Making sense of danmu: coherence in massive anonymous chats on Bilibili.com

Zhang, Leticia Tian; Cassany, Daniel

doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1461445620940051

Making sense of danmu: coherence in massive anonymous chats on Bilibili.com

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Citation

Zhang LT, Cassany D. Making sense of danmu: coherence in massive anonymous chats on Bilibili.com. Discourse Stud. 2020;22(4):483–502. DOI: 10.1177/1461445620940051

Abstract

Although coherence has been widely studied in computer-mediated communication (CMC), insufficient attention has been paid to emergent multimodal forms. This study analyzes a popular commentary system on Chinese and Japanese video-sharing sites – known as danmu or danmaku – where anonymous comments are superimposed on and scroll across the video frame. Through content and multimodal discourse analysis, we unpack danmu-mediated communication analyzing the newest interface (on Bilibili.com), the comments, the interpersonal interactions and the unusual use of the second-person pronoun. Results show that despite the technological constraints (hidden authorship, unmarked sending date and lack of options to structure comments), users construct order in interactions through repetition, danmu-specific expressions and multimodal references, while using playful language to make fun. This study provides an up-to-date analysis on an increasingly popular CMC medium beyond well-studied social networking sites, and broadens the understanding of coherence in contemporary CMC.