{"id":1371,"date":"2018-08-12T04:10:10","date_gmt":"2018-08-11T20:10:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acas.world\/?p=1371"},"modified":"2020-08-13T21:07:28","modified_gmt":"2020-08-13T13:07:28","slug":"between-ideological-confinement-and-cultural-creativity-an-exploration-of-chinese-independent-animation-as-a-formative-agent-of-cultural-identity-ph-d-dissertation-by-aaron-wenhai-zhou-the-univer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acas.world\/zh\/2018\/08\/12\/between-ideological-confinement-and-cultural-creativity-an-exploration-of-chinese-independent-animation-as-a-formative-agent-of-cultural-identity-ph-d-dissertation-by-aaron-wenhai-zhou-the-univer\/","title":{"rendered":" Between Ideological Confinement and Cultural Creativity: An Exploration of Chinese Independent Animation as a Formative Agent of Cultural Identity<\/em>, Ph.D. dissertation, by Aaron Wenhai Zhou, The University of Waikato, New Zealand, 2017. 318 pp."},"content":{"rendered":"

By Cyrus Huiyong Qiu<\/strong><\/p>\n

Aaron Wenhai Zhou\u2019s Ph.D. dissertation offers an in-depth exploration of the flourishing independent animation industry in modern China. While the growing animation industry in China and its rich variety of mainstream cultural products receive much of the spotlight from the media as well as attention from academia, research on Chinese independent animation, as Zhou comments, remains insufficient, arguably due to \u201cthe difficulties of highlighting the ontology of any \u2018independent\u2019 cultural production within contemporary China\u201d (pp. 3). In his attempt to contribute to the study of both the independent animation industry and contemporary society and culture in China, Zhou employs Manuel DeLanda\u2019s assemblage theory as a framework to analyze the ecology of Chinese independent animation within the context of China\u2019s \u201cpost-socialist\u201d culture from 1994 onwards. Zhou argues that Chinese independent animation embodies a potential to \u201cdiscover a realm of discourse beyond the current post-socialist Chinese society, also as an alternative opportunity to challenge the traditions of conventional Chinese animation\u201d (pp. 5). In doing so, Zhou sheds light on how individual animation artists\u2014Pisan and Lei Lei in particular\u2014navigate the border between political constraints and individual expression in their creative practices.<\/p>\n

Zhou\u2019s dissertation consists of seven chapters. In the introductory chapter, Zhou provides an overview of his research on Chinese independent animation, and contextualizes it in China\u2019s post-socialist culture. He argues that, while meishu<\/em> style (national style) plays a dominant role in Chinese traditional\/mainstream animation, as well as literature and art, \u201cthe predicament of having to negotiate between the creative possibilities of [independent artists\u2019] work and the post-socialist social order is the crucial element that distinguishes the Chinese \u2018independent\u2019 scene from others\u201d (pp. 20). Zhou then offers a literature review of the recent scholarship on Chinese animation, and he proposes an ecological approach to examine the mediascape of independent animation. He points out that there is a significant artistic shift in contemporary Chinese animation from meishu<\/em> (national style) to \u201can independent sector with a more divergent profile\u201d in 1994, as the country transformed from a \u201cplanned economy\u201d to a \u201cmarket economy\u201d (pp. 25). The proliferation of Flash animation (created by independent artists known as shanke<\/em>) around the 2000s further exemplifies the desire for self-expression and the urge to reconstruct a collective identity among the animation practitioners who \u201cstand out as one of the most significant post-socialistic initiatives\u201d (pp. 53). In order to construct a clear trajectory of the independent artists\u2019 movements during the post-socialist phase of reform after the 1990s, Zhou proposes an \u201cecological\u201d conception, which is further discussed in the ensuing chapter.<\/p>\n

The second chapter provides a detailed discussion of the methodology used in this project. Zhou makes it clear that rather than creating an exhaustive record of the current independent animation industry, he endeavors to expand the possibilities of an ecological conception of independent animation through analyses of interview transcripts, specific texts, and the institutional framework and ideological constructs, with a focus primarily on works by Pisan and Lei Lei.<\/p>\n

For his theoretical framework, Zhou employs Manuel DeLanda\u2019s assemblage theory to further an \u201cecological\u201d study of the dispersed yet interconnected independent practices of animation. According to Zhou, the ultimate aim of this approach is to \u201cidentify specific strategies for how independent animation artists find their own way out and renegotiate the balance between national propaganda, discourse and global culture\u201d (pp. 82).<\/p>\n

Applying the concept of media ecology to specific cases, Chapter 3 highlights three contrasting instances\u2014Ai Weiwei, Pisan, and Lei Lei\u2014to examine how these artists have strategically confronted and dealt with the post-socialist reality in terms of varied levels of political constraints on their practices. Zhou demonstrates how they utilize social media for different purposes in response to the sociopolitical milieu in China. While the political activist\/artist Ai focuses on the issue of democracy and social concerns, independent animators Pisan and Lei Lei concentrate on the freedom of artistic creation itself, as a form of self-expression (pp. 108). Along with the establishment of CIAFF (Chinese Independent Animation Film Forum) in 2011, the outcome of their endeavors is, as Zhou suggests, that independent animation artists have developed a sense of community\u2014\u201cnot simply as an \u2018imagined community<\/em>\u2019 but as participants in a globalized ecological assemblage\u201d (pp. 124).<\/p>\n

Whereas Chapter 3 focuses on the independent artists\u2019 strategies to work around the social and political confinements in China, Chapter 4 and 5 offer an in-depth analysis of Pisan and Lei Lei\u2019s independent animation works to explore how their animated universes serve as a response to China\u2019s post-socialist reality and resonate with their audiences. In Chapter 4, Zhou first gives a brief introduction of Pisan and his career path, highlighting how Pisan prefers to use Flash to create animation for the reasons of practicality (as a low-cost technology) and convenience (for distribution on social media platform). Zhou then focuses on two of Pisan\u2019s most well-known animation series: the politically sensitive Little Rabbit<\/em> Kuangkuang<\/em> (2011), which is banned in China, and the commercially successful Miss Puff <\/em>(2011). He argues that Little Rabbit<\/em> Kuangkuang, <\/em>with its dark humor and playfulness, \u201ccritiques and questions the ultimate purpose of political propaganda by using unobtrusive manner to capture the reality of \u2018post-socialist\u2019 existence on a collective basis\u201d (pp. 159). In comparison, Pisan refrains from dealing with actual politics in Miss Puff<\/em>, and instead explores the \u201csuppressed desire for freedom\u2026an individual expression to confront social confinement\u201d through the protagonist\u2019s eroticized body and sexual promiscuity (pp. 191).    <\/p>\n

Chapter 5 focuses on the career trajectory and selected animation works of Lei Lei, another independent animation artist that is starting to receive recognition from both domestic and international audiences. Different from Pisan\u2019s approach to political\/social issues, Lei Lei\u2019s intent through his animation is \u201cneither to compliment nor criticize social events, but rather, to deliver his personalized creative expression\u201d (pp. 197). Through his thorough analysis of Lei\u2019s works\u2014The Face<\/em> (2007) and The Universe Cotton <\/em>(2009) in particular\u2014<\/em>Zhou demonstrates how they embody \u201ca level of self-expressionism rooted in [Lei\u2019s] upbringing and memories\u201d which greatly resonates with the young audiences (pp. 233). Zhou argues that Lei\u2019s tactful use of abstracted faces, metaphorically significant colors, motifs, and symbols reveals \u201ca genuinely postmodern reality and vision through Lei Lei\u2019s eyes,\u201d and \u201can attitude of resistance from the youth generation in response to sociocultural changes\u201d (pp. 233).<\/p>\n

With Pisan and Lei Lei as case studies, Zhou has hitherto demonstrated how independent artists operate within the ecological system in post-socialist China and negotiate a space for their individual artistic creativity. In Chapter 6, he presents an overview of two feature-length animation films\u2014Liu Jian\u2019s Piercing I<\/em> (2010) and Wang Chuan\u2019s Kuiba<\/em> (2011)\u2014to discuss how the independent and mainstream sectors are deeply interconnected in the contemporary media ecology of China, and how they contribute to the discourse on the notion of \u201cChineseness.\u201d Zhou points out that mainstream animation, especially projects that receive financial support from the government, tends to emphasize its contextual linkage with traditional Chinese culture and literature in order to establish a \u201cnational ideology of Chineseness.\u201d Zhou then argues that independent animation (Piercing I<\/em>, in this case) reveals \u201can abiding postmodern ambivalence to the notion of \u2018Chineseness\u2019\u201d (pp. 259), because \u201cindependent animation was positioned in the shadow to capture the post-socialist milieu based on vivid experience and rising concerns regarding individual identity\u201d (pp. 283).<\/p>\n

To conclude, Zhou\u2019s dissertation adopts an ecological approach to capture the Chinese independent animation mediascape, emphasizing the complexity and diversity of its various assemblages<\/em> that interact with each other within the transformative media ecology in post-socialist China. What is especially insightful in Zhou\u2019s work is that he provides both an insider view (on how artists navigate their way to succeed and survive in the context of China\u2019s contemporary sociocultural configuration), as well as an outsider view (on how various artists, industry sectors, institutes, etc., exert influence on each other while remaining closely interconnected). It is a significant work that contributes not only to the study of Chinese independent animation but also to a greater understanding of a changing China.<\/p>\n

Bio: <\/strong><\/p>\n

Cyrus Huiyong Qiu received his B.A. in Japanese from Shenzhen University (Shenzhen, China) and M.A. in Modern Japanese Literature and Popular Culture from the University of British Columbia (Vancouver, Canada). His Master\u2019s thesis, entitled \u201cKeroro Guns\u00f4<\/em>: Carnivalization in Japanese Anime,\u201d explores issues of political humor, war history\/memory and gender as embedded in anime comedies. Qiu is currently pursuing a Ph.D. at the University of British Columbia, and his research focuses on Japanese popular culture and its circulation among Japan, Korea, and China. <\/p>\n\r\n\t\t