Synopsis of Research in Shanghai: January 15 - March 1
“Jiqiren/robots” as a techno-scientific solution has become a keyword for the Chinese government, scientists, robotics entrepreneurs, elderly Chinese, and their families concerned with China’s aging issue and care crisis. Shuting Li’s research project aims to examine the entanglement of aging, care, family reconfiguration, and modernization in the development of robotic technology in post-reform China. As one of the four municipalities, Shanghai represents the diversity of social and cultural lives in contemporary China. The myriad of elders living in Shanghai will provide Li with a point to observe tensions between the traditional and the modern, between the urban and the countryside. Shanghai has become one of the pilot cities for the implementation of new eldercare policies and for the testing of the innovative technology used to satisfy the needs of the increasing population of elders.