So you want to get started teaching Mao’s China, but are unsure where to start

This post attempts to provide some degree of curation to some of the resources I’ve found helpful in developing my teaching of the Mao’s China unit for A-level history (Edexcel Paper 2E). I’ve absolutely loved immersing myself in this topic again over the past few years — it’s really fired up that learning desire in my when I latch on to a topic that floats my boat for whatever reason.

As I’ve said before, this is a period that is ripe for greater study in British schools. If the Twentieth Century was the American century, then there is no doubt that the Twenty-First Century is being defined by China. From COVID, to Hong Kong, to Xinjiang, to the economy, Belt and Road and climate change, global politics is increasingly being influenced by decisions made in Beijing.

I’ve also said before that this is a topic lacking a ‘history’ of good resources in the way that more popular A-level topics like Germany, Russia or the Tudors are much better supported. Therefore it’s really important for teachers to go beyond the core textbooks, which in many ways are a bit unsatisfactory anyway.

So, with all this in mind, here are a few of the resources I’ve found useful to increase my knowledge of this topic. I haven’t linked anything because effort, but Google will be your friend if you’re looking for something specific from here.

Core Resources

Delia Davin, Mao: A Very Short Introduction

Richard Curt Kraus, The Cultural Revolution: A Very Short Introduction

Rana Mitter, Modern China: A Very Short Introduction

· I think if I was starting from scratch, then I’d begin by acquiring these three very handy overviews. Clocking in at around 100 short pages each, they are an excellent primer that cover the entire period. The Delia Davin book is excellent for a narrative of the period in general, as well as providing vital context for the pre-1949 period, something often missing from the core A-level resources. The Kraus book is excellent for making sense of the Cultural Revolution which is a phenomenally tricky event to get your head round, and Rana Mitter’s work identifies the central problem facing China in the Twentieth Century, which is how to achieve modernity, and what that should look like.

Zheng Yangwen, Ten Lessons in Modern Chinese History

· This book is designed for undergraduate students new to modern Chinese history, and is therefore excellent for A-level teachers and eminently usable with students. It covers ten aspects of Chinese history from the mid-1800s onwards, by giving a basic narrative followed by an exploration of the historiography. The chapter on the Maoist period is an excellent primer to the topic, but I’d recommend the whole thing so you can contextualise the Maoist period. I think that is really important when you cover the Social and Cultural change sections, and indeed the development of the experience of women receives it’s own chapter, and the issue of Culture is covered as part of another chapter.

Frank Dikotter, The Tragedy of Liberation, and Mao’s Great Famine, and The Cultural Revolution: A People’s History

· This trilogy is essential for teachers, and I’ve used this liberally in lessons. What is great about these works is the way they blend the overarching political narrative, with lots of anecdotes and stories of the experience of ordinary people. If I had to pick one, I would recommend most strongly the book on the Great Famine, which discusses the narrative of events and then explores different themes such as the experience of different social groups and a rather dark section entitled ‘ways of dying’. His Cultural Revolution book has also directly affected my own teaching through the way it breaks down the time period into three different periods — the ‘Red’ Years of 1966–1968, the ‘Black’ Years of 1968–1971, and the ‘Grey’ Years of 1971–76.

Advanced Resources

Roderick Macfarquhar (ed.), The Politics of China

· I’ve got the second edition, and I think there’s now a third edition, but this is absolutely brilliant if you want to get into the fine detail of the political machinations at the top of the party. The book consists of a series of long essays (around 60–70 pages each) covering different periods since 1949 by eminent scholars of Chinese history and politics. The first essay, on the period up to 1957, was really helpful in shaping my analysis of this period, and it also led me to want to know a lot more about the period before 1949, especially the Yan’an period, which was critical in shaping the collective leadership of the party, albeit with Mao at the head. I think if you’re new to the topic, understanding the constraints on Mao’s power is a real challenge and this book gets into that very well. Episodes like the Lin Biao affair of 1971 are very well covered and the account in Macfarquhar’s essay has directly influenced my own teaching. It goes well past 1976 if you’re covering the AQA Component 2 version of this unit. It is very detailed though — not necessarily one for bedtime reading, but good for reference if you want to know exactly what happened when and involving whom.

Jung Chang, Wild Swans and Mao: The Unknown Story

· I’m reading Wild Swans at the moment and it’s absolutely great for understanding the experience of women in China both before and during the Communist period. When you’re teaching about the problems women faced prior to 1949, such as concubinage, this book has excellent material on that, as well as the challenges faced in being a revolutionary wife. Chang’s later biography of Mao is an absolute epic, and resolutely negative about the Chairman and his legacy. It’s a beast clocking in at around 800 pages but is certainly well worth your time. Some of the conclusions of the book have been contested, and it is important to note that Chang has a good amount of skin in the game here.

Lee Feigon, Mao: A Reinterpretation

· This is almost the opposite of Chang’s biography, being a generally rose-tinted appraisal of Mao’s rule (and therefore very good for A-level teachers doing interpretations work — in fact this work and Chang’s would make two excellent works if you were doing the Edexcel coursework on this period). It’s a lot shorter than Chang’s as well, which is to its’ credit, although I think many westerners, except those on the revolutionary left, would find the conclusions pretty difficult to swallow. In general there are quite a lot of Mao biographies out there, and it’d be good to see more on some of the underlings. Zhou Enlai in particular would be a good subject I think.

Jonathan Fenby, The Penguin History of Modern China, 1850-present

· This is a very detailed overview of modern Chinese history. I’d say useful for reference, with some handy bits to put in the way of students, especially an excellent bit where he does a little potted overview of the personalities of the key figures within the CCP. His description of Lin Biao’s….unusual, shall we say, habits, is certainly worth sharing with students to bring some colour to the topic.

Julia Lovell, Maoism: A History

· This provides a global take on the story of Maoism. It shows that Mao’s ideas had a reach well beyond China, affecting several decolonising African states, India, Peru, Indonesia and the West. The introductory chapter is also very useful for summarising the main ideas of Maoism and the history of their development, through an analysis of the quotations that Mao has been so renowned for (‘revolution is not a dinner party’, for instance).

Dong Guoqiang and Andrew Walder, A Decade of Upheaval: The Cultural Revolution in Rural China

· I’ve just picked this up and this is a study of the factionalism and conflict caused by the Cultural Revolution in Feng County. It challenges the idea of the Cultural Revolution as a mainly urban phenomenon and shows how split the Army was over this as well. Looks interesting. Walder has written extensively on China and is a leading expert on the Cultural Revolution in particular.

Books I’ve not yet read

One that I’m very keen to get my hands on is Michael Wood’s recent history of China which covers the full sweep from the ancient period to the present. Philip Short has written a monumental biography of Mao but IIRC it’s almost Figes-esque in length so that’s probably not for the faint-hearted. I’d also like to get hold of the aforementioned Macfarquhar’s book on the Cultural Revolution (Mao’s Last Revolution) as well as Yang Jisheng’s Tombstone which is a first hand account of the Great Leap Forward years.

Podcasts and other media

There’s some excellent material out there that’s freely available in most cases if you don’t want to splurge too much cash on books.

· BBC In Our Time has a number of excellent episodes on China, including on the Cultural Revolution, the Opium Wars, the Sino-Japanese War and the Long March.

· The Rest is History podcast did a really good episode on China with an interview with Michael Wood. Very handy for the big picture story.

· Sinobabble — This is a fantastic podcast, accessible for students, covering the twentieth century period (Edi who makes it is up to the 1960s I think, at the time of writing), as well as some contemporary news-y stuff as well. This is a recent discovery but definitely strongly recommended.

· The China History Podcast with Laszlo Montgomery is very good story-telling on a whole host of topics, including an extended set of episodes on the Cultural Revolution.

· On Youtube, I highly recommend Rory Truex’s lectures on Chinese politics — he’s an academic from Stanford University and he kindly uploaded all his lectures onto that platform. There’s some very good historical overview bits to set up the main focus of his course which is on contemporary politics. The Youtube channel called Felix Wemhauser Studying Maoist China has interviews with academics in the field that are worth a look also.

· The Historical Association has an excellent set of podcasts with the likes of Rana Mitter and Zheng Yangwen covering the entire period. These are downloadable and useful to share with students.

· The Alpha History website is really good for A-level students and covers most of the key China topics, and John D Clare’s website also has a handy China section that’s probably more pitched at GCSE level but might be useful to share with students struggling.

· Morning Sun is a documentary movie on the Cultural Revolution period that is absolutely fantastic. It was on Youtube and got taken down, and was aired by the BBC as part of their Storyville series. Hope to see that one come back at some point as I can’t find a DVD copy of it in Region 2 anywhere.

· Tong Bingxue’s Twitter page which shares lots of China photography is an absolute must follow. I’d also recommend following Covell Meyskins who also shares some fascinating Chinese archive footage. The University of Westminster’s Contemporary China Centre blog, and the SOAS China Institute blog and podcast are also worth your attention.

I hope that’s a useful primers for teachers on this topic who are either new to it, or are looking to upgrade their subject knowledge and want some inspiration. I’ll try and add to it as I come across more stuff in the future.