1. Introduction (Michael Samuel, University of Warwick and Louisa Mitchell, University of Leeds)
2. Netflix Japan: National Genres In Dialogue (Michael Samuel, University of Warwick)
3. Online Bingeing of Free Chinese TV Bound to Soft Power (Sheng-mei Ma, Michigan State University)
4. Attaining #fame Stardom: Middle-class Female Cover Artist’s Socio-musical interactions with Livestream Audiences (Nina Menezes, University Of Tampa)
5. Islands in the Stream (Stephen Sarrazin and Yangyu Zhang, Tokyo University of Art)
6. The Cosmopolitics of Asian Magical Realism: Analysing the Decentralisation of Local Chinese Folklore in the Global Netflix series The Ghost Bride(David H.J. Neo and Sanghamitra Dalal, Universiti Teknologi Mara (Uitm), Malaysia)
7. Content ‘Carnival’: (Re)Viewing Over-the-Top Culture in India (Anmol Dutta, University of Mumbai)
8. Riding the Wavve: Platform Imperialism and South Korea’s Streaming Market (Daniela Mazur, Melina Meimaridis and Daniel Rios, Federal Fluminense University, Brazil)
9. Sounding Local? The Use of Library Music in Original Australian Streaming Productions (Toby Huelin, University of Leeds)
10. She Eats Well: Exploring Desirability Through Food and Romance in Korean Dramas (Shelby Ragan and Katy Lewis, Illinois State University)
11. Compressed Modernity in China: Grassroots-made Fiction on Short Video Streaming Platforms (Liang Meng, University College London and Song Sun, University of Science and Technology of China)
12. Screening a New 2Getherness: The Purple Baht and Soft Power in Thai Boys Love (BL) Stories (M. Antonio Lizada, The University of Hong Kong)
13. China’s Streaming Culture: A Study of Bilibili and Bullet Comments (Dongli Chen, Hong Kong Baptist University)
14. Interactivity, Discoverability and Localization: Chinese Streaming Apps for Chinese Viewers (Xiaoran Zhang, University of Nottingham)
15. How Much Does Subtitle Say? A Viewer Reception Study of Chinese TV Dramas Streamed Overseas (Jingjing Li, University of Leicester)
16. Eastern Promise? The Ill-fated Journey of Marco Polo and the Role of Medieval Fantasy in Netflix’s Strategy for Development in East Asia (Daniel Clarke, University of Sheffield)
17. Conclusion (Michael Samuel, University of Warwick, and Louisa Mitchell, University of Leeds)
Louisa Mitchell is an independent scholar and editor. Her doctoral thesis, “Disrupting Heritage Cinema: The Historical Films of South Korea,” was completed at the University of Leeds in 2019, under the WRoCAH Doctoral Research Partnership. Her research interests include national cinemas, colonialism/postcolonialism, and issues of cultural and historical representation. She has most recently been published in the 2021 collection Renegotiating Film Genres in East Asian Cinema and Beyond (2020) by Lin Feng and James Aston.
Michael Samuel is a Lecturer in Film and Television Studies at the University of Bristol, UK. He is the author of Popular Factual Heritage Television (2022) and Northern Exposure: A Cultural History (2021), and the co-editor of True Detective: Critical Essays on the HBO Series (2017). He is currently editing an anthology about television and empathy.
“This exciting new collection explores the dynamic terrain of streaming platforms in the Asia Pacific and the attendant transformation of screen cultures in the region. The perspectives offered are timely, engaging, and help us make sense of a vast and rapidly changing field.”
— Olivia Khoo, Associate Professor in Film and Screen Studies, Monash University, Australia, author of Asian Cinema: A Regional View (2021) and co-editor of The Routledge Handbook of New Media in Asia (2016)
This book is an interdisciplinary collection exploring the impact of emergent technologies on the production, distribution and reception of media content in the Asia-Pacific region. Exploring case studies from China, Japan, South Korea, India, Thailand and Australia, as well as American co-productions, this collection takes a Cultural Studies approach to the constantly evolving ways of accessing and interacting with visual content. The study of the social and technological impact of online on-demand services is a burgeoning field of investigation, dating back to the early-2010s. This project will be a valuable update to existing conversations, and a cornerstone for future discussions about topics such as online technologies, popular culture, soft power, and social media.
Louisa Mitchell is an independent scholar and editor. Her doctoral thesis, “Disrupting Heritage Cinema: The Historical Films of South Korea,” was completed at the University of Leeds in 2019, under the WRoCAH Doctoral Research Partnership. Her research interests include national cinemas, colonialism/postcolonialism, and issues of cultural and historical representation. She has most recently been published in the 2021 collection Renegotiating Film Genres in East Asian Cinema and Beyond (2020) by Lin Feng and James Aston.
Michael Samuel is a Lecturer in Film and Television Studies at the University of Bristol, UK. He is the author of Popular Factual Heritage Television (2022) and Northern Exposure: A Cultural History (2021), and the co-editor of True Detective: Critical Essays on the HBO Series (2017). He is currently editing an anthology about television and empathy.