Media, Culture and Social Change in Asia

Series · 46

books · 2001-2017

By Kuei-Fen Chiu, Yingchi Chu, Ben Murtagh, and more

Books in series

Television Across Asia

TV Industries, Programme Formats and Globalisation

2001

This book explores the trade in television program formats, which is a crucially important ingredient in the globalisation of culture, in Asia. It examines how much traffic there is in program formats, the principal direction of flow of such traffic, and the economic and cultural significance of this trade for the territories involved, and for the region as a whole. It shows how new technology, deregulation, privatisation and economic recession have greatly intensified competition between broadcasters in Asia, as in other parts of the world, and discusses how this in turn has multiplied the incidence of television format remakes, with some countries developing dedicated format companies, and others becoming net importers and adapters of formats.

Journalism and Democracy in Asia

2005

Journalism and Democracy in Asia addresses key issues of freedom, democracy, citizenship, openness and journalism in contemporary Asia, looking especially at China, Japan, Korea, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The authors take varying approaches to questions of democracy, whilst also considering journalism in print, radio and new media, in relation to such questions as the role of social, political and economic liberalization in bringing about a blooming of the media, the relationship between the media and the development of democracy and civil society, and how journalism copes under authoritarian rule. With contributions from highly regarded experts in the region examining a broad range of issues from across Asia, this book will be of high interest to students and scholars in political communications, journalism and mass communication and Asian studies.

Cultural Control and Globalization in Asia

2005

This is a succint and well-written book introducing a truly interdisciplinary approach to the study of copyright and related issues in contemporary popular culture in relation to the current development of Asian cinema, and questions how copyright is appropriated to regulate culture. It examines the many meanings and practices pertaining to "copying" in cinema, demonstrating the dynamics between globalization’s desire for cultural control and cinema’s own resistance to such manipulation. Focusing on the cinema of China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, and film 'piracy' in these countries, the book argues that ideas of cultural ownership and copyright are not as clear-cut as they may at first seem, and that copyright is used as a means through which cultural control is exercised by the cultural big business of the dominant power.

Conflict, Terrorism and the Media in Asia

2006

There are many different kinds of sub-national conflicts across Asia, with a variety of causes, but since September 11, 2001 these have been increasingly portrayed as part of the global terrorist threat, to be dealt with by the War on Terror. This major new study examines a wide range of such conflicts, showing how, despite their significant differences, they share the role of the media as interlocutor, and exploring how the media exercises this role. The book raises a number of issues concerning how the media report different forms of political violence and conflict, including issues of impartiality in the media's relations with governments and insurgents, and how the focus on the 'War on Terror' has led to some forms of violence - notably those employed by states for political purposes - to be overlooked. As the issue of international terrorism remains one of the most pressing issues of the modern day, this is a significant and important book which will interest the general reader and scholars from all disciplines.

Media and the Chinese Diaspora

2006

The importance of the Chinese diaspora is widely recognized. Wanning Sun examines the key role of the media in the Chinese diaspora. She focuses especially on the media's role in communication, in fostering a sense of community, in defining different kinds of 'transnational Chineseness' - overseas Chinese communities are often very different from one country to another - and in showing how media communication is linked to commerce, which is often a key activity of the overseas Chinese. Revealing a great deal about the vibrancy and dynamism of the Chinese-language media, the book considers the Chinese diaspora in Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and Australia, showing how it plays a crucial role in the changing nature of the Chinese diaspora.

Hong Kong Film, Hollywood and New Global Cinema

No Film is An Island

2006

In recent years, with the establishment of the Hong Kong Film Archive and growing scholarly interest in the history of Hong Kong cinema, previously neglected historical documents and difficult-to-access films have offered new research materials. As Hong Kong film history comes into sharper focus, its inextricable links across the decades to Southeast Asia, Korea, Japan, the United States, and to the far reaches of the Chinese diaspora have also become more evident. Hong Kong’s connection with Hollywood involves ties that bring together art cinema and popular genres as well as film festivals and the media marketplace with popular transnational genres. Giving fresh and facsinating insights into the vibrant area of Hong Kong, this exciting new book links Hong Kong with world film culture both within and beyond the commercial Hollywood paradigm. It emphasizes Hong Kong film in relation to other cinema industries, including Hollywood, and demonstrates that Hong Kong film, throughout its history, has challenged, redefined, expanded, and exceeded its borders.

Media in Hong Kong

Press Freedom and Political Change, 1967-2005

2007

This book examines the Hong Kong media over a forty year period, focusing in particular on how its newspapers and TV stations have struggled for press freedom under the colonial British administration, as well as Chinese rule. Making full use of newly declassified material, extensive interviews and specific case-studies, it provides an illuminating analysis of the dynamics of political power and its relationship with media censorship. Overall, this book is an impressive discussion of the evolving face of the Hong Kong media, and is an important contribution to theoretical debates on the relationship between political power, economics, identity and journalism.

Chinese Documentaries

From Dogma to Polyphony

2007

In China, unlike in Western cinema, documentary film, rather than fiction film, has been the dominant mode since 1949. In recent years, documentary TV programmes have experienced a meteoric rise. Arguing that there is a gradual process of 'democratization' in the media, in which documentaries play a significant role, this book discusses various types of Chinese documentaries, under both the planned and the market economy. It especially explores the relationship between documentaries and society, showing how, under the market economy, although the government continues to use the genre as propaganda to promote its ideologies and policies, documentaries are being used as a medium where public concerns and alternative voices can be heard.

#10

The Origins of the Modern Chinese Press

The Influence of the Protestant Missionary Press in Late Qing China

2007

This book traces the emergence of the modern Chinese press from its origins in the western Christian missionary press in the late nineteenth century. It shows how the western missionaries and their evangelical/educational newspapers changed the long-standing traditional practices, styles, content, print culture and printing technology of Chinese newspapers and, in the process, introduced some of the key ideas of western modernity which were to have a profound effect on Chinese society. Xiantao Zhang demonstrates how missionary publications reshaped print journalism, rather indirectly, from a centuries-long monopoly by the state - the Imperial press - into a pluralized, modernizing and frequently radical public journalism. She focuses in particular on the relationship between the missionaries and the class of ‘gentry scholars’ - literati and civil servants, educated via the traditional state examination system in the Confucian classics, who were the prime target readers of the missionary publications. This key group and the independent press they established at the end of the nineteenth century played a crucial role in shaping the ongoing struggle for a modern democratic media culture in China.

#11

Created in China

The Great New Leap Forward

2007

This book examines China’s creative economy―and how television, animation, advertising, design, publishing and digital games are reshaping traditional understanding of culture. Since the 1950s China has endeavoured to catch-up with advanced Western economies. ‘Made in China’ is one approach to global competitiveness. But a focus on manufacturing and productivity is impeding innovation. China imports creativity and worries about its ‘cultural exports deficit’. In the cultural sector Chinese audiences are attracted to Korean, Taiwanese, and Japanese culture, as well as Hollywood cinema. This book provides a fresh look looks at China’s move up the global value chain. It argues that while government and (most) citizens would prefer to associate with the nationalistic, but unrealized ‘created in China’ brand, widespread structural reforms are necessary to release creative potential. Innovation policy in China has recently acknowledged these problems. It considers how new ways of managing cultural assets can renovate largely non-competitive Chinese cultural industries. Together with a history of cultural commerce in China, the book details developments in new creative industries and provides the international context for creative cluster policy in Beijing and Shanghai.

#12

Political Regimes and the Media in Asia

2007

This book analyzes the relationship between political power and the media in a range of nation states in East and Southeast Asia, focusing in particular on the place of the media in authoritarian and post-authoritarian regimes.

#13

Television in Post-Reform China

Serial Dramas, Confucian Leadership and the Global Television Market

2008

This book explores the political, economic, and cultural forces, locally and globally that have shaped the evolution of Chinese primetime television dramas, and the way that these dramas in turn have actively engaged in the major intellectual and policy debates concerning the path, steps, and speed of China’s economic and political modernization during the post-Deng Xiaoping era. It intertwines the evolution of Chinese television drama particularly with the ascendance of the Chinese New Left that favors a recentralization of state authority and an alternative path towards China’s modernization and China’s current administration’s call for building a "harmonious society." Two types of serial drama are highlighted in this regard, the politically provocative dynasty drama and the culturally ambiguous domestic drama. The book also provides cross-cultural comparisons that parallel the textual and institutional strategies of transnational Chinese language TV dramas with dramas from the three leading centers of transnational television production, the US, Brazil and Mexico in Latin America, and the Korean-led East Asia region. The comparison reveals creative connections while it also explores how the emergence of a Chinese cultural-linguistic market, together with other cultural-linguistic markets, complicates the power dynamics of global cultural flows.

#14

Tamil Cinema

The Cultural Politics of India's Other Film Industry

2008

This book examines Tamil cinema, which has recently overtaken Bollywood in terms of annual output, outlining its history and distinctive characteristics, and proceeds to consider a number of important themes such as gender, religion, class, caste, fandom, cinematic genre, the politics of identity and diaspora.

#15

Budaya Populer di Indonesia, Mencairnya Identitas Pasca-Orde Baru

2008

Buku ini mengkaji budaya populer di Indonesia, negeri dengan penduduk Muslim terbanyak dan berkiblat pada sistem demokrasi terbesar ketiga di dunia. Buku ini menyajikan gambaran lengkap kecenderungan penting yang muncul sejak jatuhnya rezim otoriter Suharto (1998), masa terjadinya perubahan besar-besaran di Indonesia secara umum. Buku ini juga menguraikan bagaimana salah satu akibat terpenting dari pertumbuhan industrialisasi di Asia Tenggara sejak tahun 1980-an ialah perluasan konsumsi dan berbagai bentuk baru media, dan Indonesia merupakan contoh terbaik atas perkembangan tersebut. Buku ini juga menggambarkan kendati krisis ekonomi yang terjadi di Asia tahun 1997 memberi dampak langsung dan pengaruh negatif pada pemerintah yang tengah berkuasa, dan pada kehidupan sosio-ekonomi masyarakat di seluruh kawasan, di saat yang sama budaya populer secara dramatis mengalami kebangkitan yang tidak pernah terjadi sebelumnya. Analisis terhadap berbagai tema penting dimuat dalam buku ini, termasuk aktivisme politik dan kewarganegaraan, jender, kelas sosial, dan etnisitas. Secara keseluruhan, buku ini menunjukkan bagaimana proses pembentukan identitas yang berlapis-lapis dan saling-bertentangan di Indonesia teranyam erat dengan budaya populer. Sumber asli terjemahan ini mungkin merupakan salah satu buku berbahasa Inggris pertama yang mengupas media dan budaya populer di Indonesia. Dengan demikian buku ini diharapkan akan memberikan sumbangan penting bagi kepustakaan budaya populer di Asia, dan akan bermanfaat bagi siapa saja yang tertarik dengan perkembangan terbaru media dan budaya populer di Indonesia dan Asia.

#16

Television in India

Satellites, Politics and Cultural Change

2008

This book examines the development of television in India since the early 1990s, and its implications for Indian society more widely. Until 1991, India possessed only a single state-owned television channel, but since then there has been a rapid expansion in independent satellite channels which came as a complete break from the statist control of the past. This book explores this transformation, explaining how television, a medium that developed in the industrial West, was adapted to suit Indian conditions, and in turn has altered Indian social practices, making possible new ways of imagining identities, conducting politics and engaging with the state. In particular, satellite television initially came to India as the representative of global capitalism but it was appropriated by Indian entrepreneurs and producers who Indianized it. Considering the full gamut of Indian television - from "national" networks in English and Hindi to the state of regional language networks – this book elucidates the transformative impact of television on a range of important social practices, including politics and democracy, sport and identity formation, cinema and popular culture. Overall, it shows how the story of television in India is also the story of India's encounter with the forces of globalisation.

#17

Media and Cultural Transformation in China

2009

This book examines the role played by the media in China's cultural transformation in the early years of the 21st century. In contrast to the traditional view that sees the Chinese media as nothing more than a tool of communist propaganda, it demonstrates that the media is integral to China's changing culture in the age of globalization, whilst also being part and parcel of the State and its project of re-imagining national identity that is essential to the post-socialist reform agenda. It describes how the Party-state can effectively use media events to pull social, cultural and political resources and forces together in the name of national rejuvenation. However, it also illustrates how non-state actors can also use reporting of media events to dispute official narratives and advance their own interests and perspectives. It discusses the implications of this interplay between state and non-state actors in the Chinese media for conceptions of identity, citizenship and ethics, identifying the areas of mutual accommodation and appropriation, as well as those of conflict and contestation. It explores these themes with detailed analysis of four important 'media spectacles' the media events surrounding the new millennium celebrations; the news reporting of SARS; the media stories about AIDS and SARS; and the media campaign war between the Chinese state and the Falun Gong movement.

#18

Global Chinese Cinema

The Culture and Politics of 'Hero'

2010

The film Hero, directed by Zhang Yimou and released in 2002, is widely regarded as the first globally successful indigenous Chinese blockbuster. A big expensive film with multiple stars, spectacular scenery, and astonishing action sequences, it touched on key questions of Chinese culture, nation and politics, and was both a domestic sensation and an international hit. This book explores the reasons for the film’s popularity with its audiences, discussing the factors which so resonated with those who watched the film. It examines questions such as Chinese national unity, the search for cultural identity and role models from China’s illustrious pre-communist past, and the portrayal of political and aesthetic values, and attitudes to gender, sex, love, and violence which are relatively new to China. The book demonstrates how the film, and China’s growing film industry more generally, have in fact very strong international connections, with Western as well as Chinese financing, stars recruited from the East Asian region more widely, and extensive interactions between Hollywood and Asian artists and technicians. Overall, the book provides fascinating insights into recent developments in Chinese society, popular culture and cultural production.

#20

The Media, Cultural Control and Government in Singapore

2010

This book explores this inherent contradiction present in most facets of Singaporean media, cultural and political discourses, and identifies the key regulatory strategies and technologies that the ruling People Action Party (PAP) employs to regulate Singapore media and culture, and thus govern the thoughts and conduct of Singaporeans. It establishes the conceptual links between government and the practice of cultural policy, arguing that contemporary cultural policy in Singapore has been designed to shape citizens into accepting and participating in the rationales of government. Outlining the historical development of cultural policy, including the recent expansion of cultural regulatory and administrative practices into the ‘creative industries’, Terence Lee analyzes the attempts by the Singaporean authorities to engage with civil society, the ways in which the media is used to market the PAP’s policies and leadership and the implications of the internet for the practice of governmental control. Overall, The Media, Cultural Control and Government in Singapore offers an original approach towards the rethinking of the relationship between media, culture and politics in Singapore, demonstrating that the many contradictory discourses around Singapore only make sense once the politics and government of the media and culture are understood.

#21

Politics and the Media in Twenty-First Century Indonesia

Decade of Democracy

2010

Every political aspirant and activist knows the media are important. But there is little agreement on how an increasingly diversified media operate in post-authoritarian transitions and how they might promote, or impede, the pathways to a sustainable liberal democracy in the 21st century. This book examines the role of the media during Indonesia’s longest experiment with democratisation. It addresses two important and related how is the media being transformed, both in terms of its structure and content, by the changing political economy of Indonesia after the fall of Suharto? And what is the potential impact of this media in enabling or hampering the development of democracy in Indonesia? The book explores the relation between the working of democratisation, by examining the role of ethnic identity and nationalism; increasingly cheaper and diversified means of media production, challenging state monopolies of the media; the reality of personalised and globalised media; and the challenging of the connection between a free media and democracy by global capitalism and corporate control of the media. The book argues that the dominant forces transforming Indonesia today did not arise from the singular point of Suharto’s resignation, but from a set of factors which are independent from, but linked to, Indonesia’s internal politics and which shape its cultural industries.

#24

Islam and Popular Culture in Indonesia and Malaysia

2011

Home to approximately one-fifth of the world’s Muslim population, Indonesia and Malaysia are often overlooked or misrepresented in media discourses about Islam. Islam is a religion but there is also a popular culture, or popular cultures of Islam that are mass mediated, commercialized, pleasure-filled, humorous, and representative of large segments of society. During the last forty years, popular forms of Islam, targeted largely towards urbanized youth, have played a key role in the Islamisation of Indonesia and Malaysia. This book focuses on these forms and the accompanying practices of production, circulation, marketing, and consumption of Islam. Dispelling the notion that Islam is monolithic, militaristic, and primarily Middle Eastern, the book emphasizes its dynamic, contested, and performative nature in contemporary South East Asia. Written by leading scholars alongside media figures, such as Rhoma Irama and Ishadi SK, the case studies although not focused on theology per se, illuminate how Muslims (and non-Muslims) in Indonesia and Malaysia make sense of their lives within an increasingly pervasive culture of Islamic images, texts, film, songs, and narratives.

#25

Online Society in China

Creating, celebrating, and instrumentalising the online carnival

2011

This book discusses the rich and varied culture of China's online society, and its impact on offline China. It argues that the internet in China is a separate 'space' in which individuals and institutions emerge and interact. While offline and online spaces are connected and influence each other, the Chinese internet is more than merely a technological or media extension of offline Chinese society. Instead of following existing studies by locating online China in offline society, the contributors in this book discuss the carnival of the Chinese internet on its own terms. Examining the complex relationship between government officials and the people using the Internet in China, this book demonstrates that culture is highly influential in how technology is used. Discussing a wide range of different activities, the contributors examine what Chinese people actually do on the internet, and how their actions can be interpreted within the online society they are creating.

#26

Rethinking Transnational Chinese Cinemas

2011

The Amoy-dialect film industry emerged in the 1950s, producing cheap, b-grade films in Hong Kong for direct export to the theatres of Manila Chinatown, southern Taiwan and Singapore. Films made in Amoy dialect - a dialect of Chinese - reflected a particular period in the history of the Chinese diaspora, and have been little studied due to their ambiguous place within the wider realm of Chinese and East Asian film history. This book represents the first full length, critical study of the origin, significant rise and rapid decline of the Amoy-dialect film industry. Rather than examining the industry for its own sake, however, this book focuses on its broader cultural, political and economic significance in the region. It questions many of the assumptions currently made about the ‘recentness’ of transnationalism in Chinese cultural production, particularly when addressing Chinese cinema in the Cold War years, as well as the prominence given to ‘the nation’ and ‘transnationalism’ in studies of Chinese cinemas and of the Chinese Diaspora. By examining a cinema that did not fit many of the scholarly models of ‘transnationalism’, that was not grounded in any particular national tradition of filmmaking and that was largely unconcerned with ‘nation-building’ in post-war Southeast Asia, this book challenges the ways in which the history of Chinese cinemas has been studied in the recent past.

#27

Film in Contemporary Southeast Asia

Cultural Interpretation and Social Intervention

2011

This book discusses contemporary film in all the main countries of Southeast Asia, and the social practices and ideologies which films either represent or oppose. It shows how film acquires signification through cultural interpretation, and how film also serves as a site of contestations between social and political agents seeking to promote, challenge, or erase certain meanings, messages or ideas from public circulation. A unique feature of the book is that it focuses as much on films as it does on the societies from which these films it considers the reasons for film-makers taking the positions they take; the positions and counter-positions taken; the response of different communities; and the extent to which these interventions are connected to global flows of culture and capital.The wide range of subjects covered include documentaries as political interventions in Singapore; political film-makers' collectives in the Philippines, and films about prostitution in Cambodia and patriotism in Malaysia, and the Chinese in Indonesia. The book analyses films from Burma, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines, across a broad range of productions - such as mainstream and independent features across genres (for example comedy, patriotic, political, historical genres) alongside documentary, classic and diasporic films.

#28

China's New Creative Clusters

Governance, Human Capital and Investment

2011

Recognising that creativity is a major driving force in the post-industrial economy, the Chinese government has recently established a range of "creative clusters" – industrial parks devoted to media industries, and arts districts – in order to promote the development of the creative industries. This book examines these new creative clusters, outlining their nature and purpose, and assessing their effectiveness. Drawing on case studies of a range of cluster models, and comparing them with international examples, the book demonstrates that creativity, both in China and internationally, is in fact a process of fitting new ideas to existing patterns, models and formats. It shows how large and exceptionally impressive creative clusters have been successfully established, but raises the important questions of whether profit or culture is the driving force, and of whether the bringing together of independent-minded, creative people, entrepreneurial businessmen, preferential policies and foreign investment may in time lead to unintended changes in social and political attitudes in China, including a weakening of state bureaucratic power. An important contribution to the existing literature on the subject, this book will be of great interest to scholars of urban studies, cultural geography, cultural economics and Asian studies.

#29

Media and Democratic Transition in South Korea

2012

Since South Korea achieved partial democracy in 1987, the country has moved away from authoritarian political control. However, after two decades of democratic transition, South Korea still does not have a strong liberal, individualist culture – something that has brought about a wide range of scholarly discussion on the nature of democracy practised in this dynamic country. While the political changes in South Korea have received rigorous attention from Western scholars, less attention has been given to the changing nature and role of media in this and other such transitions. This book focuses on the changing role of media in the more democratised political landscape of South Korea. It thereby contributes to debates about the emerging role of the media in democratic transition, especially in relation to approaches that go beyond traditional Western constructs of media freedom and the relationship between the state and the media. In addition, it discusses the complex interacting forces that affect the role of the media and their implications for state control and democratisation.

#30

The Asian Cinema Experience

Styles, Spaces, Theory

2012

This book explores the range and dynamism of contemporary Asian cinemas, covering East Asia (China, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan), Southeast Asia (Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia), South Asia (Bollywood), and West Asia (Iran), in order to discover what is common about them and to engender a theory or concept of "Asian Cinema". It goes beyond existing work which provides a field survey of Asian cinema, probing more deeply into the field of Asian Cinema, arguing that Asian Cinema constitutes a separate pedagogical subject, and putting forward an alternative cinematic paradigm. The book covers "styles", including the works of classical Asian Cinema masters, and specific genres such as horror films, and Bollywood and Anime, two very popular modes of Asian Cinema; "spaces", including artistic use of space and perspective in Chinese cinema, geographic and personal space in Iranian cinema, the private "erotic space" of films from South Korea and Thailand, and the persistence of the family unit in the urban spaces of Asian big cities in many Asian films; and "concepts" such as Pan-Asianism, Orientalism, Nationalism and Third Cinema. The rise of Asian nations on the world stage has been coupled with a growing interest, both inside and outside Asia, of Asian culture, of which film is increasingly an indispensable component – this book provides a rich, insightful overview of what exactly constitutes Asian Cinema.

#31

Asian Popular Culture

The Global (Dis)continuity

2013

This book examines different aspects of Asian popular culture, including films, TV, music, comedy, folklore, cultural icons, the Internet and theme parks. It raises important questions such as – What are the implications of popularity of Asian popular culture for globalization? Do regional forces impede the globalizing of cultures? Or does the Asian popular culture flow act as a catalyst or conveying channel for cultural globalization? Does the globalization of culture pose a threat to local culture? It addresses two seemingly contradictory and yet parallel processes in the circulation of Asian popular the interconnectedness between Asian popular culture and western culture in an era of cultural globalization that turns subjects such as Pokémon, Hip Hop or Cosmopolitan into truly global phenomena, and the local derivatives and versions of global culture that are necessarily disconnected from their origins in order to cater for the local market. It thereby presents a collective argument that, whilst local social formations, and patterns of consumption and participation in Asia are still very much dependent on global cultural developments and the phenomena of modernity, yet such dependence is often concretized, reshaped and distorted by the local media to cater for the local market.

#32

Rumor and Communication in Asia in the Internet Age

2013

New communication technology has transformed the way in which news about key events is communicated. For example, in the immediate aftermath of catastrophic events such as the Mumbai attacks or the Japanese tsunami, partial accounts, accurate and inaccurate facts, rumour and speculation are now very rapidly disseminated across the globe, often ahead of official announcements and formal news reporting. Often in such situations rumours take hold, and continue to characterise events even after a more complete, more accurate picture eventually emerges. This book explores how such rumours are created, disseminated and absorbed in the age of the internet and mobile communications. It includes a wide range of examples and, besides considering the overall processes involved, engages with scholarly debates in the field of media and communication studies.

#33

Genders and Sexualities in Indonesian Cinema

Constructing gay, lesbi and waria identities on screen

2013

Indonesia has a long and rich tradition of homosexual and transgender cultures, and the past 40 years in particular has seen an increased visibility of sexual minorities in the country, which has been reflected through film and popular culture. This book examines how representations of gay, lesbian and transgender individuals and communities have developed in Indonesian cinema during this period. The book first explores Indonesian engagement with waria (male-to-female transgender) identities and the emerging representation of gay and lesbi Indonesians during Suharto’s New Order regime (1966-98), before going on to the reimagining of these positions following the fall of the New Order, a period which saw the rebirth of the film industry with a new generation of directors, producers and actors. Using original interview research and focus groups with gay, lesbi and waria identified Indonesians, alongside the films themselves and a wealth of archival sources, the book contrasts the ways in which transgendered lives are actually lived with their representations on screen.

#34

Contemporary Chinese Print Media

Cultivating Middle Class Taste

2011

This book examines the transformations in form, genre, and content of contemporary Chinese print media. It describes and analyses the role of post-reform social stratification in the media, focusing particularly on how the changing practices and institutions of the industry correspond to and accelerate the emergence of a relatively affluent urban leisure-reading market. It argues that this reinvention of Chinese print media vis-�-vis the creation of a post-socialist taste (class) culture is an essential part of the cultural and affective transformations in contemporary Chinese society, and demonstrates how the reinvention of such taste culture effectively creates, through new kinds of reading materials and carefully demarcated target audiences, a middle-class civility that serves as the locus of the new niche media market.

#36

Democracy, Media and Law in Malaysia and Singapore

A Space for Speech

2013

Commentators on the media in Southeast Asia either emphasise with optimism the prospect for new media to provide possibilities for greater democratic discourse, or else, less optimistically, focus on the continuing ability of governments to exercise tight and sophisticated control of the media. This book explores these issues with reference to Malaysia and Singapore. It analyses how journalists monitor governments and cover elections, discussing what difference journalism makes; it examines citizen journalism, and the constraints on it, often self-imposed constraints; and it assesses how governments control the media, including outlining the development and current application of legal restrictions.

#37

Indonesia-Malaysia Relations

Cultural Heritage, Politics and Labour Migration

2014

Drawing on social media, cinema, cultural heritage and public opinion polls, this book examines Indonesia and Malaysia from a comparative postcolonial perspective. The Indonesia–Malaysia relationship is one of the most important bilateral relationships in Southeast Asia, especially because Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populous country and third largest democracy, is the most populous and powerful nation in the region. Both states are committed to the relationship, especially at the highest levels of government, and much has been made of their ‘sibling’ identity. The relationship is built on years of interaction at all levels of state and society, and both countries draw on their common culture, religion and language in managing political tensions. In recent years, however, several issues have seriously strained the once cordial bilateral relationship. Among these are a strong public reaction to maritime boundary disputes, claims over each country’s cultural forms, the treatment of Indonesian workers in Malaysia, and trans-border issues such as Indonesian forest fire haze. Comparing the two nations’ engagement with cultural heritage, religion, gender, ethnicity, citizenship, democracy and regionalism, this book highlights the social and historical roots of the tensions between Indonesia and Malaysia, as well as the enduring sense of kinship.

#38

Chinese and Japanese Films on the Second World War

2014

This book examines representations of the Second World War in postwar Chinese and Japanese cinema. Drawing on a wide range of scholarly disciplines, and analysing a wide range of films, it demonstrates the potential of war movies for understanding contemporary China and Japan. It shows how the war is remembered in both countries, including the demonisation of Japanese soldiers in postwar socialist-era Chinese movies, and the pervasive sense of victimhood in Japanese memories of the war. However, it also shows how some Chinese directors were experimenting with alternatives interpretations of the war from as early as the 1950s, and how, despite the "resurgence of nationalism" in japan since the 1980s, the production of Japanese movies critical of the war has continued.

#39

New Chinese-Language Documentaries

Ethics, Subject and Place

2014

Documentary filmmaking is one of the most vibrant areas of media activity in the Chinese world, with many independent filmmakers producing documentaries that deal with a range of sensitive socio-political problems, bringing to their work a strongly ethical approach. This book identifies notable similarities and crucial differences between new Chinese-language documentaries in mainland China and Taiwan. It outlines how documentary filmmaking has developed, contrasts independent documentaries with dominant official state productions, considers how independent documentary filmmakers go about their work, including the work of exhibiting their films and connecting with audiences, and discusses the content of their documentaries, showing how the filmmakers portray a wide range of subject matter regarding places and people, and how they deal with particular issues including the underprivileged, migrants and women in an ethical way. Throughout the book demonstrates how successful Chinese-language independent documentary filmmaking is, with many appearances at international film festivals and a growing number of award-winning titles.

#40

K-Pop

The International Rise of the Korean Music Industry

2014

K-pop, described by Time Magazine in 2012 as "South Korea’s greatest export", has rapidly achieved a large worldwide audience of devoted fans largely through distribution over the Internet. This book examines the phenomenon, and discusses the reasons for its success. It considers the national and transnational conditions that have played a role in K-pop’s ascendancy, and explores how they relate to post-colonial modernisation, post-Cold War politics in East Asia, connections with the Korean diaspora, and the state-initiated campaign to accumulate soft power. As it is particularly concerned with fandom and cultural agency, it analyses fan practices, discourses, and underlying psychologies within their local habitus as well as in expanding topographies of online networks. Overall, the book addresses the question of how far "Asian culture" can be global in a truly meaningful way, and how popular culture from a "marginal" nation has become a global phenomenon.

#41

China Online

Locating Society in Online Spaces

2014

The Chinese internet is driving change across all facets of social life, and scholars have grown mindful that online and offline spaces have become interdependent and inseparable dimensions of social, political, economic, and cultural activity. This book showcases the richness and diversity of Chinese cyberspaces, conceptualizing online and offline China as separate but inter-connected spaces in which a wide array of people and groups act and interact under the gaze of a seemingly monolithic authoritarian state. The cyberspaces comprising "online China" are understood as spaces for interaction and negotiation that influence "offline China". The book argues that these spaces allow their users greater "freedoms" despite ubiquitous control and surveillance by the state authorities. The book is a sequel to the editors’ earlier work, Online Society in Creating, Celebrating and Instrumentalising the Online Carnival (Routledge, 2011).

#42

Multimedia Stardom in Hong Kong

2014

This book details original research into the practices and discourse of multimedia stardom alongside changing social and cultural landscapes in Hong Kong since 1980. It examines the cultural and sociological significance of stardom in the region, and the conditions which gave rise to such famous stars as Jackie Chan. This book elaborates the distinction between multimedia stardom and celebrity, asserting that in Hong Kong stardom has been central in the production and consumption of local media, while demonstrating the importance of multimedia stardom as part of the ‘cultural Chinese’ mediascape and transnational popular culture from both historical and contemporary contexts.

#44

Media and Communication in the Chinese Diaspora

Rethinking Transnationalism

2015

The rise of China has brought about a dramatic increase in the rate of migration from mainland China. At the same time, the Chinese government has embarked on a full-scale push for the internationalisation of Chinese media and culture. Media and communication have therefore become crucial factors in shaping the increasingly fraught politics of transnational Chinese communities. This book explores the changing nature of these communities, and reveals their dynamic and complex relationship to the media in a range of countries worldwide. Overall, the book highlights a number of ways in which China’s "going global" policy interacts with other factors in significantly reshaping the content and contours of the diasporic Chinese media landscape. In doing so, this book constitutes a major rethinking of Chinese transnationalism in the twenty-first century.

#45

Lifestyle Media in Asia

Consumption, Aspiration and Identity

2015

Across Asia, consumer culture is increasingly shaping everyday life, with neoliberal economic and social policies increasingly adopted by governments who see their citizens as individualised, sovereign consumers with choices about their lifestyles and identities. One aspect of this development has been the emergence of new wealthy middle classes with lifestyle aspirations shaped by national, regional and global media – especially by a range of new popular lifestyle media, which includes magazines, television and mobile and social media. This book explores how far everyday conceptions and experiences of identity are being transformed by media cultures across the region. It considers a range of different media in different Asian contexts, contrasting how the shaping of lifestyles in Asia differs from similar processes in Western countries, and assessing how the new lifestyle media represents not just a new emergent media culture, but also illustrates wider cultural and social changes in the Asian region.

#46

The Internet and New Social Formation in China

Fandom Publics in the Making

2016

There are billions of internet users in China, and this number is continually growing. This book looks at the various purposes of this internet use, and provides a study about how the entertainment-consuming users form into publics through the mediation of technologies in the era of network society. It questions how individuals, mediated by new information and communication technologies, come together to form new social categories. The book goes on to investigate how public(s) is formed in the era of network society, with particular focus on how fans become publics in a society that follows the logic of network. Using online surveys and in-depth interviews, this book provides a rich description of the process of constructing a new social formation in contemporary China.

#47

Youth Culture in Chinese Language Film

2016

This book explores the vigorous film cultures of mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong from the perspective of youth culture. The book relates this important topic to the wider social, cultural, and institutional context, and discusses the relationship between the films and the changes that today are transforming each society. Among the areas explored are the differences between the three film industries, their creation of new types of screen hero and heroine, and their conflicts with traditional Chinese attitudes such as respect for age. The many films discussed provide fresh perspectives on the ways in which young people are coping with gender, sexuality, class, coming of age, the pressures of education, and major social shifts such as rural to urban migration. They show young adults in each society striving to construct new value systems for a complex, rapidly changing environment.

#49

Eastern Westerns

Film and Genre Outside and Inside Hollywood

2016

The western, one of Hollywood’s great film genres, has, surprisingly, enjoyed a revival recently in Asia and in other parts of the world, whilst at the same time declining in America. Although the western is often seen as an example of American cultural dominance, this book challenges this view. It considers the western from an Asian perspective, exploring why the rise of Asian westerns has come about, and examining how its aesthetics, styles and politics have evolved as a result. It analyses specific Asian Westerns as well as Westerns made elsewhere, including in Australia, Europe, and Hollywood, to demonstrate how these employ Asian philosophical and mythical ideas and value systems. The book concludes that the western is a genre which is truly global, and not one that that is purely intrinsic to America.

#50

Singapore Cinema

New Perspectives

2016

This book outlines and discusses the very wide range of cinema which is to be found in Singapore. Although Singapore cinema is a relatively small industry, and relatively new, it has nevertheless made an impact, and continues to develop in interesting ways. The book shows that although Singapore cinema is often seen as part of diasporic Chinese cinema, it is in fact much more than this, with strong connections to Malay cinema and the cinemas of other Southeast Asian nations. Moreover, the themes and subjects covered by Singapore cinema are very wide, ranging from conformity to the regime and Singapore’s national outlook, with undesirable subjects overlooked or erased, to the sympathetic depiction of minorities and an outlook which is at odds with the official outlook. The book will be useful to readers coming new to the subject and wanting a concise overview, while at the same time the book puts forward many new research findings and much new thinking.

#51

Taiwan Cinema

International Reception and Social Change

2017

The book examines recent developments in Taiwan cinema, with particular focus on a leading contemporary Taiwan filmmaker, Wei Te-sheng, who is responsible for such Asian blockbusters as Cape No.7, Warriors of the Seediq Bale and Kano . The book discusses key issues, why (until about 2008) Taiwan cinema underwent a decline, and how cinema is portraying current social changes in Taiwan, including changing youth culture and how it represents indigenous people in the historical narrative of Taiwan. The book also explores the reasons why current Taiwan cinema is receiving a much less enthusiastic response globally compared to its reception in previous decades.

#52

Chinese Television and National Identity Construction

The Cultural Politics of Music-Entertainment Programmes

2016

This book examines music entertainment programmes on China Central Television, China’s only national level television network, as well as on nationally-available provincial channels, exploring how such programmes project a nuanced image of China’s identity and position in the world. It shows how the images presented - primarily to domestic audiences - are in step with China’s party-state nationalism, and at the same time flexible and open to change as China’s circumstances change. The book contextualises identity construction in the media by examining the development of television in China and the political struggles between provincial and national television stations, as well as by foregrounding the historical and contemporary role of musical culture in China's nation-building project. It discusses the portrayal of the majority Han Chinese, and of ethnic minorities and their music, which, the author argues, are shown as fitting with the party-state rhetoric of “a unitary multi-ethnic state”. It also outlines how the Chinese of Greater China – Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macao and the overseas Chinese – are incorporated into a mainland centred Chinese identity. In addition, it shows how the performances of foreign personalities on the Chinese television stage emphasise foreigners' attraction to China, the uniqueness of the Chinese nation and Chinese civilisation, and the revitalised role of China in the world. Overall, the book demonstrates how the variations of Chinese identity fit with prevailing political ideologies in China and with the emerging theme of a China-centred world.

#53

Screening China's Soft Power

2017

Promoting China's cultural soft power by disseminating modern Chinese values is one of the policies of President Xi Jinping. Although, it is usually understood as a top-down initiative, implemented willingly or unwillingly by writers, filmmakers, artists, and so on, and often manifesting itself in clumsy and awkward ways, for example, the concept of "the Chinese dream," intended to rival and perhaps appeal more strongly than "the American dream," modern Chinese values are in fact put forward in many ways by many different cultural actors. Through analyses of film festivals, CCTV, Confucius Institutes, auteurs, blockbusters, reality TV, and online digital cultures, this book exposes the limitations of China's officially promoted soft power in both conception and practice, and proposes a pluralistic approach to understanding Chinese soft power in local, regional, and transnational contexts. As such, the book demonstrates the limitations of existing theories of soft power, and argues that the US-derived concept of soft power can benefit from being examined from a China perspective.

Authors

Weiyu Zhang is an Associate Professor at the Department of Communication and New Media, National University of Singapore. She holds a PhD in Communication from the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, USA. Her research focuses on civic engagement and ICTs, with an emphasis on Asia. Her published works have appeared in the Journal of Communication, Communication Theory, Communication Research, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, and others. Her recent project is to develop and examine an online platform for citizen deliberation.

Terence Lee is an Associate Professor in Communication and Media Studies and a Research Fellow of the Asia Research Centre at Murdoch University, Australia. He is an interdisciplinary researcher with an interest in the intersections of media, culture and politics in Asia, especially Singapore. He is the author or editor of several books, including: Singapore: Negotiating State and Society, 1965-2015 (with Jason Lim, Routledge, 2016), Voting in Change: Politics of Singapore’s 2011 General Election (with Kevin YL Tan, Ethos Books, 2011) and The Media, Cultural Control and Government in Singapore (Routledge, 2010 and 2012).

Dr. Ying Zhu is a Professor in the Department of Media Culture at The College of Staten Island of the City University of New York (CUNY). She earned her Ph.D. at the University of Texas at Austin. In addition to her books, she also produced documentaries for Netherlands public television: Google vs. China (2011) and China: From Cartier to Confucius (2012).

Laikwan Pang teaches cultural studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She is the author of Building a New Cinema in China: The Chinese Left-wing Cinema Movement, 1932-37 (Rowman and Littlefield, 2004) and Cultural Control and Globalisation in Asia: Copyright, Piracy and Cinema (RoutledgeCurzon, forthcoming). (copied from the blurb at the back of Masculinities and Hong Kong Cinema)

Stephen Teo is currently associate professor at the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He has done significant research work in the field of the Hong Kong cinema, and his research areas include other Asian cinemas, revolving around subjects of genre theory, film history, auteur studies, cultural studies, national cinema, and investigations into the literary and visual aspects of film theory.