Transcoding a wanghong city: Mediatized culturalization of urban places in China

Abstract

Digital media have been playing an increasingly pivotal role in reshaping urban spaces, landscapes, and lifestyles across the world. In China, the rapid development of digital infrastructure, platforms, and e-commerce has fueled the rise of a number of so-called wanghong cities. A term originally employed to denote internet celebrities, wanghong as a social phenomenon, practice, and modus operandi now penetrates different spheres of life in China. This article presents a case study of a new wanghong city, Zibo, a third-tier industrial city that rose to sudden fame in 2023 with the aid of livestreaming and short video. Extending Manovich’s idea of “transcoding” between the cultural and the digital, this article investigates how the logics, aesthetics, and sensibilities of digital (social) media increasingly carry over to the “imagineering” of built environment—particularly urban place-making—within interlocking processes of mediatization and culturalization. Mediatized culturalization of urban places in China prompts us to critically reflect on deeper questions around the right to and the future of our cities in the social media era.