Off-campus UMass Amherst users: To download campus access dissertations, please use the following link to log into our proxy server with your UMass Amherst user name and password.

Non-UMass Amherst users: Please talk to your librarian about requesting this dissertation through interlibrary loan.

Dissertations that have an embargo placed on them will not be available to anyone until the embargo expires.

ORCID

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1749-5180

Access Type

Open Access Thesis

Document Type

thesis

Degree Program

Chinese

Degree Type

Master of Arts (M.A.)

Year Degree Awarded

2020

Month Degree Awarded

May

Abstract

In 2013, Zhang Jiajia 张嘉佳’s book I Belonged to You (从你的全世界路过； thereafter Belonged) became a huge hit and a miracle of publication. In 2013 after half a year in circulation, the paper print sold more than 2,000,000 copies and was soon adapted to two movies. In 2014, both the kindle and paper edition of Belonged won No.1 for the best books list on Amazon China. Zhang Jiajia’s incredible success is a miracle, and it can only happen with the easy access of Internet. In addition to that, the lifestyle Belonged depicts is what post-80s and post-90s generations in China are experiencing now. My thesis studies how the Internet and Sina Weibo platform make the popularity of Belonged possible and why post-80s and post-90s readers from Sina Weibo like this kind of story. By investigating the reasons behind this book’s popularity, I argue that Internet literature and literary works in a similar genre to Belonged fulfill the emotional needs of post-80s and post-90s generations, which the literature works written by writers who receive government stipends cannot meet.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.7275/17662269

First Advisor

Enhua Zhang

Second Advisor

David K. Schneider

Download

Share

COinS