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The original meaning of abstract is often referring to philosophy or artistic concept. In philosophy aspect, abstraction means the process of generalizing rules and concepts from specific examples. In artistic aspect, abstract represents an art style that composite shape, form, color and line to create a form of visual references. Nevertheless, I my opinion, abstract in Chinese means something that is highly-conceptualize, esoteric, and meaningless in day-to-day life. However, when the word “abstract” is introduced to Chinese internet the meaning of it changed dramatically.

Before talking about what is “abstract” means, lets talks about the origin of “abstract” in Chinese internet. When and how does “abstract” in become so popular in China? many people argue that abstract start from nowhere. However, the online popularity of “abstract” is origin from “abstract studio”(抽象工作室), founded by Li Gan. Li Gan is one of the most famous streamers in early-stage Chinese internet. Firstly, the streaming content is just merely playing video games. However, Li Gan found that these dull contents cannot capture the attention of audiences. He switched his streaming style into talking style, for example watching others’ streaming, talking with chatroom. Soon, the interesting accent of Li Gan and other streamers in “abstract studio” leads to many audiences imitate their ways of talking. That is the origin of “abstract”. The audiences called these ways of talking and expression as “abstract speech”. Nevertheless, audiences of “abstract studio” started to spread hatred and vulgar speech in the community. They poured in other streamers’ chat and spread tons of irrelevant and hatred comments. Due to the censorship, Li Gan have soon been banned from the Chinese streaming platform. In the first stage, “abstract” represents the specific ways of talking, and “abstract” also express many hatreds, negative , and vulgar atmosphere.

After “abstract studio” was banned, meaning of “abstract” have changed drastically. After “Abstract Studio” was banned, the meaning of “abstract” changed drastically. Without the direct influence of Li Gan and his group, the word began to evolve in broader online communities. Internet users started to use “abstract” not only to imitate Li Gan’s speech patterns but also to describe any content that felt bizarre, illogical, or absurdly funny. The negative and aggressive tone of the early “abstract” gradually faded away, and the word transformed into a cultural symbol of absurdist humor. It became a way for people to express sarcasm, irony, and self-mockery in an exaggerated or irrational manner. Also, as a result of reducing its aggressive tone, “abstract” became a popular Chinese internet keyword that is accepted and collected by the official.

“Doing abstract stuff”(搞抽象) have been collected in Chinese language report in 2024. Abstract refers to a style of expression that disobey the social norms and convention, focusing on characterize expression. People who are “abstract” often tends to express their emotions through absurd, sardonicism, non-linear ways.

The popularity of “abstract” on Chinese internet is definitely not an accident. It reflects the emotions, generation confusion, self-identity, and cultural environment of the younger generations.

Firstly, “abstract” fulfill the needs of younger generation’s desire to rebel the social norms and seriousness. In the modern Chinese society, younger generations often face uncountable pressure from multiple aspects, like society and family. And the rise of “abstract” offers them a creative way to deconstruct authority and challenge the social expectation by expressing absurdity. By deconstruct the original meaning, the creator of “abstract” content contains a sense of humor which are used to express their emotions that unable to express in the normal time.

In addition to helping younger generation resisting the competitive social atmosphere, “abstract” also fit perfectly with today’s mainstream Chinese internet media form—short videos. On the platform like Bili Bili, Douyin (Chinese TikTok), Red Notes, and etc. All of these users of these platform consume an astonishing amount of short vides. However, explaining or creating something that have real contents in probably 30 seconds to 1 minutes is nearly unrealistic. Therefore, by the unstoppable trend of short video in Chinese internet, “abstract” contents are largely created and published in Chinese social media since in the most of time “abstract” contents are presented in a short and dramatic style, for example, “abstract” video often only last within 1 minute.

In conclusion, the rise of “abstract” in the Chinese internet represent not only a linguistic evolution, it also demonstrate the chinese younger generation’s spirits, where they would pursue humor and challenging authority through meaningless and absurdity.