Piracy Cultures| From “D-Buffs” to the “D-Generation”: Piracy, Cinema, and An Alternative Public Sphere in Urban China

Authors

  • Jinying Li

Abstract

China’s rampant movie piracy has given rise to an alternative film culture. Through the viral infrastructure of pirate circulation and consumption, an active cineaste culture of “D-buffs” and an independent film practice, the “D-generation,” have rapidly emerged and expanded in urban China. This essay’s examination of the D-buff subculture and the D-generation movement shows that this alternative, pirate film culture has opened up precious space for an alternative public sphere to develop counter to the hegemonic pseudo-public controlled by state censorship and commercial industries. By organizing spectatorship and filmmaking through the shadow system of piracy, this alternative public sphere provides an inclusive, heterogeneous, and non-controllable social horizon for organizing collective experience and identities.

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Published

2012-04-12

Issue

Vol. 6 (2012)

Section

Special Sections

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