Ghetto at the center of the world

Description

Gordon Mathews’s Ghetto at the Center of the World is an ethnographic portrait of Chungking Mansions, a dense commercial and residential complex in Hong Kong. Through the people who stay, work, and trade there, Mathews examines networks linking Hong Kong with South Asia and Africa. The building’s inexpensive lodging, small businesses, and cross-border commerce provide a ground-level view of globalization outside the world of large corporations. Attention to traders, migrants, workers, and asylum seekers shows how opportunity can coexist with insecurity and social exclusion. Focused on one distinctive place, the book reveals the everyday relationships and improvised exchanges that move people and goods across continents.

Themes