User:ZUZU/Project proposal
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a series of workshops /self-life protocol /role-play games focus on how the intricacies of daily existence and digital communities shape the lives of me and my female (internet)neighbours in the Netherlands
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Focuses on uncovering hidden rituals; participants share micro-stories of their lives or present daily performances in an alienated space
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Focuses on uncovering hidden rituals; participants share micro-stories of their lives or present daily performances in an alienated space
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In a fictional country, an unintelligible language will be spoken, a dice-rolling mechanism will be used to randomly assign identities, and the challenges faced by players will vary according to their assigned identities. These challenges will integrate my thesis findings, including exploring the daily lives of my female βinternet neighboursβ through personal interviews and data collection from Chinese social media.
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The initial idea stemmed from a class discussion where I realised that the biggest topic for me at the moment is how to make it in the Netherlands. At first, I tried to explore issues related to visa anxiety, but gradually realised that focusing on visa policy could easily lead the perspective into a grand narrative framework and start a discussion of abstract terms, which was not the direction I wanted to delve into. I was more interested in how individuals live their lives behind these issues - or rather, how I (and people in various other situations) manage to live and cope in concrete situations.
Before leaving China, my sense of everyday life and βnearbyβ had, in some ways, already disappeared. This project feels like a response to my process of rebuilding the everyday and the βnearbyβ while living in the Netherlands.I aim to avoid engaging with overarching narratives or overly broad topics, focusing instead on the day-to-day details. Here, I find myself relying on the Chinese internet more than ever before. Part of this is due to language barriers limiting my information access. Conversely, Because of the nature of big data, Iβve found that my understanding of the daily lives of women in the Netherlandsβwho Iβve never metβmay even surpass my understanding of the lives of those around me when I lived in China. By relying on shared content from social platforms, Iβve learned things like which supermarket products are beautifully packaged but overly sweet, where to look to spot the northern lights on certain days, which newly opened restaurant is delicious but has poor service, or which hiking trail in a specific national park offers a chance to encounter friendly wild horses. Other tips include how a βsunlight lampβ can improve your mood during continuous rain, or which hairdresser truly understands and delivers on specific haircut requests.
These womenβwhom Iβve never met and likely never willβare like my βinternet neighbors.β While weβve never spoken directly, I rely heavily on their advice to navigate my life here. This observation reminds me of the anthropologist Xiangbiao's suggestion that ιθΏβthe nearbyβ is a fluid concept, not tied to any fixed space. As people move, their βnearbyβ also shifts, formed by emotional and spatial connections with the people and space around them. The everyday details of one personβs nearby might become a brand-new story for another. In these details, I try to focus on language, body, space, and their intertwining in the daily life.
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My Female Internet Neighbours - Their presence is a help Michael Murtaugh-Inspiring advice and feedback Manetta Berends, Joseph Knierzinger Assistance with designing workshops and integrating digital tools Steve Rushton-Guidance on structuring the thesis. Yangliu-Visual feedback and reference for the aesthetic aspects. Wang Ziheng-Help with sound for role-play games.
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I hope this project is both deeply personal and universally relatable. A common criticism on the Chinese internet is that people "don't care about specific individuals" and become collectively obsessed with grand narratives. These grand narratives often attempt to instil a sense of national identity in the masses, and these grand narratives undermine or weaken closeness and concrete, meaningful action in the immediate, everyday context.
Initially, I focused on exploring the survival strategies of non-EU women in Europe, but I gradually narrowed the scope to Chinese women. However, even this classification felt awkwardβattaching nationality as a category to "women" created discomfort, as it seemed to politicize identity in ways I sought to avoid. Eventually, I shifted my attention to the specific group of "my female internet neighbours," attempting to decouple gendered identities from their political labels, such as nationality.
This approach aligns with feminist practices that emphasize womenβs autonomy beyond the confines of national borders. As Virginia Woolf wrote, "As a woman, I have no country. As a woman, I want no country. As a woman, my country is the whole world." My aim is to focus on the soft, intimate realities of individualsβtheir bodies, emotions, and connectionsβrather than framing them within political or nationalist narratives.
In essence, this project is a response to the erosion of immediate, everyday connections, reclaiming the importance of the specific and the personal. It aims to see and understand individuals as they are, unburdened by the weight of political or collective identities, and instead defined by their lived experiences and shared acts of living.