Introduction: Social Networks and Elite Identity

Abstract

Introduction:Social Networks and Elite Identity Beverly Bossler The two articles in this section, by Chang Wei-ling and Wenyi Chen, explore the construction and shaping of literati (shi 士) culture and identity in the late Southern Song and Yuan. It is by now a truism in the field that, over the course of the Southern Song dynasty, the growing numbers of men who were educated to seek office came to outstrip by far the numbers of bureaucratic positions available. As officeholding—once the defining characteristic of shi status—became increasingly difficult to attain, men who identified as shi were forced to define themselves in new ways. Over recent decades, a considerable body of scholarship on the Song and Yuan dynasties has sought to understand and illuminate the shift in the self-understanding and activities of this expanding literati group. These two articles contribute important new evidence and insights to this ongoing project. Chang Wei-ling's essay, "Interplay between Official Careers and Local Identity among Puyang Literati during the Late Southern Song," examines the tensions (or lack thereof) between local commitments and the continuing pull of service to the state. Her work is in some regards a response to the Hartwell-Hymes hypothesis, which had suggested that Southern Song literati became disenchanted with state service and instead turned their attentions to leadership in their local areas. Through a closely-argued case study of Xinghua prefecture 興化軍 (or Puyang 莆陽, as it was known in the Song), she demonstrates that commitment to—or identification with—one's home area was not at all inimical to continued interest in government service. On the contrary, Chang shows how, in the mid- to late- Southern Song, local identities became important elements in political factions and networks of political patronage. In the case of Puyang, Chang argues, a sense of locally-based political identity took form in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. It began with the celebration of earlier political and literary luminaries from Puyang, [End Page 99] and was strengthened by geographically-based political favoritism (which disadvantaged men of Puyang) during the long tenure of the Grand Councilor Shi Miyuan 史彌遠 (1164–1233), a Ningbo native who dominated the court between 1208 and 1233. When, under the influence of the rising Grand Councilor Zheng Qingzhi 鄭清之 (1178–1251), Puyang men once again began to enter office, they began to hold "locality gatherings" (xianghui 鄉會) at court. Such gatherings included both serving officials and newly-minted degree-holders from Puyang, and were both based in, and enhanced the salience of, local ties. Finally, Chang shows that men from Puyang who did gain some measure of political prominence (most notably Liu Kezhuang 劉 克莊, 1187–1269) explicitly expressed a sense of obligation to provide political support, in the form of recommendations and other sorts of patronage, to others from their local area. Chang demonstrates that in the thirteenth century, both commitments to one's home area (that is, a sense of "local identity") and commitment to government service were integral aspects of Puyang literati identity. Wenyi Chen's article approaches the question of literati identity from a very different perspective, examining the ways that late Song and Yuan literati—both in and out of office—exploited the networks of other literati friends and acquaintances to seek financial assistance. Whereas Chang's study centers on a geographic area, Chen focuses on a specific literary form: an unusual subset of the genre of "presentation prefaces" (zengxu 贈序). Chen explains that presentation prefaces—once meant to grace a collection of the recipient's writings, or to introduce a set of writings composed to celebrate a particular event—by Southern Song had come to be used for a variety of social purposes, and especially as a means to forge new social connections. A presentation preface by a notable figure could be used by the recipient to forge connections with other individuals, who might then add literary embellishments of their own. Here Chen examines a group of presentation prefaces in which the author—usually a writer of some note—appealed to potential readers to provide material assistance for the recipient or bearer of the preface. Chen explores the various kinds of economic needs for which such prefaces...