Muskegon Community College’s Lecture Series continues Wednesday, Nov. 10, with University of Michigan Post-Doctoral Fellow Dr. Sheng Zou discussing “Entertaining Propaganda? How State-run Media in China Reinvent Themselves on Digital Platforms.”
The online lecture, which is free and open to the public, begins at 6:30 p.m. To join the Zoom meeting, please use the following link: https://muskegoncc-edu.zoom.us/j/95287125323 Meeting ID: 952 8712 5223 To connect to audio by phone, dial 1-646-558-8656.
Zou’s talk focuses on the restyling of propaganda in China, particularly the role of Chinese state-run media in the making of soft propaganda, where ideological persuasion is entwined with various forms of digital entertainment, such as hip-hop music videos, memes, webapps, and mobile games.
“Propaganda has been increasingly digitized, popularized, and aestheticized globally,” explains Zou, whose research is conducted at the University of Michigan’s Lieberthal-Rogel Center for Chinese Studies. “By offering a glimpse of emblematic cases, it will illuminate Chinese state-run media’s appropriation of digitization to enhance their status and the resilience of the political regime.”
Zou approaches propaganda not simply as a political instrument but as multifaceted media artifacts. In doing so, he redirects attention from the reception and effect of propaganda to its production and disingenuous design. Using the example of China, Zou seeks to address a global challenge for the public in the digital age, namely the rise of hybrid media forms and practices that stealthily finesse and blur the line between strategic and autotelic communication.
He received his PhD in Communication and Media Studies from Stanford University. His research interests include global media industries, digital politics and popular culture, platform economy, and emergent technologies. His recent projects explore how digital technologies reshape modes of cultural production and governance and how they refashion subjectivities, mobilities, and social encounters in China.
“China has the largest population and the second largest economy in the world,” added MCC Instructor Andy Wible, who coordinates the Lecture Series. “Yet, the internet and social media work quite differently than the rest of the world presenting both challenges and opportunities for the rest of the world. Dr. Zou’s talk couldn’t be timelier.”
For more information on the MCC Lecture Series, contact Wible at (231) 777-0626 or andy.wible@muskegoncc.edu.