An Opinion leader and the making of a city on China's Sina Weibo

This chapter examines the role of an opinion leader on Sina Weibo who conducted the online campaign that countered the nationwide anti-Japan protests in Guangzhou. Specifically, I focus on those online practices by the opinion leader and his followers which have reproduced the sense of locality of Guangzhou, the southern Chinese city near Hong Kong and Macau. I argue that the online practice of (re)posting, archiving, uploading and searching evolved into the bodily practices of photographing, observing and mapping the city. Such technobodily embodiment encapsulates Guangzhou's local values on the one hand and the national agenda of border sovereignty on the other. It has thus effectively renarrated an alternative vision of nationhood, one that differs from the state imposed version