| Journalist Noelle Mateer moved to Beijing in 2014 for an internship, a gig that turned into a six-year stint as a magazine editor and freelance writer. China's burgeoning economy and culture were a source of frequent wonder and amazement to her, but one small thing stuck out especially: Why were there so many people on the street wearing Linkin Park T-shirts? As Mateer writes this week on Backchannel, the weird ubiquity of T-shirts celebrating a rap-rock band whose heyday passed in the '90s opens a window on the way global culture works in the 21st century. "Over the years," she writes, "I've watched bemusedly as hallmarks of my suburban American upbringing recast themselves as Chinese chic. On behalf of the magazine I worked for, I attended a VIP preview of Beijing's first Cheesecake Factory and a ritzy opening party for China's first Old Navy. It is bizarre to watch influencers flock to something as seemingly mundane as, say, a new Beijing location of Red Lobster, but so it goes. Cultural icons take on new significance when they enter new cultures." Linkin Park hasn't faded away. In China, it has been transformed into something new. Mark Robinson | Features Editor, WIRED | 
.jpg "Larry Brilliant")
Post a Comment