NAME: DATE: PERIOD: D irections Read the article titled Photographer Captures Bizarre, Intimate Scenes of Chinese Factory Life by Shen Lu and Katie Hunt. When you are finished, answer the 15 questions seen below and the required essay. Remember to express yourself fully and carefully in your answers, using the skills you have learned in Language Arts class this year. Use your own paper to answer. READING ASSIGNMENT: CHINESE FACTORY LIFE PART I: SHORT ANSWER: 1. What does the word chunyun mean? 2. What day was the 2015 Chinese New Year? 3. How many people make up China s floating population? 4. What Chinese province was originally home to photographer Zhan Youbing? 5. What was Zhan s first job around Guangzhou when he first arrived from the countryside? 6. What has been Zhan s photo project for the past ten years? 7. Why would workers in an electronics factory be dressed like astronauts? 8. About how many photos has Zhan taken as part of his project? 9. Why hasn t Zhan seen any of the many exhibits of his photographs shown around China? 10. What is the name of Zhan s book published last November? 11. How did Zhan find his photos helping him to communicate with his mother and mother-in-law? 12. Give two examples of how life as a migrant worker can be turbulent: 13. Why is it that migrant worker s children are often raised by someone else? 14. Why is Zhan so concerned about the lives of the children of migrant workers? 15. In what way does Zhan still see himself as no different from a migrant worker?
PART II: ESSAY: Write a short-constructed-response of at least 10 sentences that answers the following writing prompt: How is life for a Chinese factory worker different from an American factory worker? How are the two lives similar? What do you think would be the most difficult thing about working in a Chinese factory? Explain: STANDARDS FOR GRADING THIS READING ASSIGNMENT: GRADE C: 1. The requirements for a C are the same as for a B except that there are one or two errors or omissions that would prevent the student from getting a B. GRADE B: 1. The report answers all of the short answer questions in complete sentences. 2. The short answer section shows only minor factual errors. 3. The essay question or questions are of proper length and written in complete sentences. 4. The essay question addresses the topic clearly. 5. Paper is neatly written and carefully proofread with no more than four typos or spelling errors. GRADE A: 1. The report meets all the requirements for a B. 2. The essay question or questions show outstanding effort and analysis as well as an exceptional overall understanding of the topic chosen. 3. The report is carefully proofread with no more than two typos or spelling errors. 4. The report is word-processed.
PHOTOGRAPHER CAPTURES BIZARRE, INTIMATE SCENES OF CHINESE FACTORY LIFE By SHEN LU and KATIE HUNT CNN February 23, 2015 Chinese workers sleep on a crowded bus taking them home for the Chinese New Year holiday. The Lunar New Year is the only time of year China s army of migrant workers gets to go home. Known as "chunyun," the annual travel crush is the world's largest migration of humans. The lengths workers go to to see their families during the country's biggest holiday, which this year began February 19, is one facet of migrant worker life captured by factory hand turned photographer, Zhan Youbing. For more than a decade, Zhan was himself one of China's 250-million strong "floating population" of migrant workers. Originally from the rural, inland province of Hubei, he worked as a security guard in the factories that surround the southern boom town of Guangzhou, over six hundred miles away.
Now a professional photographer, he trains his camera lens on those he left behind. "I have lived this life," he says. "So I know exactly what their situations are." For the past 10 years, he has photographed workers in eight factories in Dongguan, a factory town near Guangzhou, documenting their life on and off the assembly lines. The scenes Zhan has captured range from the bizarre to the intimate. Chinese workers take a nap break in an electronics factory in southern China In one electronics factory, workers resembling astronauts -- their protective clothing only reveals their eyes -- take a quick nap. But he also shows a life where strong friendships are forged -- at a dormitory dinner party for example. He's taken more than 400,000 photos and they've been exhibited across the country. But he didn't go to any of the exhibitions. "I didn't have the travel expenses," he says. In November, he published a book called "I'm a Migrant Worker," a compilation of writing and more than 150 photos. Zhan started taking photos for an internal factory publication in 2002. He then took vocational classes. When he returned to his hometown for the Lunar New Year celebrations, he found photos a better way than words to describe life in the factory to his mother and mother-in-law Yet it was a deeper feeling of insecurity that drove him to keep documenting the life of migrant workers - a turbulent life over which they have little control.
"Sometimes, you want to jump ship for better pay at another factory shortly after starting your current job," Zhan says. "Yet at other times when you want to stay on and settle down, you get fired or the factory gets taken over." If photography meant self-fulfillment for Zhan in the early days, it is now more of a mission. He says the more photos he takes, the more deeply he understands the issues migrants face. Zhan says he is particularly concerned about the plight of children left behind by parents. Restrictions on housing, education and healthcare, make it hard for migrant workers to bring along their kids and they are often raised by grandparents, relatives or neighbors. "The parents have devoted their lives to the manufacturing industry, but they barely get anything. Now their kids start entering the sad cycle." Despite his success, Zhan thinks himself no different to a migrant worker and says the feeling of uneasiness from that time will never fade. "I feel like rootless duckweed on a strange land." A migrant worker comes home for the Lunar New Year loaded down with gifts for the whole family.