Todd Sandel, associate professor of communication at the University of Macau, will visit UNU Institute in Macau and deliver a talk entitled “Addressing, Re-Accenting, and Othering Utterances on WeChat: a Bakhtinian Analysis.” Dr. Sandel is also the supervisor of Jenny Ju at the University of Macau.
SHORT BIO
Todd Lyle Sandel is Associate Professor of Communication at the University of Macau. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, associate editor of The International Encyclopedia of Language and Social Interaction, and author of Brides on Sale: Taiwanese Cross-Border Marriages in a Globalizing Asia, for which he received the 2016 Outstanding Book Award from the International & Intercultural Division of the National Communication Association. His research has appeared in Language in Society, Research on Language & Social Interaction, Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, Journal of Contemporary China, China Media Research, and elsewhere.
ABSTRACT
WeChat is a popular social media application developed in China and designed for the mobile phone. Users may send and receive messages in a variety of systems, including text, emoji, gif files, pictures, and audio messages. They may create messages in one or more languages and code systems, and may interact asynchronously, or synchronously. Studying how young people in the Pearl River Delta of Macao and Zhuhai construct and communicate such messages on social media is the aim of this paper. In particular, this study uses Bakhtin’s concept of ‘speech genres’ in order to analyze and explain how users construct, interpret, and address their messages. Lastly, this paper considers implications of these messages on identity and relationship construction among China’s youth.