TY - JOUR
T1 - The cruel optimism of digital dating : heart-breaking mobile romance among rural migrant workers in South China
AU - Liu, Tingting
AU - Wang, Yinan
AU - Lin, Zhongxuan
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - Based upon thirteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in South China, this study employs Lauren Berlant’s concept of cruel optimism to examine how Chinese rural migrant workers–an economically and culturally disadvantaged group–use digital dating services and select dates. It juxtaposes the rural migrant workers’ encouraged engagement with digital dating with interview accounts which reveal that digital dating presents a large sum of obstacles to the fulfilment of sexual and romantic desire. Our research shows that these obstacles (both ‘virtual' and ‘real') are highly gendered, which is partly related to a cultural shift towards materialism in the Chinese society. Specifically, rural migrant men have described themselves as being harshly excluded or exploited on the dating scene, whereas rural migrant women have reported that they have unwittingly dated men with deceptive profiles or developed romantic relationships that were dashed by economic turmoil. Hence, the study empirically extends the literature on digital dating beyond its traditional focus on Western contexts. It also clearly demonstrates that, while digital dating ignites a sense of possibility and desire, particularly among individuals of lower socioeconomic status, it fails to support these users in tackling the structural inequalities obstructing realization of their desire.
AB - Based upon thirteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in South China, this study employs Lauren Berlant’s concept of cruel optimism to examine how Chinese rural migrant workers–an economically and culturally disadvantaged group–use digital dating services and select dates. It juxtaposes the rural migrant workers’ encouraged engagement with digital dating with interview accounts which reveal that digital dating presents a large sum of obstacles to the fulfilment of sexual and romantic desire. Our research shows that these obstacles (both ‘virtual' and ‘real') are highly gendered, which is partly related to a cultural shift towards materialism in the Chinese society. Specifically, rural migrant men have described themselves as being harshly excluded or exploited on the dating scene, whereas rural migrant women have reported that they have unwittingly dated men with deceptive profiles or developed romantic relationships that were dashed by economic turmoil. Hence, the study empirically extends the literature on digital dating beyond its traditional focus on Western contexts. It also clearly demonstrates that, while digital dating ignites a sense of possibility and desire, particularly among individuals of lower socioeconomic status, it fails to support these users in tackling the structural inequalities obstructing realization of their desire.
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/1959.7/uws:65453
U2 - 10.1080/1369118X.2021.1874039
DO - 10.1080/1369118X.2021.1874039
M3 - Article
SN - 1369-118X
VL - 25
SP - 1614
EP - 1631
JO - Information Communication and Society
JF - Information Communication and Society
IS - 11
ER -
