| Sumario: | Douyin's socio-economic opportunities have made it popular among the Chinese diaspora, who position themselves as 'cultural knowledge brokers' to introduce overseas lives to Chinese audiences. This study investigates the representation of the national self/ cultural other and the performance of national/cosmopolitan identity in the content produced by Chinese diasporas on Chinese digital platform Douyin. By performing a thematic analysis of N = 70 Douyin videos produced by diasporic individuals, we identify four themes engaging with Chineseness and the cultural other, namely the global recognition of Chinese culture; the long-distance connection to the homeland; the 'exoticism' of difference; and, the affective ties to the Other. We argue that Chinese diasporic vloggers blend national and cosmopolitan identities when narrating their overseas lives. This discursive work of the diasporic vloggers reproduces official nationalist narratives back in China, romanticised or stereotypical representations of the cultural other, and established social imaginaries of the global hierarchy. The representation of the national self/ cultural other and the performance of national/ cosmopolitan identity is complicated by the entanglement of various factors: the commercial logic of Douyin, the dominance of nationalism in Chinese cyberspace, and the mobility capital and cosmopolitan capital as a sign of social distinction.
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