This talk reinterprets the Gaokao as a system of symbolic credit production. Drawing on yearlong ethnographic fieldwork and 149 interviews, Siyu Li shows how mock exams, rankings, and teacher evaluations form a moralised cycle that converts effort, competence, and family investment into institutional recognition. Preparation of the final exam, not the selection itself, becomes the real engine structuring hierarchy and mobility in Chinese schooling.

Speaker: Siyu Li

Siyu Li is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Aix-Marseille University. Her research focuses on education, meritocracy, and elite formation in contemporary China, using ethnography, in-depth interviews and multiple correspondent methods. She draws on political sociology, sociology of quantification, and sociology of education, she is currently developing a book project on symbolic credit and the moral economy of the Gaokao.

Date: 16 December 2025
Time: 15:00–16:30
Location: Room 3360, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Clear Water Bay, Hong Kong
No registration required