Tom McDonald

I am a media anthropologist dedicated to using ethnographic engagement to achieve a richer understanding of how digital technologies, media and material culture come to mediate ongoing transformations in the communicative practices, economic behaviours, social relationships and human subjectivities of people in China and beyond. I joined the HKU Department of Sociology in August 2015. Prior to this I was a Research Associate at the Department of Anthropology, University College London.

My research increasingly focuses on economic concerns, reflecting the rapid convergence between digital money and media in China and the wider world. I have recently completed two major projects in this area. The first concerns the adoption of digital payment and consumer finance platforms and their impact in shaping financial subjectivities. The second examines the potential of digital money in facilitating everyday cross-boundary money transactions.

I am currently in the early stages of a new project examining how NFTs are transforming processes of collection, exchange and production in the Hong Kong art market.

Research interests

• Anthropology
• China
• Credit/debt
• Communications
• Digital money
• Internet
• Social media
• Technology

Education

• PhD Anthropology University College London
• MRes Anthropology University College London
• BSc Anthropology University College London