The Preface of My First Academic Book
To many people, the rise of China begins in 2008. The west fell into the credit crisis while Beijing held the first Olympic Games to show its power to the world. I was 18 years old and studying hard for the national college entrance exam of 2009. During four years of a university in Wuhan of Hubei province, World Exposition, Asia Games, and Universiade were held by other three big cities of China. I still remember the days when I searched microblogs to follow their news. In Shanghai, I visited the exhibition with my first boyfriend. Everything was full of hopes.
However, for my family and me, the rise of China begins in the 1980s. My father finished a three-year college education after he came back from the battlefield of Sino-Vietnam War. He left hometown and did many jobs in a bigger city. The most outstanding one is journalist. He worked at newspaper then shifted to radio station. In my memory, we moved five times from a small house without living room, a small house with living room where my little brother was born, an apartment with two bedrooms to an apartment with three bedrooms. And me, I am far and far away from my family. Since 2009, I left Guangdong province and have stayed in Wuhan, Taipei, Kaohsiung, and Victoria. No one in my family had the chance to study and work abroad before.
The feeling of a rising China is so strong, but I also realize huge gaps at many levels: the imbalanced developments between city and town, the inequality between the rich and the poor, the diverse values and ideologies among Chinese, the pervasive corruptions, the accumulated pollution, the aging population, and so on. In this regard, I often feel lucky enough to live in this era and am able to observe, discover, discuss, and investigate vibrant voices and various disputes.
There is no doubt that countless changes occurred, are occurring, and will occur in China. The transition is ongoing but impacts on Chinese and the world are dramatically uncertain. Thanks to numerous watchers, thinkers, analysts, and practisers within and beyond China, their long-term discourses and actions pave the way for my book. I stand on their shoulders with my interdisciplinary trainings including journalism, education, information, and political science in past years to conceive and write all papers . The book has multiple meanings.
As a witness from 2014 to 2019, it collects eight papers which have been accepted or presented in conferences on information, text, media, migration, governance, and international relations in China, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and America. It follows dynamics of East and Southeast Asia and reflects recent political discourses and civil practices. Eight papers are grouped according to three themes: civil practices and discourses within China, political discourses and practices beyond China, and memories and diasporas in and beyond Asia.
In the first theme, the first paper is about operations of a rural library which was run by a non-government organization in 2014. It adopts document analysis, interview, and observation to explain how Li Ren library serves for local residents through the lens of social capital theory and community resources. The second paper is an analysis of the relationships between a think tank’s research and social issues with content analysis and discourse analysis. 37 publications and related news reports are collected to understand how a think tank in Beijing persuades the public with opinions and researches.
The second theme includes four papers. The first paper describes an opinion leader’s routine communication and dissemination on political issues on Facebook. The methods of interview and content analysis are employed to summarize strategies to increase influences online in the pan-Chinese context. The second paper is a batch of opinion leaders’ online behaviors during the legislative council election of Hong Kong. The characteristics of political mobilization and communication on social media are concluded. Then the third paper is a case study of the earliest Facebook fan page of Hong Kong’s native history and nation building. The meaning of a citizen’s history writing on public platform are discovered through data visualization. The last paper is to discuss the potential role and change of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations when it is facing competitions between China and America. It tries to provide solutions for small or weak states amid the interdependence and potential conflicts.
In the third theme, the first research explores how international students enrolled in Taiwan’s universities relieved homesickness by searching information. Through conducting a survey of seven students from Italy, Russia, America, Vietnam, and Ecuador at the undergraduate and graduate levels with methods of interview and critical incidents technique to propose advice to improve potential talents’ learning and working conditions in Taiwan. And the last paper is a research on five oversea Chinese immigrants’ leaving motivations with storytelling method. Data is collected from Zhihu, the Chinese Quora, in Singapore, Canada, Brazil, Finland, and Australia.
Meanwhile, the book is a valuable record, as well. Something happened on several cases selected and analysed by me after papers were done. Such as, Li Ren rural libraries were shut down by the government without explanations; Beijing Transition Institute was closed under pressure. The book thus preserves and presents the delicate efforts of citizen-led organizations in contemporary China.
Besides, for me, the book is a temporary summary of past research on communication and information which I have been working on for years. My next stage of academic journey focuses on political science that is different from the past learning. When the book is finished, I will continue to study China, ethnic Chinese, and social computing.
In all, the book provides cases analysis for interdisciplinary studies and implications of China and ethnic Chinese studies for scholars, students, and the public who have interests.
