Issue 19: Little Changes
Zhou, Holly
By Holly Zhou

they/them

Thirty Sonic • again & gain & in &

cratered once-oceans / looping the lunar / phases, playing our faces / on shuffle, no [[ agents ]] to label us / illegal

Thirty Sonic

—for SOPHIE

again & gain & in &

This particular approach to internet speak — substituting words that sound like or are spelled like others — has been an essential part of being online in China for decades. To bypass censorship around criticism of policies that Chinese citizens are repeatedly and forcefully subjected to, people use the phrase 又双叒叕 to represent the concept “again and again” visually, repeating the character for “again” (又) an escalating number of times.

Meaghan Tobin and Katherine Lee,
How Chinese citizens use puns to get past internet censors


Edited by Stuti Pachisia and Jeff Joseph Katz.
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