Paper short abstract:

This project examines the emerging experiments in fibers among young entrepreneurs in Nantong, China’s largest textile town. It investigates how the pursuit of new materials, technologies, and connotations of “homeyness” reshape production and consumption in a precarious post-pandemic economy.

Paper long abstract:

This project examines the emergence of experiments in fiber and textiles among young entrepreneurs in Nantong, Jiangsu Province, China. Facing challenges posed by post-pandemic economic anxieties, resurgent geopolitical tensions, international trade wars, and re-spatialized global supply chains, young generations of textile businesspeople in China’s largest domestic textile center have lately resorted to new fibers, technologies, and connotations of “homeyness” (or “cozy-ness”) as potential solutions. My fieldwork has encountered, for example, bean-based fibers (marketed as an alternative to cotton) that cater to rising eco-friendly preferences among homeowners, as well as lightweight synthetically made blankets with the name “cool bean (bing doudou)” referring to their bean-like shape and texture. Unpacking these material-semiotic experiments through the narratives of various involved actors (entrepreneurs, factory workers, designers, etc.), this ethnographic study seeks to investigate the following questions: 1) What motivates such experiments? Are multiple levels of drives involved, prospectively ranging from peer pressure, market competition, and the Chinese state’s promotion of the slogan “created in China” (i.e., beyond “made in China”)? 2) What kinds of new relations, movements, economies, or experiences can be generated from within? Could they lead to substantial and sustainable developments or could they end up instilling a sense of “cruel optimism,” since the stakes of experimenting with new products in a constantly shifting economy are high? That is, with a thing-oriented analytical approach, this paper attends to new fibers’ rich materiality, configurations for different textile producers, and implications for understanding today’s Chinese economy.