In:Discourse, Politics and Media in Contemporary China
Edited by Qing Cao, Hailong Tian and Paul Chilton
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 54] 2014
► pp. 97–120
Get fulltext
Chapter 4. It’s a small world after all?
Simulating the future world order at the Shanghai Expo
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.
Published online: 23 April 2014
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.54.05sch
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.54.05sch
This chapter asks what visions of the world came together at the Shanghai Expo, how they were formed, and what role the Chinese authorities played in framing the event. Based on qualitative interviews and multi-media data collected at the Expo site in July 2010, the chapter analyzes the Expo site and compares the contents and communication strategies of two key pavilions: the China Pavilion and the US Pavilion. It shows how the institutional constraints at the Expo collapse much of the political discourse into a narrative that to some extent re-enforces the political ideals of the Chinese authorities, but that the various actors nevertheless present different visions of the world’s future and of world politics that at times challenge the worldview that the Chinese government is trying to foster. Keywords: Shanghai World Expo; political discourse; China Pavilion; worldview
References (69)
Appiah, Kwame Anthony. 2006.
Cosmopolitanism – Ethics in a World of Strangers
. New York & London: W. W. Norton and Company.
Barthes, Roland. 1977. “Rhetoric of the Image.” In
Roland Barthes - Image, Music, Text
, ed. by Stephen Heath, 32–51. London: Fontana Press.
BIE. 1928/1988.
Convention Relating to International Exhibitions
. Paris: Bureau of International Exhibitions. [URL]
. 2010.
Official Site of the Bureau International des Expositions
, Paris: Bureau of International Exhibitions. [URL]
Brady, Anne-Marie. 2008.
Marketing Dictatorship – Propaganda and Thought Work in Contemporary China
. Plymouth: Rowman and Littlefield.
Breslin, Shaun and Simon Shen. 2010. “Online Chinese Nationalism.”
Chatham House Asia Programme Paper
ASP PP 2010/03: [URL]
Buzan, Barry. 2006.
From International to World Society? English School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalisation
. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Callahan, William A. 2008. “Chinese Visions of World Order : Post-Hegemonic or a New Hegemony?”
International Studies Review
10: 749–761.
. 2012. “Shanghai’s Alternative Futures: The World Expo, Citizen Intellectuals, and China’s New Civil Society.”
China Information
26: 251–273.
China Daily. 2010. “Q&A about China Pavilion Tickets.”
China Daily Expo Visitors Service
10 May 2010: [URL]
Chomsky, Noam. 2011.
Contours of Global Order: Domination, Stability, Security in a Changing World and the Rise of Xenophobia in the West
. Lecture 13 March 2011. Amsterdam: Westerkerk. [URL]
Chouliaraki, Lilie and Norman Fairclough. 1999.
Discourse in Late Modernity - Rethinking Critical Discourse Analysis
. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Dreyfus, Hubert L. and Paul Rabinow. 1982.
Michel Foucault - Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics
. Hertfordshire: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Expaña Expone. 2010.
Pabellón de Expaña - Expo Shanghai 2010
. Madrid: Sociedad Estatal para Exposiciones Internacionales.
Fairclough, Norman. 1995.
Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language
. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited.
Foucault, Michel. 1978/1990.
The History of Sexuality: An Introduction (Volume 1)
. New York: Vintage Books.
Gilbert, James. 2009.
Whose Fair? Experience, Memory, and the History of the Great St. Louis Exposition
. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.
Held, David and Anthony McGrew (eds). 2003.
The Global Transformations Reader: An Introduction to the Globalization Debate
. Cambridge et al.: Polity Press.
Held, David. 2002. “Cosmopolitanism: Ideas, Realities, Deficits.” In
Governing Globalization: Power, Authority and Global Governance
, ed. by David Held and Anthony McGrew, 305–324. Cambridge et al.: Polity Press.
Hogg, Chris. 2010. “Shanghai Expo is China’s New Showcase to the World.”
BBC Online
29 April 2010: [URL] [21.03.13].
Huang, Huiming and Kuang Zhiqiang (eds). 2010.
Shibo kan guan: 2010 nian Shanghai shibohuichang guan kan dian sousuo (Highlights of 2010 Expo Pavilion)
. Shanghai: Shanghai wenhua chubanshe.
Hwang, Yih-jye and Florian Schneider. 2011. “Performance, Meaning and Ideology in the Making of Legitimacy: The Celebrations of the People’s Republic of China’s Sixty-Year Anniversary.”
The China Review
11 (1): 27–56.
Jäger, Siegfried. 2004.
Kritische Diskursanalyse. Eine Einführung
.
(Discourse Analysis. An Introduction)
. 4th unabr. ed. Münster: UNRAST-Verlag.
Jenkins, Henry. 2006.
Fans, Bloggers, and Gamers – Exploring Participatory Culture
. New York and London: New York University Press.
. 2008.
Convergence Culture – Where Old and New Media Collide
. New York and London: New York University Press.
Johnson, Nuala C. 2002. “Mapping Monuments: The Shaping of Public Space and Cultural Identities.”
Visual Communication
1 (3): 293–298.
Korte, Helmut. 1999. “Filminterpretation - Filmanalyse (Film Interpretation - Film Analysis).” In
Die Sichtbarkeit der Macht. Theoretische und empirische Untersuchungen zur visuellen Politik (The Visibility of Power. Theoretical and Empirical Analyses Concerning Visual Politics)
, ed. by Wilhelm Hoffmann, 76–90. Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft.
Kress, Gunther and Theo van Leeuwen. 2001.
Multimodal Discourse - The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication
. London: Arnold.
Landsberger, Stefan. 2010.
Chinese Posters – Propaganda, Politics, History, Art
. [URL] [21.03.13].
Li, Li and Chen Ran. 2010. “Grand Opening – Shanghai Lifts the Curtain on the Largest Ever Expo in History.”
Beijing Review
53 (19): 10–14.
Minter, Adam. 2010a. “A Sorry Spectacle – The Uninspiring Saga of the United States’ World Expo Pavilion in Shanghai.”
Foreign Policy
8 March 2010: [URL] [21.03.13].
. 2010b. “China Rules the World at Expo 2010.”
The Atlantic
29 April 2010: [URL] [21.03.13].
Müller, Marion G. 2003.
Grundlagen der visuellen Kommunikation (Basics of Visual Communication)
. Konstanz: UVK Verlagsgesellschaft mbH.
Neuman, W. Russell, George E. Marcus, Ann N. Crigler, and Michael Mackuen. 2007. “Theorizing Affect’s Effects.” In
The Affect Effect – Dynamics of Emotion in Political Thinking and Behavior
, ed. by id., 1–20. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Nordin, Astrid H.M. 2012a. “Space for the Future: Exhibiting China in the World at the Shanghai Expo.”
China Information
26: 235–249.
. 2012b. “Taking Baudrillard to the Fair: Exhibiting China in the World at the Shanghai Expo.”
Alternatives: Global, Local, Political
37: 106–120.
Pinker, Steven. 2002.
The Blank Slate – The Modern Denial of Human Nature
. New York et al.: Penguin Books.
Richburg, Keith B. 2010. “Shanghai Prepares World’s Fair while Wondering about Costs.”
The Washington Post Online
19 April: [URL] [21.03.13].
Roche, Maurice. 2000.
Mega-Events & Modernity – Olympics and Expos in the Growth of Global Culture
. London & New York: Routledge.
Shiboju. 2010.
Expo 2010 Shanghai China Online
. Shanghai: Bureau of the Shanghai World Expo Coordination: [URL] [21.03.13].
Shirky, Clay. 2009.
How Social Media Can Make History
. TED Lecture June 2009: [URL] [21.03.13].
Sperber, Dan. 1996.
Explaining Culture – A Naturalistic Approach
. Oxford and Malden MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Stockmann, Daniela, Ashley Esarey, and Zhang Jie. 2010. “Advertising Chinese Politics: The Effects of Public Service Announcements in Urban China.”
2010 APSA Political Communication Division Pre-Conference
September 2010. Washington DC.
Sun, Jian and Ye Lin. 2010. “Mega-Events, Local Economies, and Global Status: What Happened before the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai.”
Journal of Current Chinese Affairs
2: 133–165.
Sun, Zhijian (ed.). 2009.
Zhongguo 2010 nian Shanghai shibohui gailan (General Overview of the World Exposition Shanghai China 2010)
. Shanghai: Dongfang chuban zhongxin.
Thøgersen, Stig. 2008. “Educational Tradition.”
Brill’s Encyclopaedia of China
. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill.
Tian, Tian and Huang Yi. 2010. “Shanghai shibohui: yuyue daiti paidui shengshi haishi feishi? (Shanghai Expo: Does replacing standing in line with ticket reservations save time or waste it?)”
Nanfang Dushibao
6 May 2010: [URL] [21.03.13].
Tufte, Edward R. 1997.
Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative
. Cheshire CT: Graphic Press.
Xinhua. 2008.
Shanghai shibohui Zhongguoguan kaigong zong jianzhu mianji chao 150 wan pingfangmi (Total Construction Area of China Pavilion at Shanghai Expo Exceeds 1.5 Million Square Meters)
. 28 November 2008: [URL] [21.03.13].
. 2010.
Shanghai Expo marks 100th day of running
. 9 August 2010: [URL] [25.01.11].
Xu, Wei (ed.). 2010.
Zhuti guan quan jilü (Full Record of Theme Pavilions)
. Shanghai: Shanghai shibo bianjibu.
Zhang, Mei. 1999. “From Lei Feng to Zhang Haidi: Changing Media Images of Model Youth in the Post-Mao Reform Era.” In
Civic Discourse, Civil Society, and Chinese Communities
, ed. by Randy Kluver and John H. Powers, 111–123. Stanford: Ablex Publishing Corporation.
Cited by (3)
Cited by three other publications
Hubbert, Jennifer
Musolff, Andreas
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 8 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.
