Chinese Media Improvisations: Thriving on Deficits

Xuenan Cao offers an unexpected angle on China's technological rise, spotlighting the role of deficit-driven improvisation. As Cao demonstrates, where printing paper, computers, and microchips have been in shortage, media improvisations and AI gadgetry have filled the gap and become the unlikeliest accelerants of tech imaginaries.

Equal parts media-historical and literary analysis, the book connects several moments in Chinese history: Mao's Great Leap Forward that demanded the country prod...