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Micro-Blogging Contesting Modernities: Producing and Remembering Public Events in Contemporary Chinese Social Media Platforms

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Micro-Blogging Contesting Modernities: Producing and Remembering Public Events in Contemporary Chinese Social Media Platforms University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2014 Micro-blogging Contesting Modernities: Producing and Remembering Public Events in Contemporary Chinese Social Media Platforms Le Han University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Communication Commons Recommended Citation Han, Le, "Micro-blogging Contesting Modernities: Producing and Remembering Public Events in Contemporary Chinese Social Media Platforms" (2014). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 1306. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1306 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1306 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Micro-blogging Contesting Modernities: Producing and Remembering Public Events in Contemporary Chinese Social Media Platforms Abstract How does journalism empower citizens through reporting and remembering news events, as they take shape in the era of social media in a society where the state power penetrates every aspect of social life and freedom of expression is not legally guaranteed? This inquiry is implemented through looking at the contemporary Chinese context, examining three sets of tensions that capture the characteristics of social media platforms: control/resistance, past/present, and global/local. It analyzes journalism and its reliance on collective memory in social media, by considering social media as an important venue where journalism interacts with other sets of discourses in a tradition of absolute state power. My study shows that in China, a society that enjoys a limited free flow of information, journalism uses social media platforms to mobilize symbolic resources for online activism targeting the Party-state system. These symbolic resources mainly derive from the past, both inside and beyond the Chinese context, leading to a debate of different versions of modernity in China. This is a study that spans three years along with the development of Sina Weibo (now Weibo), a micro- blogging service provided by Sina.com, one of the major Chinese portal websites. I argue that social media complicate the landscape of journalism, by taking a balancing position between market interests and political safety. In particular, micro-blogging has blurred the conventional distinction between professional and citizen journalism. Instead, the institutional and personal journalistic practices are working together contest censorship via social media platforms. Social media opens up spaces for journalists and ordinary citizens to rewrite history, and to use various resources provided by the past to criticize the present Party-state system and struggle for journalistic freedom. The global-local exchange of news and memory via social media platforms brings about a new version of Chinese identity, competing with the version promoted by the Party-state in contemporary social transition, and urging a thorough political reform to reach the goal of a "civilized nation." Social media, as shown in the case of Weibo, reflect the conflicting views of China's route to modernity-- the debate between "Chinese characteristics" and "universal values," which produces the meanings of a modern Chinese nation and raises the relevance of citizenship. This conflict is situated in the complexities of historical and contemporary social transitions and China's dilemma in the embracing of a global world. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Communication First Advisor Barbie Zelizer Keywords China, collective memory, journalism, social media Subject Categories Communication This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1306 MICRO-BLOGGING CONTESTING MODERNITIES: PRODUCING AND REMEMBERING PUBLIC EVENTS IN CONTEMPORARY CHINESE SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS Eileen Le Han A DISSERTATION in Communication Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2014 Supervisor of Dissertation ____________ Barbie Zelizer Raymond Williams Professor of Communication Graduate Group Chairperson _____________ Joseph Turow, Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Communication Dissertation Committee Guobin Yang, Associate Professor of Communication and Sociology Marwan Kraidy, Professor of Communication Sharrona Pearl, Assistant Professor of Communication MICRO-BLOGGING CONTESTING MODERNITIES COPYRIGHT 2014 Eileen Le Han This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ To my parents iii Acknowledgements I was told that academia is a lonely path when I started to pursue my graduate study. However, during the past few years, I never felt this way, because of the support and encouragement I have been surrounded by. I cannot express my gratitude enough to my advisor Barbie Zelizer. She walked me through the highs and lows and offered me invaluable advices and resources beyond my imagination, and I will treasure them throughout my academic career. She read every word of my writings at every stage and offered insightful comments that shaped my dissertation. Her teaching and her scholarship have had profound influence on me. More importantly, from her, I have learned to have faith in what I am doing, never give up where it seems to be no way out, and always push further than where the limits seem to be. I am equally blessed to have studied with Guobin Yang. His research on activism and the Internet in China opened a new door for my dissertation research. His broad knowledge and solid theoretical foundation helped transforming my research. Belonging to the generation that witnessed major traumatic moments in contemporary China, his insights of China greatly inspired my way of thinking about the social context of my research. I will always remember his kindness and openness as a teacher and scholar. iv Marwan Kraidy had also given me rigorous training in the field of global communication, a very important aspect of my research. His scholarship in the Arab media and society provided me a reflection of the situation in China. Sharrona Pearl shared her brilliant ideas about the features and potential of micro-blogging for my dissertation. She also brought me scholarship of culture and technology, historical research methods, and professional development trainings, all of which are valuable resources in my career. At Penn, I had the privilege to take classes with many great scholars from Annenberg and other departments. I am also indebted to Annenberg’s Scholars Program in Culture and Communication, from which I had the opportunity to study with globally renowned scholars in communication and culture. My gratitude also goes to the wonderful Annenberg staff, Joanne Murray, Lizz Cooper, Emily Plowman, Sharon Black, Min Zhong, Donna Edwards and Cory Falk. They always knew exactly what I need and were very considerate. They have made my life at Annenberg easy and comfortable. I was lucky to be surrounded by many friends at Annenberg, Xiaoxia Cao, Eun Ja Her, Chloe Lee, Tara Liss-Mariño, Rosemary Avance, Susan Haas, Angela Lee, Bo Mai, Jingwen Zhang, Jiaying Liu, Sijia Yang, Rui Shi, Nick Gilewicz, Andy Tan, Lokman Tsui, Omar Al-Ghazzi, and Sandra Ristovska. In the past few years, we shared moments of joy and sorrow, all of which became wonderful memories that I will always cherish. Many friends outside of Annenberg and Penn showed their support for me in many ways. I would like to thank Joanne Chen Lyu, Guanxiong Huang, Shijing Zhang, Yilin Chiang, Nagatomi Hirayama, Helen Liang, Philip and Anya Siu, Jie Bai, Stephanie Sun, Daniel v Li, Melody Wang, Sherri Wu, Xinyuan Shang, Jade Lo, and Jing Hu, for their prayer, sharing, and encouragement. I would also like to thank Qin Wang, Fei Jiang, Sheng Mao and Lushan Shi for their help with my dissertation research. The final paragraph is reserved for my family. Without their unconditional love that never fails, I could not have gone this far. My parents always have faith in me, even at the time when I did not have much confidence in myself. My husband Sidney accompanied me through the writing of this dissertation. He was the reader of my first draft and never failed to surprise me by adding new and inspiring ideas to it. He is the joy and delight of my life. vi ABSTRACT MICRO-BLOGGING CONTESTING MODERNITIES: PRODUCING AND REMEMBERING PUBLIC EVENTS IN CONTEMPORARY CHINESE SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS Le Han Barbie Zelizer How does journalism empower citizens through reporting and remembering news events, as they take shape in the era of social media in a society where the state power penetrates every aspect of social life and freedom of expression is not legally guaranteed? This inquiry is implemented through looking at the contemporary Chinese context, examining three sets of tensions that capture the characteristics of social media platforms: control/resistance, past/present, and global/local. It analyzes journalism and its reliance on collective memory in social media, by considering social media as an important venue where journalism interacts with other sets of discourses in a tradition of absolute state power. My study shows that in China, a society that enjoys a limited free flow of information, journalism uses social media platforms to mobilize symbolic
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