Image and Experience: Watching Shanghai Promotional Videos with Shanghai Residents

Please join the USC U.S.-China Institute for a talk by Professor Lu Ye from the Fudan University on how locals in Shanghai understand visual expressions of their urban culture, and how their personal experiences shape what people take away from these images of the city.

Click here to watch a video of the presentation. 

Lu Ye 陆 晔
School of Journalism, Fudan University

These days, individuals, organizations, and governments are all engaged in self-promotion, offering up self-definitions. One example of this are city promotional videos. These media productions transform a living city of people into an image. How do audiences process and understand these images? Can audiences agree on what constitutes urban culture?

This presentation draws on in-depth interviews in Shanghai to explore how local audiences understand visual expressions of their urban culture, and how their personal experiences shape what people take away from these images of the city.

Prof. Lu Ye is one of China’s most accomplished media scholars. Starting out as a computer scientist, she subsequently earned an MA in journalism at the Beijing Broadcasting Institute and a Ph.D. in journalism at Fudan University. She’s now a professor at Fudan and deputy director of the Center for Information and Communication Studies. Prof. Lu’s research interests includes professionalism and news production; media effects and audience; and urban communication.