Wing Lam Michelle Chan

Supervisor: Jennifer Altehenger

My DPhil project examines post-war Hong Kong (1950s-1970s), using the lens of work and professions to probe social-cultural change amidst domestic industrial transitions and the internationalised Cold War. It centres the communication and creative industries of press, printing, advertising and design as key sites where consumer culture and mass media took shape. By examining the white collar work of editors and journalists, the technical work of pressmen, the evolving field of commercial art and advertising, and the emergence of design as a profession, I analyse how media and consumer culture were made material in and through Hong Kong.

My DPhil study is funded by the Clarendon Scholarship and the Magdalen College Graduate Scholarship in History, and my work is supervised by Dr Jennifer Altehenger. Also at Oxford, I developed my interest in print culture beyond its textual dimension during my MSt in Global and Imperial History and my BA in History and Economics. My masters work explored cultural production by Hong Kong Chinese businessmen during the Interwar, and my undergraduate research investigated diglossia and political journalism in 1905 Hong Kong amidst a transnational boycott movement. My research thus adopts an integrated lens on production and consumption, highlighting everyday voices within Hong Kong's local and transborder contexts.