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Introduction

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Entertainment and Politics in Contemporary China

Part of the book series: East Asian Popular Culture ((EAPC))

Abstract

The opening chapter narrates the ever-intensifying entertainmentization and Westernization in China’s media as the country entered the twenty-first century. Wu introduces some of the most recent and representative cases (Super Girl, If You Are the One, Dwelling Narrowness, and Naked Wedding) to give readers a good sense of recent media developments in China and the source of tensions between its entertainment media and the political public sphere. This chapter also lays the theoretical ground by its critical reflections on theoretical traditions that have guided much scholarly thinking and studies of media and politics. Wu introduces a redefinition of politics, which has supported such theoretical interventions as cultural citizenship and aesthetic public sphere. They serve the overarching theoretical and empirical frameworks for this book’s examination of the entertainment–politics relationship in contemporary China. In addition, Wu discusses how authoritarianism manifests in a uniquely Chinese way, different from other systems such as those in the Middle East, and how the authoritarian rule creates an intricate interrelationship between the state, the entertainment media, and ordinary Chinese citizens. As the notion of “multiple modernities” addresses reservations about the application of largely Western born theories to authoritarian systems like China, Wu argues that empirically grounded insights about the connection between entertainment and politics in non-Western worlds promise more informed perspectives about the civic significance of entertainment media and new digital media in Western societies as well. The final section maps out the structure of the book.

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  1. Department of Journalism, Media Studies, and Public Relations, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, USA

    Jingsi Christina Wu

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Wu, J.C. (2017). Introduction. In: Entertainment and Politics in Contemporary China. East Asian Popular Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48264-4_1

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