How has the cultural phenomenon of Chinese rock music shaped the identity of a Chinese woman scholar and influenced wider Chinese society? What does Chinese rock reveal about global power structures and their interconnectedness?

Drawing on her lived experiences, author Lei (Nada) Peng embarks on a journey as a Chinese rock listener and researcher between mainland China, France, and the United Kingdom. Bridging scholarly analysis with personal narrative, Interrogating Chinese Rock examines how rock—a Western genre—is reimagined within China’s shifting socio-political landscape. It reveals the interplay between Chinese rock music, Chinese social transformation, global power structures, and her personal identity, framing music as a site of resistance, mystification, and self-discovery.

Peng argues that the evolution of Chinese rock cannot be separated from global dynamics shaped by Western hegemony, cultural imperialism, and the legacies of colonial history. Alongside this, she reflects on how both Chinese rock and her own transnational experiences have shaped a cross-cultural identity that defies rigid categorisation.

Addressing issues of gender, race, class, consumerism, patriarchy, and cultural hegemony, this autoethnographic work is essential reading for students and scholars in Cultural Anthropology, Transcultural Studies, Sociology of Music, China Studies, Asian Studies, Women’s Studies, and related social sciences.

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Epigraph
• Abstract
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Learning objectives
• Introduction
• Prelude: My encounter with rock ‘n’ roll in the People’s Republic of China – A call for self-awareness
• Part I Understanding Chinese rock, or Yaogun: A socio-political history and metaphor for ‘identity searching’
  • 1 The rise of Chinese rock: A vessel for collective aspirations and echoes of individual liberation
    • ‘Chinese rock’, ‘rock in China’, or Yaogun? – Defining identity: The naming conundrum of Chinese rock music
    • Cui Jian and Rock ’N’ Roll on the New Long March: Against the odds at a historical turn
  • 2 Constructing myth: Revolutionary narrative of rock
    • Constructing the myth of rock: Creation of a ‘centre’
      • Two dimensions of the ontology of rock
        • (a) From metaphysical and philosophical perspectives:
        • (b) From anthropological, critical ethnographic, and cultural studies perspectives:
      • The revolutionary rhetoric of rock myth
      • Romantic individualism and its influence on rock’s revolutionary rhetoric
  • 3 Unveiling the myth of Yaogun: A reassessment of rock’s ‘periphery’
    • Prehistory: The emergence of ‘modern music’ in China
    • Communist ideology and the Cultural Revolution: One source of the Yaogun myth
    • From ‘variety song’ to Yaogun: The shift towards market dynamics and individualism
    • The projection and integration of the myth of ‘revolutionary’ rock in China: Early rock journalism and broadcasting
      • Rock: Inherently political, subversive, and anti-establishment
      • Rock: Unconventional, anti-commercial (opposition of ‘pop’), and representing new social consciousness
      • Yaogun: A representation of cultural heroism and imaginary ‘Enlightenment’ – The legacy of the ‘revolutionary’ rock
      • Yaogun: An attempt at nationalism and a spiritual quest
  • 4 ‘China Fire’ under the ‘Modern Sky’: Transforming Chinese society before the dawn of a new century
    • Dreams and profits: The idealism of Chinese cultural rejuvenation with Taiwan and Hong Kong capital
      • ‘China Fire’: The Chinese alternative voices on the market
      • ‘Rock China: The Power of Music’ live in Hong Kong: Ephemeral splendour
    • Facing the ‘reality’: Modern Sky, market logic, and the dissolution of myths
  • 5 ‘New Sound of Beijing’ and ‘Dakou generation’: ‘New clothes, new life!’
    • New Sound of Beijing Movement: ‘This is Our Time!’
      • Reinterpreting individualism in music
      • Shifting focus: From ideological protest to personal expression
    • Dakou: From unwanted plastic waste to spiritual nourishment in a different world
      • A personal anecdote: My first encounter with Dakou cassettes
      • The story of Dakou: A case study about consumerism and colonial modernity
      • The myth of Nirvana, Kurt Cobain, and the imagination of underground culture
      • Dakou business: Accidental subversion and colonial modernity
    • ‘Dakou generation’: Self-education ‘with a cut’
• Interlude: From Dakou to the ‘new era’ – Navigating the spectacle of ‘Chinese independent music’ and the unfinished journey
• Part II Cross-cultural identity in motion: Navigating the journey from ‘me’ to ‘us’
  • 6 Leaving home: From Kunming to Beijing – The awareness of centre and periphery
    • Awareness of centre and periphery
    • Feeling ‘free and alive’: First gig in the suburbs of Beijing
    • ‘Last utopia’: Midi Music Festival
    • Home and identity
  • 7 Departing China for France: The second move and the disillusionment of an ‘enlightened Europe’
    • Losing labels: From an elite Peking university student to an ‘asian’, ‘female’, ‘foreigner’
    • Eurocentrism unveiled: The myth of Enlightenment cracks
      • Story 1. First encounter: Panic on the margins of French society
      • Story 2. The limits of comparison: Navigating Eurocentrism through the academic landscape
  • 8 Departing France for England: The third move and the disillusionment with the ‘liberal world’
    • A pre-history of my life in the United Kingdom: Visa rejection and the collision with the limits of freedom
    • Navigating neoliberal logic in the British academic system
      • Turning education into a business: A system that maintains and reinforces social hierarchies
    • An interlocking system of power
• The unfinished finale: From ‘me’ to ‘us’ – Metamorphosis of cross-cultural identity integration
  • The ‘invisible Chinese rock’, or the silence of China
  • From ‘me’ to ‘us’: Standing on the periphery together
  • A cross-cultural identity process: Transcending the ‘box’, constantly in making
  • Between modernity and fragmentation
  • Disillusionment as revelation
  • Towards fluid belonging: Transcending the ‘box’
• Suggested projects, assignments, and discussion questions
  • 1. Comparative analysis of rock (or other) cultures through case studies
  • 2. Autoethnographic narrative project (e.g., autoethnographic multimedia portfolio)
  • 3. Critical engagement project: Identity, knowledge production, and cultural politics
• Notes
• References
• Recommended further readings
• Index

Lei (Nada) Peng PhD is a Lecturer in Chinese Studies at the University of Liverpool.