Introduction
China, a developing country with increasing influence and bargaining power on world economies and politics, has experienced rapid transformations since the implementation of Reform and Open-up policy in 1978. “Pop Culture China! : Media, Arts, and Lifestyle” can be regard as a Social Science and History book which covers different aspects of popular culture of China. The author, Kevin Latham, an expert in media and Chinese culture, mentioned that the book aims to be an introductory book covering broad aspects of contemporary Chinese popular culture and practices.

The book starts by introducing the cultural backgrounds and major historical events of China, such as defining China and Chinese, which helps the readers to establish basic understanding about China. It is important for the readers to know the background, as the emergence and development of cultures are interrelated to the physical environment and history. In the main body of the book, the author focuses on 3 major areas of popular culture in China, including mass media, consumption and arts, covering 10 different topics like television, the Internet, traditional Chinese operas and popular music, sports and movies. The formation and transition of various cultural objects after reform and opening up are presented descriptively. Moreover, the
Traditionally, the mass media communicates with the public in a top-down approach. It is common for the mass media to disseminate information to the public in a unidirectional way and the people receive the information passively. In the contemporary technological environment, this kind of the interaction has been changed as more channels are provided for the public to express their views in the mass media. However, from my perspective, this cannot be regard as a representation of democracy or freedom of