ABSTRACT
This chapter takes up the thread of the previous chapter in looking at school textbooks for subjects other than history and examining their role in designing or constructing a political sense of ‘self’ – this time in the case of Hong Kong. It reviews efforts undertaken so far by Hong Kong’s post-colonial regime to (re-)socialise local residents as Chinese patriots, focusing particularly on schooling, but also analysing changes to the broader curriculum. Textbook content is taken as indicative of these curricular changes, while the relationship between textbooks and teaching, and the nature of the textbook publication and vetting processes, are also discussed. The analysis additionally ranges beyond the school gates to consider how the authorities have sought to deploy other vehicles for transmitting patriotic messages, including museums, heritage tourism, events such as the Beijing Olympics and the Chinese Space Programme. The chapter identifies the key messages conveyed through these various channels regarding the nature of ‘China’, its relationship to Hong Kong’s own ‘Chineseness’ and the definition of the ‘patriotic’ sentiment that Hong Kong Chinese are expected to share and express following the region’s 1997 retrocession.
