工读生

Followed by a talk with Biao Xiang. 

Filmed with extraordinary access at reform schools in Beijing, it was produced for state television but never aired and has never been unseen publicly until now. Rather than framing the students as problems in need of discipline and correction, the filmmakers show how China’s youth have borne the brunt of the damage caused by the Mao era and postsocialist society.

Xiang Biao（项飙) is a Chinese anthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, known for his work on migration, mobility, and social change in contemporary China. Through long-term fieldwork and public engagement, he examines how large political and economic systems shape everyday life, aspiration, and uncertainty.