Tag Archives: humor

A village with only one restaurant

Below is a translation of a joke that is currently being circulated widely on Sina Weibo and other Chinese social networks: There is a village that only has one restaurant. Everyone in the village has to eat at that restaurant. Villager: Why can’t … Continue reading

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We survived a day in China

Notes about social criticism and black humor on the Chinese Internet, by Victor H. Mair, Professor of Chinese Language and Literature at the University of Pennsylvania.  We survived! Here is a translation of the cartoon at left that has been … Continue reading

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The Lius I admire

Liu is an idol to many.

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Green Dam Girl

The latest onslaught on a government policy that everyone from nationalist Chinese netizens to foreign journalists derides as absurd.

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Humorists of the world, unite!

Sun Rui edits a new humor magazine.

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The text message as satire

Satirical mobile phone text messages.

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Old fables retold: The Tortoise and the Hare

The story of The Tortoise and the Hare (龟兔赛跑) told from a Chinese bureaucratic perspective.

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Lin Changzhi: Back with more Q goodness

Author and humorist Lin Changzhi, author of Q Reader (Q版文学), has a new book – Friends (6人行) – and a blog on Sina.

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Stifled Laughter: How the Communist Party Killed Chinese Humor

The Chinese government has systematically stifled crosstalk by bowdlerizing its tradition, restricting its natural growth and evolution, and reducing the form to a sycophantic, unsatisfying — and unfunny — shadow of its former self.

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David Moser on Mao impersonators

I first became aware of this phenomenon in 1992 when I turned on a Beijing TV variety show and was jolted by the sight of “Mao Zedong” and “Zhou Enlai” playing a game of ping pong. They both gave short, rousing speeches, and then were reverently interviewed by the emcee, who thanked them profusely for taking time off from their governmental duties to appear on the show.

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