one hand, I have a lot of conditions that people don't have, such as time, environment, etc., and I haven't suffered a lot, which is very difficult, so I have the responsibility to do this well. On the other hand, this is my job, and I want to ensure the quality of my work, which is common sense and a reminder of myself.
Another layer is, will I be afraid that I will not do well, my reputation will be ruined, or my personality will collapse? Why? I feel very fortunate to exist, and I see my relationship with the world through this luck. As mentioned earlier, dialogue is my way of being, and now I have a very interesting coexistence with the world, which is not my design, nor the result of my efforts, but my luck as an individual.
This kind of luck is not agnostic, it has the logic of history in it, it is history that has come to this juncture, the public has such a need, and I have been pushed to this position for various reasons. For me personally, it's accidental, but not entirely accidental from a historical point of view. So this luck is not a pie in the sky, I will panic, afraid of losing, but a more solid luck, I feel more cherished, and I am very grateful.
So if one day young people think that I can't speak well and don't want to listen, will I be disappointed? No, no. Because this is my state of existence, if young people think that I can't speak well, it is a stimulus for me, indicating that I am starting to fall behind, and it is the motivation for me to continue to grow. There is also a situation that at a certain stage, everyone really no longer needs my ideas, and there are others who provide more suitable ideas, and I am going to withdraw from the stage of history, and this day will come sooner or later. I'm also confident because I've been a part of someone else's life. At that time, I became the king next door, smiling at the window and watching the children who continued to play below.
P: When you were invited to do this interview, you also said that you felt like you were talking too much. In your opinion, where is the line between "dialogue" and "talking too much"?
X: Fear of "talking too much" means fear of repetition, and there is no shock. Originally, I thought that repetition would weaken the effect. Like Nietzsche and Arendt we mentioned earlier, their way of thinking is concentrating, seeing a cloud, there is light in it, there is a problem, they will chase it, condense a lot of energy, put it in the hands of the reader, let the reader create again. This is one of my aesthetic trends.
Recently, I had a discussion with some friends, and they thought that this was a big misjudgment of me. In their opinion, my strength is not cohesion, but the feeling of being more moisturizing and silent, slowly immersing people. I've always felt that this is not what I am pursuing, but they feel that too much condensation has no effect, because the reader can't understand what you want to say at once, it is better to open yourself, talk more, talk more carefully, and not be afraid of repetition, because the communication itself has a strong scene, let people know where your ideas come from and where they are pointing, and the effect may be better. I think everyone's feedback on me is very interesting, and I will continue to think about it.
P: What do you mean by saying "history has pushed you to this position"?
X: My view of history is not temporal, it's spatial, and this is more influenced by Benjamin, who believes that history is to jump into, break into, break into history. How do you break in? It has to be in the moment, it has to be in the moment. In Benjamin's understanding, the "moment" is the most important point in history. Therefore, when I say that my luck is caused by history, it is not that one thing after another has happened and pushed me here step by step, but that all kinds of things are constantly happening at the same time and superimposed, forming such a multi-dimensional "moment" in space, and there is a thunder in this moment, and for various reasons, the person who is stepping on this moment is me.
In the 80s, there was an original poetry magazine in the "cultural fever", called "Today", I have read the information, at that time, Feng Yidai suggested to Beidao, English translation is The Moment, "this moment", which is very interesting, "today" is a unit of measurement, a calendar concept, but when we say "this moment", it is a mobilizing concept, a vigilant concept, which means that you have to open your eyes and look around you, what is going on at the "moment".
There are many specific factors that have caused us at this moment, such as the improvement of education level, since the expansion of Chinese universities in 1999, everyone's knowledge level, contact area, thinking ability and desire to think have been greatly improved; material development, the one-child policy, etc., young people's pursuit of a sense of meaning is no longer only about the improvement of living standards, but also includes the question of the meaning of life. Another example is the development of social media, which has changed the way of communication, and the desire for communication during the epidemic, the shift from offline to online activities, has formed a new habit of reading and engaging with information. Personally, from the perspective of the ordinary people we just mentioned, I am more willing to engage in the nourishment I have received in the course of the dialogue over the past few years.
When all these factors come together in space into this moment, it is like opening a gap, and an important way for me to relate to the world is these gaps, how I get in. Of course, this moment will change, it will pass, but I don't have a strong desire to look back at this moment ten years ago, whether there is a line between this moment five years ago and now, for me, this is not important, what matters is this moment.
P: What about "history"?
X: History is important, but history is important because it helps us understand the moment, helps us get into the moment. If we say that we should live in order to continue history and protect history, then I do not agree.
As an example, my recent article called "Sexual Violence in Logistics" starts with the idea of why there is so much trauma in Shanghai in 2022, even worse than the trauma in Wuhan? By the time of the epidemic control in Shanghai, there were already two years of experience, why did it still cause so much trauma?
My way of explaining it is historical. I don't think we can understand this from a policy perspective, because there is no fundamental difference between the situation in Wuhan and Shanghai in terms of policy intent, political form, and administrative approach.
What is the problem? Starting from the history of the 80s, I put forward a point of view: There is a line in the development of China's history that logistical power has become logistical violence. The English word for power is power, power, which is both a civil power and a state power. In the 80s, the logistics power included not only the power formed by the private sector due to the relatively free flow of people and goods, such as the flow of migrant workers, but also the public power of the national government, such as investment in the logistics industry, and the construction and control of public infrastructure.
In the beginning, this kind of logistics power was a bit of a win-win situation, and the power of both the private sector and the government increased, but after 2010, with the change of technical conditions and policy changes, the logistics power of the private sector slowly weakened. Although the flow we see is still very high-speed, this flow is increasingly managed by intermediaries such as platforms, so it is equivalent to a state of "being flowed".
The most typical is "Zhejiang Village". Now, "Zhejiang Village" basically does not exist, and the original houses have basically been replaced by these takeaways and express delivery. These are two very interesting flows, the flow of Zhejiang Village is autonomous, and the takeaway is flowed, which is a mobility tool.
So, why is the trauma in Shanghai more serious than in Wuhan? It's because when I was in Wuhan, the logistics control was not so in place, and everyone could come out on their own, and there were ferrymen, such as drivers, who came out to help deliver medicine; when they arrived in Shanghai, not only individuals, but also logistics platforms were not allowed to move, so it became a mobile violence. In this historical analysis, I want to talk about what it means to be mobile at the moment, and whether the current social construction can be developed through more mobility, I think it can't, and the positive significance of mobility itself is declining, so we have to consider the neighborhood and so on.
P: How do you judge the future?
X: A lot of people will ask me, what do you think about the big picture, do you want to define the Chinese government? Of course I can define that, but I've always felt that if I can't do something interesting and label it, I don't know what it will do for everyone. Also, after the label, I put myself in a corner, because if you use this kind of word to call TA, you will not pay much attention to the complexity behind it, and it will cause problems for the voice, which I think will be a more negative move.
My main consideration is ideologically, and I don't think it has much value. I was very concerned about the Russian-Ukrainian war before, and to a large extent, I also cut in at the moment to see the relationship between Ukraine and the Soviet Union in history, Lenin's views, the collapse of the Soviet Union, etc., but I don't see history as a torrent, there is an inevitability, or there are bad people blocking history, so what will be done next. For me, the most important meaning of history is to explain the present moment.
Of course, big historical judgments have inspired me, such as Fukuyama's theory of the "end of history", and I think he raised a very important question, when the Cold War ended, the contradictions between the two ideologies that originally organized the world were no longer important, how should the world be organized?
The most important inspiration for me is that these new contradictions, such as the fundamentalist basis of identity, the contradiction of direct competition for resources, have to do with the disappearance of ideals of how the human world should be organized after the end of the Cold War. I don't have the ability to make some of these judgments, but they are very important.
P: In the past few years, the position of intellectuals in China's public opinion has been declining, but people are also urgently seeking new ideological resources, how do you understand the disappearance of "public intellectuals"?
X: I don't have a particular personal understanding of these issues because I don't have much interest in public intellectuals in the first place. But looking at the longer period of history, I don't think the disappearance of public intellectuals may be a change.
I remember about a decade ago, there was a discussion about the stigma of public knowledge, which actually showed that the public cares about public intellectuals. If he annoys you, it means that he is listening to you, but he is not angry after listening. In Britain and the United States, as in the United Kingdom, there will be no intellectual stigmatization, because the role of public intellectuals is relatively weak, and at most they write some opinion articles for the Guardian. The European continent has a relatively traditional tradition of public intellectuals, while China is closer to France in terms of ideological style, so in this sense, China will have a period of relatively active public intellectuals in the cultural and ideological circles.
And the stigma was not unreasonable at that time, and now there is still such a problem in social science research, always treating the masses as the object of transformation, and young people going to yoga is neoliberal self-love, and going to psychological counseling is individualism or something. None of these claims are accurate, and neither yoga nor neoliberalism is well understood.
I'm still relatively optimistic about public communication, which may have something to do with my personal experience. Of course, we see that there is a strong tear in it, and the views begin to be extreme. The views on both sides are extreme, simplistic, and in the end there is no real communication, and these are the problems. But I think people's desire for meaning, the desire to think, and the ability to think objectively are getting stronger and stronger, which is the most important foundation of public communication, so I am quite optimistic.
P: In the past few years, both academics and cultural fields have been paying attention to the experiences of ordinary people and individuals. But I also wonder if we don't have a big narrative, a big history, and an outline, will we lose the possibility of a general direction? And when the public's vision is occupied by personal experience and the endless present, can we still imagine a broader future?
X: I'm a little bit of the other way around, I think that when you really lose your direction, it's often when the big narrative prevails. There are two reasons for this, one is that when there is no sense of direction, everyone needs a big narrative. Second, the big narrative itself is easily empty, and no one can predict history. The big narrative will obscure many contradictions and difficulties in the facts, because the direction in the discourse is very different from the sense of direction in the life of the individual.
An individual narrative does not necessarily give you a sense of direction, but a real sense of direction can only be gained from such a micro-narrative. As we said earlier, what does it mean to not be able to change the world, in fact, it is more about not being able to change your life and the situation around you, if you can change these, you will feel that you can change the world, and you have a sense of direction.
In the process of growing up, many people said that Lu Xun's "The True Story of Ah Q" and "The Ugly Chinese" are very similar, both about the inferiority of the people, but I think their essence is different - "The Ugly Chinese" It can be said that it is a grand narrative, with a lot of judgment in it; Lu Xun writes about a very personal experience, he is looking for the vitality of Ah Q, which is purely individual, all kinds of illusions, all kinds of disillusionment, which can give you a sense of direction, it is not necessarily about how history will go, but how we should preserve our strength, how to face the darkness of the sense of direction.
So, I don't have that worry at all. I think what really gives us a sense of direction is to see the surging of vitality, otherwise it is easy to fall into abstract judgments of good and bad, and the feeling of breaking into concrete history will not be able to get out.
Age and time
P: In 2023, you will be 51 years old, does this age make you feel something different about life?
X: I don't have age anxiety because I think age anxiety has to do with how your life and work are programmed, and it's a response to the way you are choreographed, such as how old you are and how old you are that you haven't been married. If the arrangement is more relaxed, I don't have this awareness.
My feelings about age are more physical. For example, at this age, I will wear reading glasses. In winter, when I ride a bicycle in Germany, reading glasses are particularly inconvenient, and halfway through cycling, like looking at Google Maps, I have to stop, take off my gloves, take out my phone, and look for glasses.
Secondly, at my age, I will have a kind of inadvertent hesitation about many things, I told friends of the same age, they also have this feeling, that is, they will feel that they are weaker and more vulnerable, because the body is not as good as before, they will hesitate to do things, think more, it is the kind of unnecessary to think more.
P: How?
X: It's all very small things, for example, before you go out, you think about how to take a few extra steps, how you should go, whether there will be any accidents, and there are more unwarranted worries. But in general, apart from the physiological changes, I am relatively insensitive to the number of age. My biggest feeling now is that I'm really lucky to have the pleasure of self-discovery constantly, and how can I understand these things at such an old age.
P: Aside from physical feelings, are there any things that have become more important to you at this age?
X: I think authenticity, or feelings, has become more important. To be honest, if I'm not lucky, I'm going to have to continue performing, academic work, and at this age, it's really, really tiring because I'm going to grit my teeth and do that. Now I'm lucky enough to be able to do what I like more authentically, so I have a deeper appreciation for the value of authenticity. Even though I wasn't in good health, I was still able to do more happily and feel more like a teenager. If it weren't for this authenticity, I would definitely not have this kind of teenager feeling.
P: After listening to it, I also think that Mr. Xiang Biao is still very juvenile. Of course, it's not a juvenile feeling in the sense of "a man is a teenager until he dies".
X: I'm very happy every time I hear such comments. You say, what do you mean that a man is a teenager until he dies?
P: It's ironic to describe that men never grow up, are very naïve, and are immature. (laughs)
X: But it's not abominable, isn't it? immature, there's still a sense of cuteness.
P: Haha, so to speak. Speaking of which, I am reminded of an interview in which you said, "Look at the place I came to (Max Plank), not by success or failure, by hero, by ambition." Is this also a new insight at this stage of life?
X: At the time, it was mostly about job changes, I had just come to Max Planck at the time, and at this age, it was unlikely that there would be any more changes, and this was probably my last major job.
Ambition can also be understood as a kind of authenticity, that is, I no longer think about which goal to pursue, how to make that thing, I mean to start from "the moment", what I want to do at the moment, I don't know how far I will achieve in the end, but at the moment I think it is the most concerned and urgent issue for everyone, I will enter first, that is, I don't think about success or failure.
To break into a history, it can also be said to be a rather arrogant statement, how do I know that I have grasped a more important clue? That is, no matter what, I have this ambition, even if I can't do it in the end.
P: In addition to being a scholar, you are also a father, husband and son, and at this stage of your life, do you have any new feelings about these identities?
X: As a son, I'm more patient than before, and as I get older, I just become more patient and listen to my parents.
As a husband, I am still in the process of learning how to better understand the other person, especially the more subtle parts, such as her feelings. But overall, there wasn't much drama between us, my lover is a particularly direct person, very secure with the world and willing to share her own happiness to the fullest. If someone lied to her, her first reaction was to be amused: how could such a person lie instead of being angry, she couldn't quite understand the twists and turns. In terms of psychological structure, I am much more complex than her, so usually she interprets me, and I don't need to interpret her.
As a father, I don't feel much about this, maybe mother and daughter will be more sensitive, some things are told to me by my lover, especially some romantic emotional things, she will tell her mother, and then her mother will relay it to me.
P: The words "romantic emotion" give you a sense of your old-school side.
X: (laughs) My daughter is 12 years old, and she talks about dating, not the kind of formal dates. In addition, in Germany, there is basically no homework so far, and I am also a little worried, I want her to write more, and often chase her, because I think it is still very important to write, otherwise the lines of her thinking will not be able to lengthen, but she just refused, saying that she had already written in school and did not need to write anymore. I'm more old-fashioned in this regard, but I'm also relatively weak, and if I don't listen to me, I'll keep nagging, you have to write essays, write essays.
P: Going back to the topic we talked about before, you mentioned that when you return to China in 2023, the biggest feeling is love. At this age, is this also a new kind of self-discovery?
X: Yes, the words "I feel loved" have been important to me all my life.
Like we said before, this kind of love is a very specific, direct feeling that cannot be analyzed, but I can describe it. For me, love must be nourishing, and when you love someone, it's not that you're giving, it's that you're empowering, because you're seeing yourself there, you're magnifying yourself, or you're seeing what you don't have. This feeling for me is that when I meet those young people, they tell me about their life experiences and feelings, and I really feel moved, infected, inspired, sometimes amazed, their ideas are so interesting.
In the future, I may not remember what I felt when I returned home in October 2023, I may forget about this time, but I will definitely remember very clearly what they said, the expressions on their faces, that was the moment when I felt "love", and I will always remember it.
After talking to you last time, I also looked up Arendt's doctoral dissertation. I knew Arendt, but I didn't have that kind of spiritual touch, but in the past two years, she has suddenly become my idol. Her most important inspiration to me is to love the world, no matter how bad it is. Her philosophical reflections are motivated by love for the world. She wrote a letter to her doctoral supervisor in 1955, and she said, "I was surprised that I realized so late to love the world." When I read this paragraph, I was also surprised, because Arendt was 49 years old when she wrote this letter, and I was about the same age at which I felt love for the world.
Some people may think that my feelings about love are self-inflicted, but this is what I feel, and I can no longer persuade myself to deny it, even if this love will disappear for some reason, it doesn't matter, because it once existed, and existence is everything. It's not because you can't define it clearly and show it stably doesn't exist. For me, the indefinability of love is absolute.
P: One last question. I recently finished reading Bowman's last interview before his death, "Turning the Familiar into the Strange." The interviewer concludes by asking him, "What do you think is a good society?" and he replied, "I don't believe in such a thing as a good society anymore." A good society will be one that will say to itself: we are not good enough. What is the good society you want?
X: My wish at this moment is that we can all move towards a society where everyone feels that their vitality is being nourished, that their vitality is being amplified, and that they can also give a sense of nourishment to others.