With apologies for cross-posting. Call for Chapters Online China: Locating society in online spaces A volume edited by Peter Marolt and David Kurt Herold (proposed for Routledge) The Chinese Internet has emerged as a growing field of research and scholars have grown mindful that public spaces and movements in cyberspace are intrinsic to understanding social issues that exist offline, and vice versa. Online and offline spaces are increasingly recognized and rendered as interdependent and inseparable dimensions of social, political, economic, and cultural activity and their interrelationship is driving change across all facets of social life. In this volume, online and offline China are conceptualised as separate, but inter-connected spaces in which human and institutional actors are interacting under the gaze of the seemingly monolithic authoritarian state. The cyberspaces comprising 'online China' are understood as spaces for interaction that influence 'offline China', and can be described as augmented spaces that allow their users greater 'freedoms' despite ubiquitous control and surveillance of state authorities. Individuals, groups, and institutions are creating and shaping spaces for thought and action to express ideas, produce shared meanings, engage in social interactions, etc, in a blend of online and offline contexts. The proposed volume seeks to gather contributions that discuss and reflect on aspects of the diversity of social and cultural practices taking place in online and offline spaces in China. We encourage contributors to reflect on how various actors utilize the Internet to create and re-create meaningful spaces, institutions and movements in their quest to shape their lives, and how these spaces propel or hinder the transformation of societal structures. The chapters in the volume should strive to deconstruct the notion of the all-powerful and monolithic state, while also avoiding to cast Chinese Internet users in a primarily 'political' role. Chinese cyberspace is home to many different users, groups, events, happenings, movements, artefacts, etc., whose goals and purposes are rarely 'political' in a narrow sense �C even if they have an effect on politics. In the same way, 'the Chinese state' consists of many individuals, groupings, institutions, etc. who are often at odds with each other, and have differing views on online China. Chinese netizens are faced with contradictory, and ever shifting regulations and 'harmonizing' state interventions that require constant choices, compromises, and great flexibility, in negotiating the boundaries of permissible online and offline behaviour. A re-conceptualisation of both online and offline China and their networks of relationships will allow for a much deeper understanding of the importance of the Internet in today's China (and beyond). The editors hope to assemble and integrate empirical findings and conceptual imaginings of the ways in which 'Online China' invokes the re-making of 'Offline China' and how people create new, blended socio-cultural spaces in today's China. We particularly welcome, but are not limiting ourselves to studies that focus on: - Groups of Chinese Internet users - Diversity of online, or online/offline practices - Diversity in actions/comments/etc. of 'the state' - Interactions and negotiations among and between Internet users and state authorities - Emerging grassroots and alternative spaces and projects - Thoughts on how to detect and analyze such spaces and projects �C as they tend to be small-scale, often invoking 'only' incremental, happenstance or transient transformations - Other studies that showcase the richness and diversity of Chinese cyberspaces We also invite submissions that provide an explicit comparative perspective or that elaborate on how organically grown initiatives, movements, or institutions are using online and offline spaces to inform urban planning, policy, laws and governance. If you would like to contribute to this volume, please contact one (or both) of the editors. Important dates: 16 April 2012 Submission of 500 word abstracts for a chapter proposal 4 May 2012 Decision of the editors 20 August 2012 Submission of full chapters Dr. Peter Marolt Research Fellow Asia Research Institute National University of Singapore Singapore marolt@nus.edu.sg Dr. David Kurt Herold Lecturer for Sociology Department of Applied Social Sciences HK Polytechnic University Hong Kong ssherold@polyu.edu.hk