Reconfiguring the boundaries of self and state in the PRC: Metaverse, Social Credit, and Ethnicity

中国已经是世界上一体化程度最深、技术最先进的社会。公民的身份和机构被编码为一个单一的政府颁发的ID。这与从一个人的银行账户和社会信用评分到一个人的消息和社交媒体资料的一切联系在一起，因此重新配置了我们可能认为的“人”的边界。从最纯粹的意义上说，这就是“元宇宙”的定义：一个映射到希腊现实的虚拟领域，“合法运营商”可以在其中无缝地来回移动。继续我的硕士研究到中国的元宇宙与那些在香港和台湾的限制，我计划显示土家族少数民族的独特视角如何提供一个理想的界限，在其中绘制出当今中国的控制论人类的界限，从而为全球互联网提供一个可能的未来。土家族是非常缺乏研究的。数百万人生活在重庆附近，重庆可以说是中国最大的，最不西化的，但技术最先进的大城市。目前还没有关于重庆土家族的社区民族志，也没有关于他们如何受到快速社会技术变化影响的研究，比如5G的重新控制，很快就会在各地感受到。鉴于中国民族主义浪潮的兴起及其与快速城市化、新媒体和公共话语的去民族化的交叉，我问土家族如何调节自我与国家的界面？考虑到人工智能和算法逻辑在中国的技术统治中扮演的主要角色，新技术如何进一步调解这一过程？使用在线和离线参与观察，半结构化访谈，网络映射，和语言GIS数据，我将建立在“控制论”的理论概念，我已经通过我以前的研究来解释社会技术的演变如何重新配置自我和状态的边界。

China is already the world's most deeply integrated and technologically advanced society. The citizen's identity and agencyare coded about a singular government-issued ID. This then ties to everything from one's bank account and social creditscore to one's messaging and social media profiles and so reconfigures the boundary of what we might consider the'person'. In the purest sense, this is the definition of 'metaverse': a virtual realm mapped onto quotidian reality, from which'legitimate operators' can move seamlessly back and forth. Continuing my masters research into the Chinese metaversewith those at its limits in Hong Kong and Taiwan, I plan to show how the unique perspective of the Tujia minority providesan ideal delimitation within which to chart the boundaries of the cybernetic human in China today, and so present onepossible future for the internet globally.The Tujia are greatly understudied. Millions live within the vicinity of Chongqing, arguably China's largest, leastwesternised,and yet most technologically advanced megacity. There has been no community ethnography of the Tujia inChongqing, and no studies into how they have been affected by rapid sociotechnological changes, such as the recentroll-out of 5G, soon to be felt everywhere.Given the rising tides of nationalism in the PRC and their intersection with rapid urbanisation, new media, and thedeethnicisation of public discourse, I ask how does Tujia ethnicity modulate the interface of selfhood with the state? Giventhe prime role played by AI and algorithmic logic in China's technocracy, how do new technologies further mediate thisprocess? Using online and offline participant observation, semi-structured interviews, network-mapping, and linguistic GISdata, I will build upon the theoretical concept of 'cybernesis' that I have developed through my previous research to explainhow sociotechnological evolution reconfigures the boundaries of self and state.