The Emergence Of "A-zhong Gege":A Research On Fans’ Multiple Identities In Fandom Nationalism

China’s youth generation has increasingly become the main force in cyber nationalism and expanded their space from offline to online with the development of technology in China since the 20th century.At the same time,the new generation of young audiences is increasingly influenced by various subcultural trends,an organic interface between youth subculture and patriotic identity is gradually formed in cyberspace,resulting in an emerging trend of cyber nationalism.This convergence is particularly evident in a series of online actions such as "June 9th War"and the "Di Bar March" in recent years.Influenced by the cyber nationalism trend,fan culture,which was born in the entertainment industry,has also gradually entered the space of nationalist activities.The "Support A-zhong gege" event caused by the Hong Kong amendment controversy in 2019 has become a popular topic on SNS,and is also regarded as a typical case of cyber nationalist actions in recent years.The intersection of fan culture and nationalism has thus entered the mainstream discourse,not only attracting the attention of a wider social circle beyond the fan community,but also marking the emergence of fandom nationalism.Unlike the earlier online actions such as the "Di Bar March",the image of "A-zhong gege" was created by the fan community,and the action’s mode followed fan’s logic of supporting idols.This online action reflects not only the strong motivation of the fan group,but also the convergence between fan culture and nationalism.The positive coverage by the official media since then have showed the mainstream’s approval of fandom nationalism.In order to better understand the background and mechanism of fandom nationalism,and to deep dive into the internal ecology and psychological motivation of fan groups,this paper takes the online action of "Support A-zhong gege" as the entry point and takes the fan community as the main research object to explore the convergence between fan culture and nationalism,focusing on the discursive characteristics of fan nationalism,the driving mechanism of fans’participation in nationalism practices,and the identity transformation of fans in nationalism actions.Based on research,this paper argues that under the influence of the entertainment industry,fan groups have developed a strong sense of self-empowerment and an emotional narrative style.Due to the external pressure of being stigmatized and the internalization of nationalism consensus over years of fan activities,they have formed the idea of participating in nationalism activities to struggle for their own rights.Under such a premise,the long-standing emotional nationalism narrative framework provides an approach for fans who are familiar with emotional expressions,thus breaking down the barrier between subculture and mainstream culture,enabling them to participate in patriotic expression and continuously reconcile their own subcultural and nationalist identities.