The Great City is Fragile: Fang Fang's Wuhan Diary

This article explores issues covered in Wuhan Diary, a day-by-day account by the Chinese author Fang Fang of her experiences during the height of the pandemic crisis in the city of Wuhan during the early months of 2020. It seeks to bring out what is distinctive and innovative about the text. Most no...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cultural politics (Biggleswade, England) England), 2021-03, Vol.17 (1), p.69-79
Main Author: Robins, Kevin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Affinity
Autobiographical literature
Cities
Communication
Disruption
Dissemination
Ethics
Fang Fang
Information dissemination
Mass media
Mobilization
Pandemics
Social media
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Summary:This article explores issues covered in Wuhan Diary, a day-by-day account by the Chinese author Fang Fang of her experiences during the height of the pandemic crisis in the city of Wuhan during the early months of 2020. It seeks to bring out what is distinctive and innovative about the text. Most notably, this concerns the mobilization of social media, such as Weibo and WeChat, as a basis for social communication and the dissemination of information within and beyond the city. The resultant text is not a diary in the conventional sense but, rather, a vast montage of diverse kinds of material that have been electronically cut up and pasted together. A particular focus of the discussion concerns ethical support and solidarity among citizens of Wuhan at this time of acute disruption. In this context, the article suggests a significant, and maybe surprising, affinity between Fang Fang's immediate concerns and issues raised in the ethical philosophies of Paul Ricoeur and Gabriel Marcel.
ISSN:1743-2197
1751-7435
DOI:10.1215/17432197-8797543