In the summer of 2005, distinguished geographer Yi-Fu Tuan ventured to China to speak at an international architectural conference, returning for the first time to the place he had left as a child sixty-four years before. He traveled from Beijing to Shanghai, addressing college audiences, floating down the Yangtze River on a riverboat, and visiting his former home in Chongqing.

In this enchanting volume, Tuan's childhood memories and musings on the places encountered during this homecoming are interspersed with new lectures, engaging overarching principles of human geography as well as the changing Chinese landscape. Throughout, Tuan's interactions with his hosts, with his colleague's children, and even with a garrulous tour guide, offer insights into one who has spent his life studying place, culture, and self.

At the beginning of his trip, Tuan wondered if he would be a stranger among people who looked like him. By its end, he reevaluates his own self-definition as a hyphenated American and sheds new light on human identity's complex roots in history, geography, and language.

Yi-Fu Tuan is author of Cosmos and Hearth, Dear Colleague, and Space and Place, all from Minnesota. He retired from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1998.

About the Author
Yi-Fu Tuan is the J.K. Wright and Vilas professor of geography at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His books include The Hydrological Cycle and the Wisdom of God (Toronto), Topophilia (Prentice-Hall), Space and Place (Minnesota), Landscapes of Fear (Pantheon), Segmented Worlds and Self (Minnesota), Dominance and Affection (Yale), The Good Life (Wisconsin), and Morality and Imagination (Wisconsin).


Book Information
ISBN 9780816649921
Author Yi-Fu Tuan
Format Paperback
Page Count 184
Imprint University of Minnesota Press
Publisher University of Minnesota Press
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 137mm * 13mm