This article explores how geographic mobility is implicated in the process of bonding with place. By using data collected from a survey of a group of college graduates who grew up in Chaohu and left their hometown in their young adulthood, four types of migrants (Translocals, Departers, Aliens, and Settlers) and three types of returnees (the Trapped, the Bonded, and the Rooted) are classified. This research acknowledges the significance of traditional influences in people's bonds with places; meanwhile, it challenges the conservative view of seeing attachment/belonging to the homeland as universal and unconditioned. The findings also show that educated young migrants tend to have a greater desire to be integrated into the host city, and they are more prone to be accepted by the new socio-spatial environment. Taken together, this study corroborates the idea that geographic mobility does not undermine place-based attachment/belonging but tends to attenuate its intensity. Attachment/belonging is not necessarily limited to one single place; yet, attachment/belonging ascribed by birth still has an advantage over the attachment/belonging acquired by residence.

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In this paper, we extend recent discussions on the relationship with the host place of ‘temporary’ or non- hukou migrants in major Chinese cities through the lens of three psychological processes: familiarity, attachment and identity. The empirical analysis is based on fieldwork conducted in selected villages-in-the-city in Guangzhou. A mixed methods approach is employed. The findings highlight the emotional distance between temporary migrants and their urban milieu: while some become familiar with the city through their prolonged stay, very few establish attachment and identity. The analysis shows that the dominance of indigenous villagers is a major obstacle for migrants to develop attachment to the given village-in-the-city; moreover, perceived institutional discriminations negatively affect migrants’ attachment to the city. The findings also corroborate a social constructionist perception of place identity: when place identity is legitimated and reproduced by the hukou system, it is difficult for migrants to challenge the hegemonic constructions of place and identity and to create their own narratives of identities.

Wholesale redevelopment, suburbanization and increased population mobility in recent decades have brought significant social and spatial changes to urban neighbourhoods in Chinese cities, not least the subjective feelings of residents about their neighbourhoods. While there is a substantial literature on urban restructuring and migration at different geographical scales, relatively little is known about how feelings such as neighbourhood attachment are conditioned upon residential mobility and neighbourhood change in Chinese cities. To address this deficiency in the literature, multi-level models are employed to explore the extent to which residential mobility affects three different dimensions of neighbourhood attachment based on a large-scale household survey conducted in Guangzhou in 2012. The findings show that mobility experience and neighbourhood-related factors exert discernible influences on the attitudes towards the neighbourhood. Specifically, while people staying in reform/work-unit housing compounds tend to have better knowledge of their neighbours, those moving from reform/work-unit compounds to commodity housing estates exhibits greater involvements in the affairs of the new neighbourhood. The built environment, population size and frequency of population turnovers of the neighbourhood underpin residents’ attachment to it.

This article explores contemporary prejudice against displaced villagers in urban China, drawing on a project on urban sprawl in Yinchuan where rural villages are absorbed into the urban area. The research demonstrates that media discourses about chaiqian baofahu and suzhi that stigmatise displaced villagers are being actively reproduced in everyday life in newly built urban neighbourhoods. Urbanites’ prejudice against displaced villagers can be viewed as, on the one hand, a result of the feelings of relative deprivation from unfavourable comparisons with displaced villagers, while on the other hand, a response to maintain a positive ingroup identity – in this case, an urban and ‘civilised’ way of life. The article then examines the effectiveness of contact as a means for reducing prejudice, and reveals that intergroup contact in urban neighbourhoods does not necessarily create mutual understanding and trust. The article highlights the structural causes of prejudice and concludes by arguing for social transformation to challenge and reduce prejudice.