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The objectives of this research are to study: (i) the history and development of knowledge of Yiwulv Mountain Manchu paper-cutting art, and (ii) the process of designing and developing digital media for learning about cultural heritage. This research used qualitative research methods. By studying documents and collecting field data by surveys, interviews, observations, group discussions, and workshops. The data was elicited from a group of 40 participants. The analysis was based on the objectives and the results were presented in a descriptive analytical manner. The results are as follows: (i) The art of paper-cutting is related to history and culture. There is a unique cultural identity of the Manchus on Yiwulv Mountain. The way of conveying knowledge is told orally. Currently, there is a problem due to the age of paper-cutting artists and lack of inheritance. Therefore, it is necessary to find ways to protect them as well as transfer them to youth and those who are interested. (ii) The art of paper-cutting is applied with 3D animation technology to inherit and learn the art of Yiwulv Mountain Manchu paper-cutting. The teaching materials created can be explained in detail from the perspective and content. The design combines virtual tour technology to make it interesting. Learners study through digital media and computer systems, which makes it convenient to access information.

This paper studies the effect of learning efficiency through various animations in conjunction with instructional teaching of traditional Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) crafts projects. The germane cognitive load (GCL) is defined as an investment in cognitive resources for schema development and automation. This study employs four instructional experiments to assess schema construction and automation learning activities facilitated by four common types of animations in a curriculum setting. Additionally, comment collection and sentiment word summarization were conducted during other courses in ICH that examined Xiaoyu bamboo animation. Amongst four animations, motion graphics (MG) animation significantly enhanced learners' GCL and learning validity, and they also received positive comments from non-experimental students. Meanwhile, the 3D animation greatly affected learners' satisfaction with learning. This research analysis is based on the survey responses from a group of university students (n = 207) who participated in an ICH animation course in the Yiyang region of Hunan province, China. The study's findings indicate that two groups of animations, specifically based on the dimensions of validity and satisfaction, MG and 3D groups, using principles of GCL, have positively influenced students' understanding of traditional ICH. These different animation research results offered valuable insights for developing GCL, supporting the positive practical advancement in ICH.

Background: Preadolescents, who are in a transitional phase of development, may experience higher exposure to heterosexual interactions while facing higher risks regarding misinformation in sexual knowledge and unsafe engagement in sexual activities. There is a deficiency in the availability of qualified educators and age-appropriate teaching materials for sexuality education in China. Methods: We implemented an animation-based comprehensive sexuality education package among preadolescents aged 9 to 12 years from eight schools in Anhui, China. The first round of intervention included 1,835 participants, lasting 2 months from September to November 2020. A total of 374 participants, accounting for 52% of the intervention group, received a second round of intervention in September 2021. Participants completed immediate follow-up assessment and 1-year follow-up assessment to assess changes in their sexual knowledge, attitudes, and other outcomes. Propensity score matching and difference-in-difference analysis were performed to determine the short- and long-term impacts. Results: Significant improvements were observed for both sexual knowledge and sexual attitudes in the immediate follow-up. There was no significant effect on pornography-seeking behavior or awareness of experiencing sexual abuse. After 1 year, the effect was sustained for sexual knowledge, but slightly declined for sexual attitudes. The second intervention significantly improved sexual knowledge; however, no significant change in sexual attitudes, pornography-seeking behavior, or awareness of experiencing sexual abuse was observed. Conclusions: Our comprehensive sexuality education package was effective in improving sexual knowledge both immediately and 1 year after the intervention. Repeated intervention can be an effective strategy for promoting preadolescent health development regarding comprehensive sexuality education.

A substantial amount of literature has shown that the input flooding and enhancement (Textual enhancement, TE) technique helps learners to perceive and acquire target features implicitly. Previous studies explored the efficacy of computer-assisted TE interventions in Second Language Acquisition with diverse techniques, but animation has not yet been sufficiently taken into consideration. In this paper, we developed an animation-based TE intervention to promote the primary school children' acquisition of the linguistic features of English question sentences. The results suggested that learners in experimental group improved their performances in producing questions and statements with a large effect size, as they were found to spontaneously put extra efforts in exploring the related knowledge of the visually enhanced forms. The study presumed that the animation-based TE intervention would stimulate participants' awareness and curiosity of the target forms, which consequently led to improved performance in tasks both involving precursor knowledge and newly acquired knowledge.

Interactive learning environments provide a variety of instructional tools including educational graphics interchange format (GIF) and PowerPoint presentations which facilitate delivering stimulating and motivating lessons. This study examined the potentials of visual tools for grammatical development by administering GIFs as the educational intervention based on strategies suggested by the computer-assisted nonlinear dynamic approach. A mixed methods research was used to concurrently triangulate different strands of data on the effects of educational GIFs on grammatical proficiency development among randomly sampled adolescent and adult participants. The interpretations were made based on methodological triangulation of QUAN + QUAL data and running one-way analysis of variance. Pedagogically, the findings confirm the efficacy of animated educational GIFs for enhancing second language learners' grammatical development in mastering progressive tenses (present, past, and future).

An increasing number of MOOCs use learning videos featuring an instructor and slides, but there are few specific guidelines for the design of instructor images for these videos. A pedagogical agent (PA) is a kind of virtual instructor image in a learning video, and its image design is mostly guided by anthropomorphism. Our research attempts to introduce zoomorphism, which is the opposite of traditional anthropomorphism, into the image design of PA. This study tested the effects of two different types of PA images (i.e. anthropomorphic and zoomorphic) as well as a control condition of no PA image on learning from a learning video in a sample of 94 s-grade children. The children were randomly assigned to watch one of three learning videos on pandas. The ANOVA and Kruskal-Wallis tests showed that children who watched the zoomorphic PA image video obtained significantly higher retention, transfer, learning interest, and experience than children who watched the other two types of videos. Children self-reported more enjoyment in the zoomorphic PA image condition than in the no PA condition. Furthermore, the results of multiple regression analysis showed that children's learning interest and experience positively predicted retention and transfer scores; boredom negatively predicted transfer scores. These findings highlight the positive effect of zoomorphism on PA image design, suggesting that zoomorphism holds great prospects in PA image development.

In this study, we aimed to characterize students' inquiry skill profiles and investigate whether students' gender, major, school location and type, and household registration are related to their inquiry skill profiles. By providing an animation-based activity, we engaged students in a scientific inquiry on the atmospheric chemistry of climate change. Students performed data analytics, control of variables, and scientific reasoning tasks, which represented essential skills in the inquiry process. After removing the invalid data and conducting the two-stage stratified sampling, we analyzed 724 11th-grade Chinese students' multiple-choice and open-ended responses. A latent profile analysis (LPA) was used to identify if there were subgroups of students' inquiry skills. ?2 tests were conducted to examine whether the profiles' distribution differed in gender, major, school location, school type, and household registration. We identified four types of inquiry skill profiles among students: sophisticated, experimental, moderate, and basic, based on their skills in data analytics, scientific reasoning, and control of variables. The findings showed that school location significantly affected students' inquiry profiles, while school type, student major, and hukou had a mildly favorable impact. To sum up, the marriage of the LPA approach and the animation-based activity has illuminated not just students' different inquiry skill profiles but also the relationships these profiles have with certain demographic factors. We discussed that it is imperative to recognize these varied inquiry skill profiles and work to bridge the disparities stemming from demographic differences for a more equitable science education environment.

This paper mainly discusses the application of blending learning in animation teaching. Blending learning is a combination of traditional teaching mode and online teaching mode, which can provide students with more flexible and independent learning methods and improve teachers' teaching quality and teaching effect. This paper analyzes and discusses the current situation of animation major, the present situation and configuration of blending learning, the teaching design of blending learning, the enlightenment, significance, and practical application of blending learning in animation teaching. Universities and teachers should strengthen research and practice in technical equipment and technical support, students' autonomous learning ability and willingness, adaptability and innovation of teaching contents and methods, evaluation and monitoring of teaching quality and teaching effect, so as to promote the application and development of blending learning in animation teaching.

The elicited imitation task (EIT), in which language learners listen to a series of spoken sentences and repeat each one verbatim, is a commonly used measure of language proficiency in second language acquisition research. The "TOEFL® Essentials"™ test includes an EIT as a holistic measure of speaking proficiency, referred to as the "Listen and Repeat" task type. In this report, we describe the design considerations that informed the development of the EIT for TOEFL Essentials. We also report the results of a series of investigations conducted during the prototyping and pilot phases of test development, which were undertaken with the goal of confirming task design specifications, evaluating scoring performance, and obtaining initial validity evidence to support score interpretation and use of the EIT in the TOEFL Essentials test. We found that task design variables generally performed as expected. The length of input sentence was strongly associated with performance (Pearson r = 0.88), consistent with the construct measured by the EIT, while other task variables not directly related to the EIT construct did not impact performance (e.g., graphics, speaker accent, and response time). Scorers drawn from TOEFL iBT test raters were able to score responses consistently with over 98% exact or adjacent interrater agreement on a 6-point scale, and scores on the pilot version of the EIT were highly reliable (Cronbach's [alpha] = 0.93 on the 15-item pilot version). Correlations between EIT scores and other measures were generally as expected: Correlations with other speaking tasks were high (0.78-0.84) and slightly to somewhat lower for other language measures (0.73 for writing, 0.68 for listening, and 0.57 for reading). Correlation with an independent measure of holistic language proficiency (C-test) was moderately high (0.69), as expected. We discuss the study findings in terms of the TOEFL Essentials test validity argument and point out limitations to the current results along with future research needs. Overall, we believe that the findings provide initial support to warrant the use of the EIT as operationalized in the TOEFL Essentials test.

As a child god from Chinese legends, the figure of Nezha has a strong appeal to children, and his story has been adapted to various media. This article examines Nezha's image in three animated films, exploring how this figure has been altered to represent Chinese children and youth and symbolize their subjectivity. From a revolutionary hero to a socialized child and a rebellious adolescent, Nezha's transformations demonstrate how an iconic figure has been reimagined to reflect shifting socio-political contexts in the Chinese socialist and post-socialist eras.

L2 pragmatics have explored the effects of different factors on different aspects of learners' pragmatic performance, but often not simultaneously. In addition, syntactic complexity is rarely examined in L2 pragmatics. This cross-sectional study aimed to conduct a multidimensional analysis to explore the effects of proficiency and study-abroad (SA) on Chinese EFL learners' refusals. Data were collected from 90 Chinese university students via a computer-animated elicitation task. The participants were divided into three groups: low-proficiency learners without SA experience and advanced learners with/without SA. The scenarios were kept consistent in imposition and social distance but varied in social status. Each participant interacted with a computer-animated native-speaker interlocutor in the scenarios. 20 American native speakers also participated in the study; their responses were used as the comparison data. Participants' performance was evaluated in five aspects: appropriateness, syntactic complexity, refusal strategies, adjuncts and internal modifiers. Results revealed that there were significant effects of L2 proficiency on appropriateness and of SA on syntactic complexity. The interactions of the two factors and social status were also analysed in learners' employment of refusal strategies and internal modification. Implications for pragmatic instruction and feasible suggestions for future research are discussed.

The current study investigated whether the deep properties or shallow features of behaviors are implicitly expected to be consistent across members of highly entitative groups, by exploiting the notion that goals--as deep properties--and movements--as shallow features--can be dissociated in object-directed behaviors. Participants were asked to view group members' goal-directed behaviors toward an object. Whether perceivers implicitly expected that a new member would perform the same movement to the previously visited location (i.e., exhibit shallow feature-based behavior) or a new movement to the previously visited object (i.e., exhibit deep property-based behavior) was recorded. Study 1 revealed that perceivers implicitly expected members of a highly entitative group to approach the previously visited object with a new movement (i.e., to have a consistent goal) rather than perform the same movement to the previously visited location (i.e., to express a consistent movement). Study 2 confirmed that the responses in Study 1 were explained by group members conforming to, rather than violating, internal expectations (i.e., of consistent movement). Importantly, the implicit expectation of shared behaviors across group members relies on the goal interpretation of actions instead of the associations between actions and outcomes (Study 3). Study 4 replicated the facilitation effect of Study 1 and revealed that the goal-based expectation of common behaviors among group members is based on the majority behavior instead of a single demonstration. Hence, individuals in highly entitative groups are implicitly expected to behave consistently based on the deep properties of behaviors instead of their shallow features.

At the beginning of 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic continued to spread and became a global pandemic. Affected by the epidemic, online teaching has become the new normal. As the main form of online education, multimedia learning has attracted more and more attention. The study of traditional patterns has always been a particularly important element of art study in China due to cultural heritage and precious resources. Chinese traditional patterns are an important object of learning because of the heritage. This study examines students' understanding of the composition and evolution of traditional Chinese patterns in bronze mirrors by using different multimedia learning materials. A two by two factorial design is employed. The dependent variables includes (1) subjects' post-test scores and (2) the data of subjects' eye-movement behaviour. Data shows that students who use the animation with narration allocate a greater amount of visual attention than students who use animation with on-screen text. The students who use simulation with on-screen text demonstrated a greater amount of visual attention than students who use received simulation with narration. Furthermore, this empirical study confirmed a direct, positive correlation between the length of the subjects' eye fixation behaviour and the depth of learning. This result also provides evidence to prove that the use of multimedia learning materials is helpful in art education, especially in the study of the various elements of traditional Chinese art.

Previous studies have shown that students learn better from an online lesson when a gesturing pedagogical agent is added (Mayer & DaPra, 2012; Wang, Li, Mayer, & Liu, 2018). The goal of this study is to pinpoint which aspect of a gesturing pedagogical agent causes an improvement in learning from an online lesson. College students learned about neural transmission in an online multimedia lesson that included a pedagogical agent who displayed specific pointing gestures (i.e., pointing to the specific component in the diagram being mentioned in the narration), general pointing gestures (i.e., pointing in the general direction of the diagram), nonpointing gestures (moving hands as beats, moving an arm up or down, or crossing two hands), or no gestures. An analysis of students' eye movements during learning showed that students in the specific-pointing group paid more attention to task-related elements than did students in the other groups (as indicated by fixation time and fixation count on the target area of interest). Students in the specific-pointing group also performed better than the other groups on retention and transfer tests administered immediately after the lesson and after a 1-week delay. The results show that an active ingredient in effective pedagogical agents is the use of specific pointing gestures. This work helps clarify the embodiment principle and image principle by isolating specific pointing (or deictic gestures) as a key feature that makes gesturing effective in multimedia lessons. Educational Impact and Implications Statement: When students learn from multimedia lessons with onscreen pedagogical agents, does the type of gesturing by the agent affect student learning? In this study, students learned better and paid more attention to relevant material on the screen when the onscreen agent used specific pointing gestures during instruction rather than general pointing gestures, nonpointing gestures, or no gestures. Specifically pointing to relevant parts of the onscreen graphic while talking guides the learner's attention and leads to better learning.

This paper presents a method of assessment on how Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and animation influence the psychological process of learning by comparing a traditional web design course and an e-learning web design course, based on the Change of Internal Mental Model of Learners. We constructed the e-learning course based on Gagne's learning theory and theory of instructional design; and designed and analyzed questionnaires on the psychological process of learning in order to measure the change in a learner's mental model and performance. The result shows that HCI and animation features of e-learning have been proved to positively influence learners' cognitive perception and structuring, while the psychological process of learning as a whole is positively influenced by these technological features. In addition, the result indicates that the learning theory can be applied during the process of designing e-learning courses, and the theory of cognitive psychology is successfully used in measuring both a learner's psychological process of learning and changes in the mental model. (Contains 4 tables and 1 figure.)

This paper explores the attitudes of teachers, as adult learners, towards learning to do animation. A part of popular culture which second-language students enjoy, until recently, animation has been technically too demanding for non-specialists to learn. Adult learners can experience e-learning as transformative, but also as a barrier. Thus, teacher reception is crucial in exploring the feasibility of animation as an instructional tool in language teaching. In all, 44 Hong Kong and mainland Chinese teachers were taught animation over ten weeks. Subsequently, three surveys elicited both quantitative and qualitative data. Appraisal analysis indicated teachers positively realised animation as valuable, worthwhile and satisfactory, but also difficult and time-consuming, and entailed high levels of communication. Quantitative data indicated their view that animation would be well-received by both colleagues and secondary language learners, as an instructional tool. (Contains 8 tables and 2 figures.)

This study investigated outsourcing of the development of visual, animated and interactive learning objects for mathematics education by a Norwegian university to software vendors in China. It sought to understand the challenges in this outsourcing engagement and competences needed to meet the challenges. The authors tested outsourcing strategies and summarized their experiences with the ordering and production process. The test design included preliminary prototyping with four software vendors and a test production with one of them. The outcome of the outsourcing engagement was five complex, game-like learning objects. (Contains 5 figures and 2 tables.)

The purpose of this study was to determine if animated illustrations would increase the recall and comprehension of a subject matter, English as a foreign language (EFL), among Chinese college students. The study was specifically designed to identify the influence of graphics on Chinese EFL students' learning by comparing abstract versus concrete graphics and static versus animated graphics on immediate and long-term retention of a lesson through computer-based instruction (CBI). The sample for the study included second-year college students in the departments of Chinese language and literature, political sciences, and history at a 4-year comprehensive university in China. One hundred and seventy (170) students were randomly selected to participate in the study. With the subjects being EFL students learning the content area in a non-English-speaking environment, the study reported significant findings, showing both consistencies and inconsistencies with the findings of previous research in which the subjects were native English speakers. The results of the three-way between-groups ANOVA revealed significant differences in performance between the five Chinese student treatment groups, indicating that concrete animation had the biggest effects on the successful performance of the students. However, when the CBI lesson was supported by graphics other than concrete animation, the text-only group performed significantly better on both the immediate and delayed posttests. The significant interaction between treatment and test item identified by the three-way mixed ANOVA further indicated that treatment conditions had significant effects on the performance of the students when test items or questions were related to or supported by graphics. However, when only verbal descriptions of the test items or questions were provided without graphics, the concrete-static, abstract-static, and abstract-animated groups performed the same as the text-only group. From a research perspective, the findings initiate an important line of inquiry that should include the replication of the study in the hard sciences, in other highly abstract disciplines, and should be replicated among different populations. Further, in the United States, the study should be replicated with both native and international students in the search for better instructional practices. Additionally, research should focus on the types of graphics utilized, the quality of those graphics, and their placement within instructional units. (Contains 8 tables.)

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to introduce some new functions achieved in a web-based multimedia courseware, which is developed by Flash software and used by part-time graduate students. Design/methodology/approach: The courseware uses Adobe Flash CS3 as its development software, which supports Actionscript language, FMS and FLV technology as well. Findings: The courseware developed by Flash can meet the needs of students because of its high speed and interaction in network. Practical implications: Some part-time graduate students have already used this courseware system. Compared with the traditional online courseware, students like this kind of courseware more for its humanized interface. It is no more a question to achieve internet face-to-face conversation and streaming media play because Flash supports FMS and FLV technology. Originality/value: The paper summarizes experiences in using Flash to develop a web-based multimedia courseware and it is valuable to those who intend to develop an educational platform for teaching and training. (Contains 2 plates.)

Online interaction with 3D facial animation is an alternative way of face-to-face communication for distance education. 3D facial modeling is essential for virtual educational environments establishment. This article presents a novel 3D facial modeling solution that facilitates quasi-facial communication for online learning. Our algorithm builds 3D facial models from a single image, with support of a 3D face database. First from the image, we extract a set of feature points, which are then used to automatically estimate the head pose parameters using the 3D mean face in our database as a reference model. After the pose recovery, a similarity measurement function is proposed to locate the neighborhood for the given image in the 3D face database. The scope of neighborhood can be determined adaptively using our cross-validation algorithm. Furthermore, the individual 3D shape is synthesized by neighborhood interpolation. Texture mapping is achieved based on feature points. The experimental results show that our algorithm can robustly produce 3D facial models from images captured in various scenarios to enhance the lifelikeness in distant learning.

This article draws on constructs in second-language acquisition, literacy, cultural, and media studies as theoretical bases for examining how networked technologies and fan culture provide a young English language learner (ELL) with a site for developing her English language and writing skills. During this process, she also develops an online identity as a popular, multiliterate writer. To understand how this happens, the notion of identity is explored as a fluid construct that shifts over time with this ELL's long-term participation in a fan community. Popular and fan culture are also examined as points of affiliation and as dialogic resources that she appropriates, both in her writing and in her interactions with other fans. In so doing, the article demonstrates how popular culture and technology converge to provide a context in which this adolescent ELL is able to develop a powerful, transcultural identity, discursively constructed through the different cultural perspectives and literacies that she and other fans from across the globe bring to this space. (Contains 1 note.)

Anime-style films have been produced within East Asia for many years by relying on a cross-border production network dominated by studios in Japan. In this production model, Japanese studios provide source material and creative development, while manual work is outsourced to animators in neighbouring countries. With China's growing influence within the region's creative economy, however, more transnationally co-produced animations are based on Chinese source material, offering a promise of enhanced cultural exchange while challenging received frameworks of knowledge and production in the region's animation industry. This article examines how Japanese animation studios construct China as a nostalgic place by analyzing the use of nostalgia-driven narrative conventions in Flavours of Youth, a 2018 Sino-Japanese co-produced animation. The screen imaginaries yielded by such co-operative productions are contained within a familiar convention couched in an artistic language influenced by Japan's centrality in the anime production network. This results in a visual rhetoric that transforms the uneven landscape of China's transitions into a homogenous animation product. By outlining the theoretical terms of nostalgic representation expressed as sentiment: nostalgia as mood, and style: nostalgia as mode, we examine the way Flavours of Youth frames the interplay of the two nostalgic methods as a metacommentary on China's modernization process vis-à-vis Japan. The creative process involved in reconfiguring China's developmental transitions through anime conventions of 'nostalgia machines' creates a friction between the parasitic nostalgic form and the cultural host it attaches itself to, collapsing the film's potential for reflection on the contemporary realities of a shared Asian experience. We argue that the transnationally constructed, disembedded – and therefore artificial – nostalgia found in the film is a symptom of Japan's continuing ambivalence towards China manifested in the anime industry's overreliance on codified styles over shared engagement with the alternative cultural contexts of its Asian neighbours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence suggests that tailored inclusive sex education can be an effective response to prevent gender-based violence and promote an inclusive educational environment. This study examined the effects of an age-appropriate and animation-based inclusive sex education curriculum among Chinese adolescents. A total of 243 students from one comprehensive vocational high school participated in the study. Attitudes toward homosexuality and relevant knowledge were assessed using Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gays Scale and researcher-made questionnaires at the preintervention and postintervention. Results indicated that adolescents' attitudes and knowledge showed improvement after intervention; female students showed more positive attitudes toward homosexuals; and the animation-based inclusive sex education was welcomed by most participants. Implications of the findings and directions for future research were also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper highlights cultural intermediaries as an indispensable analytical focus through which we could make intellectual sense of cultural production in East Asia and its global journeys. The existing literature recognises cultural intermediaries as critical agents who orchestrate a match between cultural products and their target markets. Examining cultural intermediaries in the realm of the growing inflow of Chinese animation into Japanese theatrical distribution nowadays, including the introduction of White Snake in Japan in 2021, this paper suggests contingency as one of the most critical features entailed in the work of cultural intermediaries. Our cases highlight how their intermediation process was, in fact, ignited and carried out in an immensely contingent manner without any pre-established plans or principles. The paper underscores contingency as the feature that deserves straightforward attention of the literature on cultural intermediaries, and as the vantage point from which we could make rich sense of the front-line dynamism at work in trans-Asian cultural productions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 2010s, "we, the rabbit" has gained currency as an internet slang term referring to China, Chinese ethnicity, and the Chinese Communist Party. The recent popularity of the rabbit as a metonym for the nation is boosted by the varied multimedia forms of bunny characters appearing in historical narratives, web comics, games, and most important, the patriotic animated series Year Hare Affair. Juxtaposing commercial ambitions with a nationalist agenda, Year Hare Affair narrates historical events by personifying countries as anthropomorphic animals. Taking the viral rise of Year Hare Affair as a case study, this article delineates a genealogy of the bunny characters in Chinese popular culture. The transmedia forms of bunny characters, including those appearing in texts, comics, animated programs, and games, provide room for the construction of unstable meanings revolving around the bunny. Consequently, while such animated series align with official narratives of history, they also tone down the weight of those narratives by employing a variety of narrative devices, including parody, game-related motifs, and space-time manipulation. Through these diverse representations, the political message is sometimes enhanced and sometimes playfully challenged. Read in this light, the bunny's evolving trajectory in contemporary popular culture speaks volumes about the dynamics between digital aesthetics and politics, as well as the multiplicity of discourses generated as they meet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the findings of the research into improving design professional training by means of project activities alongside art and multimedia technologies (MTs). It discusses the role of artistic skills in the success of project activities, in particular, the skills of visual representation of the environment via MTs. It was confirmed that the development of media significantly changed the technological potential of design, as well as its artistic value. Therefore, professional training content became the primary focus of attention, since it appeared vital to involve new forms of creating artistic design projects with such modern methods as media fusion and motion graphics. The development of digital technologies promoted changes in teaching methods, adjustments in curricula according to the demands of modern design and those of introducing creative approaches in project activity teaching. The experimental part of the study demonstrates the dynamics of forming professional project skills on the authors' special course 'Multimedia Technologies'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have demonstrated how the image of the Chinese child has shifted from that of a political messenger in the socialist period to that of a consumer with rights in the reform era. Using the concept of the guai ("good") child, this article expands on these understandings of the Chinese child by examining the tensions a divided self faces between balancing individual desires and societal expectations in the 21st century. Through a close semiotic analysis of the blockbuster Chinese animated film Ne Zha: Birth of the Demon Child (2019), we argue that the child characters Ne Zha and Ao Bing represent a new, multi-layered Chinese individual. This ideal contemporary Chinese child is an agentive critical thinker who resists traditional expectations and takes control of their future instead of blindly obeying adult authority. These characters are simultaneously individualistic and collectivist. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the case of Bilibili, a popular Chinese video-sharing social media with a core focus on animation, comic, game and novel, this article examines the transnational prosumption practices of Chinese urban youth who mostly belong to Generation Z. I conduct ethnographic research and in-depth interviews with animation, comic, game and novel fans to investigate the construction of heterotopia on Bilibili through their various practices of tactical prosumption. This article demonstrates that young animation, comic, game and novel fans prosume, socialise and express themselves in a tactical and poetic way within the heterotopia, a place of otherness. Various tactics are employed to challenge and counter control, social norms as well as consumerism. Starting with a critical engagement with Azuma's pessimistic view on animation, comic, game and novel fan culture, the notion of 'database animals', I argue that a neglected, albeit nuanced, poetic and tactical prosumption process is evident on Chinese social media. Being the results of an interdisciplinary study, the findings will be helpful to scholars who are interested in contemporary Chinese studies with a focus on the animation industry, fandom, consumption and social media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Realist aesthetics has dominated critical discussion of postsocialist Chinese cultural production. This paper argues that contemporary Chinese animated media subverts the logic of realism by enacting virtual spaces, and in turn, hosting abject scenarios of socio-economic marginalization and even fantastic illusions of hyper-consumerism. Liu Jian's (2010) film Piercing I (刺痛我), depicts the plight of marginalized migrant workers in the big city and creates an absurd, exaggerated, and malnourished vision of a place where human characters lose their lives in a brutal, capitalist world. In contrast, multimedia artist's Cao Fei's (2007) virtual documentary, iMirror, joyfully explores digital creation in its colorful illusion of social mobility, following Cao Fei's avatar as she explores the virtual platform of Second Life – an exploration that continues in her later digital city project, RMB City (2008–2011). Online and in the gallery, iMirror and RMB City invite user engagement and creativity with a hyper-consumerist and dream-like space. Despite their divergent visions, the animated spaces created in these projects provide an interface to decipher the reality of the world in a mediated manner, but they are also marked by an ideological ambivalence towards the experience of alienation in postsocialist urban life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A comparative study of the CDIO engineering education accreditation criteria and Chinese engineering education accreditation criteria (CEEAC) is presented in this paper. The CDIO syllabus has 4 parts, 17 categories, and 73 subdivision abilities and forms a core concept of “Conceive-Design-Implement-Operate” (CDIO). The CDIO criteria are more inclined to the abilities of students to solve practical needs of engineering problems. There are detailed descriptions and requirements of the ability in teaching, more emphasis on project-driven or problem driven teaching methods. The Chinese engineering education accreditation criteria (CEEAC, 2015 edition) do not have a core concept like “Conceive-Design-Implement-Operate”. CEEAC has 12 categories, requirements of ability achievement, for students. The candidates, specialties of universities, are allowed to define their own subdivision abilities and syllabuses according to their situation, which indicates that the CEEAC is more flexible and easier to be obtained for candidates. The requirements of graduation abilities are between the categories and subdivision abilities of CDIO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Animated films undoubtedly play important roles in Children growth. Disney movie, as a typical American media product, enjoys a growing global popularity and influence the young audience particularly in family values or even in their socialization. Finding Dory is a popular animation among children especially aged 5-6 and it presents children of this age 1. how to face failure and 2. how to balance self-benefit and supporting friends. This paper samples Chinese kids aged from 5-6 with qualitative analysis to reveal the effects of Finding Dory on the socialization of particular aged children. Although the research is limited by children' language proficiency and parent's personal guidance, but it definitely set implications on how to make full advantages of those animated movies to pattern socialization for children at this particular age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Animators, architects, designers, and others active in the Chinese creative industries are expert users of tools, both analog and digital. Performances of expert tool use (the wearing of professional identity badges) are strategic ways of signaling creativity understood as sets of skills and character traits essential for attracting work projects but also for professional identity formation. Analogue tools are generally associated with creative openness and fluidity whereas digital tools are discursively constructed as a technological other to the analogue. ‘Older’ creatives (born before 1980) tend to apply some of the media-inflected discourse around the balinghou generation (born 1980–1989) to their younger competitors, including an assumed affinity with digital media and technologies (the pinning on of a generational identity badge). Such generational assumptions can have the effect of reinforcing project hierarchies and denying expert users of digital tools their claims to creativity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contains an interview with Messrs. Lo Wing Keung, Shao Haowen and Don Wu who are the creative force behind one of China's most foremost and longest running animation series called Xi Yang Yang yu Hui Tai Lang/The Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf (2005-). The interview discusses developments in Chinese creative/cultural industries and animation production for TV and film, as well as issues of intellectual property. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since China implemented animation control policies in 2004, foreign animation programmes have almost disappeared from Chinese television. At the same time, the Chinese government has invested enormous amounts of money in developing the animation industry as a creative industry. A questionnaire survey was conducted to explore how the Chinese audience views domestic and foreign animation programmes. The results indicate that pirated Japanese animation is widely viewed via the Internet by adolescents; on the other hand, domestic animation is popular only among children. Preferences for domestic animation correlate positively with age and patriotism but negatively with Internet use, while preferences for Japanese animation correlate negatively with age and patriotism but positively with Internet use. These results show that nationalistic sentiments are associated with preferences for either domestic or foreign animation programmes. However, preferences for Japanese animation are not significantly associated with anti-government attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article explores the contemporary adaptation of the Chinese children's live feature film Sparkling Red Star as a feature-length animation. By comparing their representations of play, it demonstrates how the 1974 source text deploys a political understanding of childhood, and the 2007 remake a commercial one; and how stylistic differences between the feature and the animation also underline an address to the child as consumer, not political agent, and to a transnational rather than a national audience. This reflects the inexorable commercialisation of mainstream Chinese animation in the face of external competition. This is exemplified in Chinese animation's repositioning as a “creative industry”; a discourse that defines creativity primarily in commercial terms, just as the discourse of playfulness positions the child as the subject of consumer economics. It is the convergence of these discourses in the animated adaptation of Sparkling Red Star that makes it such a rich case study. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The international visibility of Chinese animation is insignificant. However, its production has evolved since the 1920s, growing from the making of animated films based on hand-drawing and traditional crafts to producing television and new media-centred animations. With the government's increasing concern about the development of the cultural and creative industries, animation policies are being made actively and dramatically reshaping this industry at both national and local levels. This article proposes an analytic framework synthesizing or combining the three dimensions of media, geography and policy to examine the historical development and geographical performance of Chinese animation. It explains how the power of media as the broadcasting platform of animation, domestic and international production factors, and cultural policy highlighting a national style of animation have constructed the reality of the business model, the visual aesthetics and the dynamics of production locations of Chinese animation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The state-owned media system in China has evolved considerably since 1994 when the first independent TV production company was officially registered. Today, there are thousands of independent TV production companies looking for market opportunities in China. Independent production companies have facilitated the circulation of program trade and investment, and in the process have encouraged innovation and professionalization. This article focuses on the evolution of independents and the changing face of the television market. It discusses the ecology of independent television companies in China and how government regulations are impacting on the TV production market. It argues that independent TV is providing a new face for China's TV market, one often suspected of being imitative, propagandists and lacking colour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates underlying constraints within China's creative economy. Drawing on two studies of creative clusters in Suzhou and Foshan, it identifies the importance of knowledge transfer and internationalization to the generation of higher value-added products and services. Both examples illustrate relationships between resources, activities, routines and entrepreneurship. The article argues that the examples notwithstanding, the vast majority of what is accounted for in data collection as China's creative industries are more appropriately cultural industries. The focus on cultural industries drives local development and increases land values but the benefits are rarely dispersed internationally or into the broader economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]