Surviving re-education in China’s Cultural Revolution
In 1968, Jingyu Li and her parents were among thousands sent to labour camps during Mao Zedong’s cultural revolution. The communist regime said they needed to be 're-educated'.
In 1968, Jingyu Li and her parents were among hundreds of thousands of Chinese people sent to labour camps during Mao Zedong’s so-called cultural revolution.
The aim was to re-educate those not thought to be committed to Chairman’s Mao drive to preserve and purify communism in China.
Jingyu’s parents – both college professors - were put to work among the rice and cattle fields, and made to study the works of Chairman Mao. Fearful for their daughter’s safety, they disguised six-year-old Jingyu as a boy.
Over the next six years, the family were sent to four different camps. Not everyone could cope, as Jingyu tells Jane Wilkinson.
(Photo: Reading Mao's little red book in 1968. Credit: Pictures from History/Getty Images)
Last on
Broadcasts
- Tue 19 Mar 2024 08:50GMTÂ鶹ԼÅÄ World Service
- Tue 19 Mar 2024 12:50GMTÂ鶹ԼÅÄ World Service
- Tue 19 Mar 2024 18:50GMTÂ鶹ԼÅÄ World Service except East and Southern Africa, News Internet & West and Central Africa
- Tue 19 Mar 2024 23:50GMTÂ鶹ԼÅÄ World Service East and Southern Africa & West and Central Africa only
- Wed 20 Mar 2024 03:50GMTÂ鶹ԼÅÄ World Service except East and Southern Africa, East Asia, South Asia & West and Central Africa
Featured in...
Chinese history—Witness History
Listen to and download our programmes below
Podcast
-
Witness History
History as told by the people who were there