Overview

This comprehensive study offers an examination of China’s Internet celebrity (""Wang Hong"") phenomenon through a critical political economy framework, investigating how social media platforms, talent agencies, and e-commerce systems intersect to create a complex digital labour ecosystem. Employing extensive semi-structured interviews across three key platforms – social media, short video sites, and live streaming platforms – the book reveals a sophisticated three-link industry chain of production, dissemination, and consumption that characterises China’s Internet celebrity industry. The book explores the intricate workings of the influencer economy, highlighting the stark disparity in working conditions and economic outcomes between successful influencers and precarious platform workers, as well as fan identity construction and consumption patterns, examining how fans integrate into collective identities and shared values within broader social contexts. Through its theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions, this monograph provides crucial insights into the commodification of digital labour, working conditions, and the distinctive features of China’s Internet celebrity industry within its specific political, economic, and cultural framework. As such, it will be of great value to scholars, cultural practitioners, students, and all those interested in digital culture, media industry, Chinese and East Asian studies, and the political economy of communication.

Full Product Details

9781041139768

Table of Contents

Reviews

“Xinyi Yang’s book shows how class and ideology operate in China’s Internet celebrity industry and celebrity economy. It is an excellent, highly meticulous and extremely insightful study, a must-read for everyone who wants to better understand the Internet in China and how influencers shape contemporary digital capitalism. I highly recommend the book to everyone who wants to understand how to apply the political economy of communication approach to a concrete case such as Internet celebrities.” -- Christian Fuchs, Professor of Media Systems and Media Organisation, Paderborn University, Germany “This is a well-researched, cogent and penetrating study of a neglected area in celebrity studies: Internet celebrities in China. Xinyi Yang shows how platform exchange operates within the context of a state sponsored society-wide media. The book is a landmark contribution to the comparative study of celebrity culture.” -- Chris Rojek, Professor of Sociology, City and St George’s, University of London, The United Kingdom

“Xinyi Yang’s book shows how class and ideology operate in China’s Internet celebrity industry and celebrity economy. It is an excellent, highly meticulous and extremely insightful study, a must-read for everyone who wants to better understand the Internet in China and how influencers shape contemporary digital capitalism. I highly recommend the book to everyone who wants to understand how to apply the political economy of communication approach to a concrete case such as Internet celebrities”. -- Christian Fuchs, Professor of Media Systems and Media Organisation, Paderborn University, Germany “This is a well-researched, cogent and penetrating study of a neglected area in celebrity studies: Internet celebrities in China. Xinyi Yang shows how platform exchange operates within the context of a state sponsored society-wide media. The book is a landmark contribution to the comparative study of celebrity culture”. -- Chris Rojek, Professor of Sociology, City and St George’s, University of London, The United Kingdom

Author Information

Xinyi Yang is a researcher in media and communication and holds a PhD from the University of Westminster, the United Kingdom. Her research focuses on the political economy of social media, with particular attention to Internet celebrities in the Chinese context.

Tab Content 6

Countries Available