Yes, I have been remiss this week.  One silly post on old disco music and nothing more.  But this is the last week before our Spring Break here and I have been consumed with grading one set of papers (finished yesterday; hooray!) and fielding questions and drafts of another set of papers due today at  5PM.

I have also been getting ready for a trip to China, which will commence tomorrow.  My main purpose is to present a paper I have been working on (though it is still rough and in need of greater analytic depth), "Confucianism as Soft Power."  It needs a better title, too.  The central argument is that Confucianism is unlikely to serve as a significant source of soft power for the PRC in the near future.  Yes, the idea first emerged here (with some further ideas here) but I have expanded on it, and continue to expand on it, considerably.

I will present the paper at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences next week, and at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences the week after.  Perhaps the best way to describes these organizations is government-sponsored think tanks.  "Soft Power" has been something of a hot topic in China of late.  So I am sure that the people in both Academies will have ideas to share with me.  It will be interesting to see what kind of arguments will emerge both for and against the possibilities of Confucian Soft Power. 

I will also pop into a couple of classes at Beijing Foreign Studies University, one with Chinese students and one with American students.  And, in Shanghai, I will give a talk at the Foreign Correspondent's Club.  

In between there will be meet ups with former and current students and friends new and old, walks and bike rides through Beijing hutongs, visits to new art galleries in Shanghai, perhaps a look at the Chinese People's Revolutionary Military Museum (which I have never seen), and, of course, my continuing search for the perfect dumpling.

I will try to post from China, as I was able to do during my trip last year.  But blogging could slack off a bit while I am on the road.  

Any suggestions for other spots in Beijing and Shanghai that I should check out (places other than the standard historical/tourist sites)?