Wood, Michael

Summary: Michael Wood has travelled the length and breadth of China, the world's oldest civilization and longest lasting state, to tell a thrilling story of intense drama, fabulous creativity, and deep humanity that stretches back thousands of years. After a century and a half of foreign invasion, civil war, and revolution, China has once again returned to center stage as a global superpower and the...

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Publisher / Publication Date: St Martin's Press 2020

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Summary: After the Chinese Nationalist Government fled to Taiwan, Soong Mei-ling remained in the public eye as the distant and mysterious "Madame Chiang." She continued the role she had played during her years in mainland China, remaining prominent in foreign affairs and devoted to her work with women and charitable causes. This program examines the second half of Madame Chiang's life: her...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Born into a prominent family in China, Soong Mei-ling was nonetheless thoroughly Western in thought and philosophy, having studied in America-one of the first Chinese women to do so. After marrying Chiang Kai-shek, the couple led a China embroiled in years of war and political intrigue. During World War II, she became the first Chinese national ever to address a joint session of the U.S....

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Part one of the series China: Through Mao's Eyes describes Mao Zedong's youth, his formative adulthood, and his consolidation of power. Archival photographs from Mao's childhood and education, film clips from his campaigns against foreign invaders and Chinese nationalists, and lavish, government-produced reconstructions of the Long March detail the drama of those decades. Film excerpts...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Part three of the series China: Through Mao's Eyes examines the origins of the Cultural Revolution, Mao's orchestration of it, the political and economic shockwaves it created, and its human cost. Rarely seen archival footage of young Red Guard operatives raiding and ransacking a home-combined with present-day interviews featuring former Red Guards and their victims-create an in-depth portrayal...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: This program enters the world of Beijing opera through the traditional art of mask-making-and through the eyes of 76-year-old Xiang Qi Shang, a celebrated mask maker who has devoted his life to preserving a custom that may yet be lost in China's rush to modernization. Master Xiang demonstrates his remarkable brushwork as he comments on a range of topics, including the use of facial expression...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: As China continues to experiment with Western-style economics, many city dwellers already enjoy the prerogatives of a market economy. But how will China feed itself as more and more farmers flee their land for the allure of urban living? This program seeks to understand the effects of economic reform on Chinese society, from the villages to the cities. Will cultural values and the traditional...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Although they may not look exactly like their counterparts in China, North America's Chinese Buddhist temples are closely linked to them through symbolism and traditions that go back more than 1,500 years. This video looks at structural symmetry, north/south building orientation, and interior layout; architectural elements like pagodas, columns, and courtyards; the lotus flower as a design...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: This program focuses on the Land Formations and Flying Stars Schools of classical feng shui, demonstrating the ancient Chinese geomantic practice of living harmoniously with the environment as it is applied in Hong Kong and elsewhere. World-renowned teacher Grandmaster Yap Cheng Hai and several feng shui consultants provide a detailed overview of Taoism, chi, yin and yang, the five symbolic...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: A night out in Beijing-whether it's an ordinary, relaxing evening or the high point of holiday festivities-is certain to involve a lot of conversation. This program helps beginning Chinese speakers with the right phrases and vocabulary for buying tickets, finding out what time an event starts, discussing favorite pastimes, and much more. Cultural topics include: the booming nightlife of the...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2004

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Summary: After illustrating how a combination of laws, customs, and Confucian philosophy had reduced Chinese women to chattels, this program examines in detail the turning points from the late-19th through mid-20th centuries that paved the way for a complete reversal in Chinese women's status. Remarkable vintage film and fascinating interviews with women whose lives have spanned the 20th century provide...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005

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Summary: As Beijing prepares for the 2008 Olympics, most of the hutong-the city's small traditional dwellings and the network of lanes and alleys formed by them-are being demolished to make room for skyscrapers. This program explores social and cultural changes in historical Beijing, as seen in the life of a few ordinary citizens who still live in the hutong. The program includes computer models of the...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Using multilingual Hong Kong as a case in point, this program makes the hot-button phenomenon known as language-mixing easily accessible to any viewer through interviews with dozens of Hong Kong residents. Their explanations of why and when they mix Cantonese and English reveal much about cultural identity in cosmopolitan populations and the effects of globalization. Scholarly analysis is...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Over the course of six weeks in 1937-38, Imperial Japanese forces massacred hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians and prisoners of war as the Empire of the Rising Sun turned China's capital, Nanking, into a veritable Hell on Earth. This program seeks both to expose and to understand that shocking outrage against humanity through the testimonies of the last surviving Japanese veterans and...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008

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Summary: Just as being able to ask for directions is a key skill when visiting China, so is the know-how needed to pay the right fare and obtain the right ticket when using the country's public transportation. This program demonstrates how to use Chinese words and phrases to get around by taxi, bus, and train. Cultural topics include: a trip to the Great Wall, with rich historical background on its...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2004

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Summary: Within two years of the Cultural Revolution, armed factions battled each other in Mao's name. To avoid civil war, Mao essentially banished his zealots to the countryside. This program chronicles the Cultural Revolution, its disastrous aftermath, and the role of Mao's wife, Jiang Qing. Scholars, diplomats, and survivors discuss the forced labor camps known as "Schools of May 7th"; the attacks on...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005

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Summary: Will the 21st century be the Chinese century? Economics correspondent Paul Solman examines the rise of China as a global economic power—and the challenges that lie before it—in this timely collection of NewsHour reports. The episodes are…* China’s Growing Economy: This segment spotlights the freewheeling Chinese economy—and its growing pains. * The Chinese Consumer: This segment seeks to...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: China may be the world's next superpower, but its wild economic growth doesn't tell the whole story. This program reveals the widening gap between Chinese urban and rural lifestyles and the escalating pressure for government action to increase educational and career opportunities in remote areas. Interviews with city dwellers whose affluence surprises even them-and with villagers struggling for...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: On October 1, 1949, the People's Republic of China came into being following the victory of Mao Tse-tung's forces over the Kuomintang, which fled to the island of Taiwan. Thus the Communists completed a revolution begun by the idealistic Sun Yat-sen in the early 1920s. This program documents how Sun's idealism came under Bolshevik guidance; the roles of the young Chiang Kai-shek and Mao; the...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Part four of the series China: Through Mao's Eyes details the watershed Nixon-Mao diplomacy, Mao's death and its aftermath, and the legacy of his rule and philosophy. Scenes showing an aged and infirm Mao meeting with foreign emissaries and CPC assemblies reveal his determination to shape policy and preserve his imposing image as long as possible. Today's citizens who look back nostalgically on...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: Perennially popular in China, paper-cutting is treasured for its ability to transform ordinary paper into intricately patterned, brilliantly colored works of art. This program, filmed in Hubei Province, charts the evolution of Chinese paper-cutting from traditional cutouts representing luck and health to modern visual art as it illustrates the designing, cutting, and coloring processes. Tsuwoo...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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Summary: In China, where approximately 80 percent of the population is rural, the impact of democratic village elections could reshape the future of the nation. Although some Chinese are skeptical, many believe that establishing democracy at the local level will pave the way for a democratic national government. This program focuses on the efforts of The Carter Center to support China's initiative by...

Format: software, multimedia

Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006

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