Enchanted

Harry Potter and magical capitalism in urban China

Datos Bibliográficos

ID19136019
AutoresJ N Erni (0000-0003-0609-7512, autor de correspondencia)
Año2008
Volumen1
Número2
Páginas138-155
Fecha de publicación2008-08-22
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaChinese Journal of Communication (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1754-4769 • E-ISSN: 1754-4750
EditorialTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/17544750802287828
OpenAlexW2172171610
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas25

“Pottermania”, or the crazed transnational consumption of the most popular children's fantasy fiction series in publishing history, has swept across urban China. It took place along with the rapid emergence of the country's middle‐class culture since the 1990s, marked primarily by a robust consumer revolution constructed as both reality and global dream. Even before China's official membership in the World Trade Organization began, Harry Potter (translated into Chinese) had been widely popular in affluent urban centers, bringing a foreign cultural impact that accompanies the economic tidal waves promised by the accession to the WTO. This essay explores the relationships between local consumption of a transnational cultural text/intertext and the formation of an emerging social imaginary about the urban Chinese middle class. It suggests that the Potter series promotes an alternating valorization and critique of capitalist consumption, which provides young Chinese readers, growing up in the midst of a consumer revolution, with a dialectic of enchantment. It is argued that this enchantment presents a productive tension with which to theorize the current moment of Chinese consumerist capitalism

Art · Capitalism · China · Consumerism · Dialectic · Economic history · Economics · Economy · Fantasy · Literature · Media studies · Middle class · Political economy · Political science · Popular culture · Social science · Sociology · The Imaginary · Asian Culture and Media Studies · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · History · Japanese History and Culture · Law · Philosophy