Chapter 2
The divided affective connections with the influencer
Teacher Guo and fans’ digital carnival on Douyin
This study explores the multimodal Chinese language discourses of an emerging type of influencers
on the short video platform Douyin, the domestic counterpart of TikTok in Mainland China. Their hilarious performance
is scornfully celebrated for vulgarity and absurdity. In public
discussions, they are described as “pretending craziness and selling stupidity”. The analysis takes “Teacher Guo” as
an example. Her funny, awkward and obscene performance, and audiences’ participation in China’s heavily regulated
online space inspire the current study to adopt the theoretical lens of carnival. The study examines how audiences’
affective connections with Teacher Guo manifest through both the influencer’s and the audience’s carnivalesque
semiotic practices. Findings show that Teacher Guo performs a vulgar and obscene image through her grotesque body and
comic language. Audiences’ negative affective connection with her results from rejecting such social transgression:
the vulgarity and obscenity are considered as a bad object in today’s wanghong culture. In contrast,
the positive connection with Teacher Guo is manifested through the carnivalesque participation by those who
temporarily transgress the norms of being serious, positive and polite online, thus conducting light-hearted cultural
resistance with mischievous fun.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Theoretical framework
- 2.1Wanghong culture in China
- 2.2The affective connections between audiences and media figures
- 2.3Carnival and its digital manifestations
- 3.Methodology
- 3.1Data collection
- 3.2Data analysis
- 4.Results
- Teacher Guo’s performance of grotesque body
- Teacher Guo’s comic verbal composition and the audience’s mimetic uptake
- The audience’s mock abusive comments
- Frontstaging the content moderation practices of the platform
- 5.Discussion and conclusion
-
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