Wei Wang Tales of transformations, onsite and online. Bishan village, China

The rural area of China, town and village, have undertaken urbanization rapidly last 10 years result from industry boom, economic growth, society transformation and policy orientation, from which a lot of issues turns out, such as agriculture scarcity, surplus labor flow, tourism over- development and damage of nature resource, etc., economically, socially, geographically, ecologically, and architecturally, from the practice to academy, all in all accumulated and expressed in architectural and urban pattern and form.

Bishan, in particular, was known nationally and internationally from a special group of gentrifiers who engage to revival the village from the cultural perspective and create a ruralist utopia. Internet is one of the major tool to set up and promote the utopia. The research is to investigate the people and strategies as a whole, emphasize the interaction between the digital media-internet and the physical environment, the online and onsite public space in particular, analyze the cause and effects, boundary and connection, seek a new version of analytical model to review and measure the process result and evaluate the pros and cons.

The main research question of this thesis addressed is: What are the collective scenarios of the different groups of practitioners, how to define them? How does internet initiated new Bishan space?  it aggravates or integrates the fragmented space? how does the collective participation of the rural construction works in China without a master plan? How does it transform and produce space? These questions all contribute to generate new knowledge of Rural China Development through the learning of Bishan.

Apart from the traditional Urban Analysis Method I will use internet and media research and ethnographic research method etc. for reference. The internet survey, such as questionnaire and voting system, and application of We-media will be experimented in the spacial survey. The way to choose use and integrate them creatively within the dynamic transformation and motion of the villages is the core methodological output of the research.

The thesis format is either a compilation thesis with kappa and three articles or a monograph is still under discussion, I started to write an article to sharpen some significant points.

Institute of Urbanism and Landscape / Karl Otto Ellefsen (Supervisor)

PhD started in 2015