Whether Foreign Influencers Assimilate into Chinese Society or Culturally Accommodate to Social Media?

• In Event: 20220 - Section on Communication, Information Technology, and Media Sociology Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Section on Communication, Information Technology, and Media Sociology Roundtable IX: Social Media I

Abstract

Many foreign nationals who are living in China have became important influencers in Chinese social media. We tried to answer the following questions: What are the typical demographic characteristics of these influencers? What are their most well-liked contents in social media? Are the contents reflections of their assimilation in the Chinese society, or just indications of their cultural accommodation in the Chinese social media environment?
Thought analyzing the demographic profile of the 26 most popular foreign influencers in Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, we try to answer these questions. Two primary demographic profiles are shared by these influencers: (1) White women from former Soviet countries who marry Chinese men and have mixed-race children. (2) Married white men from developed Western countries who run their business in China. Their most successful contents all include sharing their family lives or their love towards China through humorous narratives. Employing information from Douchacha, a professional data analysis platform for Douyin, we also identify the typical characteristics of the followers of these influencers: small-town youngsters. Learnt from the literature, they prefer family and state-related contents and they have few opportunities to interact with foreigners in real life. However, they display a keen curiosity and openness to influencers based on discourse analysis of their comments under the videos.
Interviews with seven influencers confirm such accommodation by highlighting how the commercial models, Multi-Channel Networks (MCNs), and algorithms also contribute to the similarity of the cultural images (video themes and demographic characteristics). The influencers tailor their content to align with the preferences of Chinese social media users in pursuit of greater profits. This indicate that the interactions between Chinese netizens and foreign influencers in cyberspace result in the accommodation of foreign influencer to the social media environment in China, rather than their assimilation into Chinese culture.

Author

• Dong Cheng, Shanghai University