Post-socialist imaginaries of a digital Third Front: The case of Guizhou-cloud Big Data
Key information
- Date
- Time
-
5:00 pm to 6:30 pm
- Venue
- Main building, SOAS University of London
- Room
- RB01
- Event type
- Seminar & Event highlights
About this event
In this talk, Professor Bingchun Meng will discuss the politics and poetics of data infrastructure through an examination of Guizhou-Cloud Big Data (GCBD).
She deploys the concept of "post-socialist imaginaries" to analyse how Guizhou, an economically lagging province, has positioned itself as a strategic hub for big data and cloud computing. The "politics" refers to the development policies promoting digital innovation as an engine of growth, while the "poetics" involves the discursive framing of big data through fantasies and desires.
The qualifier "post-socialist" highlights the coexistence of multiple temporalities beyond linear developmentalism. By probing this peculiar case, she aims to generate insights into how data infrastructures are being institutionally reconfigured in China vis-a-vis its modernization trajectory and divergent conditions compared to Western contexts.
About the speaker
Bingchun Meng is a Professor in the Department for Media and Communications at LSE and the Director of LSE PhD Academy. She is also the Co-Director of LSE-Fudan Global Public Policy Research Centre. Her research interests include gender and the media, political economy of media industries, communication governance, and comparative media studies. She has published widely in these topic areas on leading academic journals.
Her book The Politics of Chinese Media: Consensus and Contestation was published by Palgrave in early 2018. Her co-edited volume (with Guobin Yang and Elaine Yuan) Pandemic Crossings: Digital Technology, Everyday Experience and Governance in the Covid-19 Crisis is coming out with Michigan University Press in January 2024. She is currently working on another monograph under contract with Columbia University Press about AI industries in China.
Chair: Dr Xiaoning Lu, SOAS School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics
Registration
This event is free to attend, but registration is required. Please note that seating is on a first-come, first-served basis.
This event is taking place on campus and will not be recorded or live-streamed.
Organiser
Contact
- Email: sci@soas.ac.uk
Photo credit: Joshua Fernandez via Unsplash
