China Digital Times

From their website:

China Digital Times (CDT) is an independent, bilingual media organization that brings uncensored news and online voices from China to the world.

We achieve this through:

  • Filtering and aggregating news from English-language media and placing it in a broader social and political context;
  • Amplifying the voices of Chinese citizens through translation;
  • Revealing the hidden mechanisms of state censorship by collecting and translating filtered keywords, propaganda directives, and official rhetoric;
  • Interpreting the resistance discourse of Chinese netizens by introducing and translating the codes, metaphors, and satire created in response to breaking news and censored topics.

CDT English was launched in 2003 as a blog to track the development of the Internet in China and quickly grew into a more comprehensive news portal. In 2010, we launched CDT Chinese to aggregate content that has been censored or blocked in Chinese cyberspace. We select the most valuable and relevant material from CDT Chinese to translate for our English readers. CDT is based in Berkeley, CA, but our team contributes to the site from across the globe.

At any time, we welcome your feedback and suggestions. We also encourage you to join the discussions on our various social media sites.

To increase connectivity to our readers in China, we have also set up a mirror site for English and Chinese.

Last Updated: July 7, 2016

The Great Leap from Myth to History

Josh Rudolph
China Digital Times
n an article for Asia Times Online posted earlier this month, Peter Lee examines the cooling prohibition on discussion of the disastrous effects of the Great Leap Forward. The collection of hastily enacted policies resulted in mass starvation. What...

The Light of the Law Never Shone on Them

Anne Henochowicz
China Digital Times
Soon after self-taught lawyer Chen Guangcheng escaped from illegal house arrest, local officials entered the house of his nephew, Chen Kegui, without any notice or warrent. Chen Kegui lashed out with a kitchen knife, then ran away. None of the...

Hong Kong US Consulate “Acts Cute” With People's Daily

Anne Henochowicz
China Digital Times
On May 25, the official Weibo account of the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong published its “Thoughts on Reading the U.S. Human Rights Report in the Style of the People’s Daily.” The humorous and sarcastic tone of the comments caused large scale re-...

Chen Guangcheng News: A Digest

Samuel Wade
China Digital Times
An nice annotated collection of coverage and commentary on rights activist Chen Guangcheng's arrival in New York.

The Law is Not a Shield!

Sophie Beach
China Digital Times
For his latest contribution to the Hexie Farm CDT series, cartoonist Crazy Crab looks at last week’s expulsion of Al Jazeera English bureau chief Melissa Chan from China. At a press conference, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hong Lei referred...