This video consists of eight separate segments, each on a different aspect of Chinese life and lasting from two to three minutes each. The video was made during a trip to China in 1997 by a group of American middle school students who were involved in developing the stories and doing the on-camera narration.
The segments cover Clothes, Spare Time (leisure activities), Food, the Forbidden City, School, Transportation, Buying Stuff, and Jobs. Overall, they do a nice job in covering each of the topics in a short time. For example in the segment on Spare Time, they show a number of activities from adults playing chess and card games to different sports (all ages) and several kinds of popular entertainment. The viewer is left with an appreciation of the wide range of leisure activities available to the Chinese. The segment which offers the least information is the one on the Forbidden City. The narrative is somewhat disconnected, giving the impression that there was no clear idea of what the producers wanted to get across to the audience. While the major focus of these video segments is on young people, the adult world is included as well. Also, wherever possible they have included short interviews (one or two questions) with Chinese.
I do have one or two minor quibbles. Several of the segments were shot in Chengde and some of the student narrators mispronounced the city's name. I also think that the statement that (urban) Chinese adults do not wear highly-colored clothes is overstated. While this might be the norm in northern China and with older Chinese in many parts of urban China, it is less the case further south, especially Shanghai, and with young adults. All in all, this should be a welcome and very useful video for use in the precollegiate classroom, although its appeal would be greatest to students in the middle range of the suggested grade levels (grades 4-12).
