IDOL CHINA
Each project below stands on its own — a different field site, a different community, a different rhythm. Together they form what I call IDOL CHINA: a long-term inquiry into how participation, performance, and devotion are being reorganized in everyday Chinese life.
A long-term, multi-sited inquiry into idolization, ritual, and participation across contemporary Chinese culture — from animals to algorithms.
"What does it mean to worship something — a panda, a costume, a market, a dead poet — when participation is mediated by platforms, photography, and the daily routines of strangers?
“My idol is a national treasure”: Fandom, idolization, and the multispecies ethnography of giant pandas
How animal celebrity, conservation labour, and fan devotion intersect at panda bases — including the curious afterlife of “fan-baby” pandas online.
Hanfu revival communities for fans, and hanfu photography for tourists
Two intertwined economies — the deeply researched costume revival, and the casual costume rental — meet at city walls and ancient streets.
E-commerce livestreaming of traditional physical markets in the Greater Bay Area
The flagship funded project (PI, 1+1+1 CUHK-CUHK(SZ)-GDST Joint Collaboration Fund YSP04) — tracking how wholesale and traditional markets are being remediated by group livestreams across nine cities in the Greater Bay Area, and what it does to labour and time.
Creative industries on short-video platforms: micro-dramas, AI-generated dramas, and group livestreaming
How verticalized melodrama and synthetic actors are reshaping the creative labour pipeline, with field sites in industry hubs.
Fandomization of commemorative rituals for famous historical figures
From Du Fu's birthday parties to fan-fiction at Confucius temples — a study of how online fan logics are being re-grafted onto the cult of the dead.
More threads unfolding
This list grows. New threads are added as the fieldwork unfolds.