Fresh off the boat again? The conversion of cultural capital and distinction-making among Western-educated returnee scholars in China

This article investigates how Western-educated scholars negotiate the distinction-making process and strategise the conversion of acquired cultural capital to social capital upon return to China. Building on Bourdieusian theory, it finds anti-Western distinction constructed by local scholars monopolises their privileged positions in Chinese academic reproduction. Cultural capital obtained by returnee scholars is often devalorised by nationalist rhetoric, posing obstacles to its convertibility to other forms of capital. Some returnees tactically hide their acquired cultural capital to demonstrate easiness with Chinese culture and to marginalise their returnee peers as too ‘Westernised’ to fit in. Others stress their cosmopolitan cultural capital as sources of distinction, claiming they do not want to play the Chinese game, but are more likely to be excluded from the core academic network, thus disadvantaging their career progression. This study highlights how transnational mobility across fields affects the revalorisation of rule-specific cultural capital in the process of distinction-making.