The new urban middle class, ――referred to as “Xiaozi” ―― emerged in chinese society in the 1990s. When “Xiaozi” came into the spotlight as China's new “urban middle class” , it was also viewed as the subject to promote the development of consumer society. However, with the development of consumer society, Xiaozi was reproduced in the mass media discourse space and undermined gradually, resulting in a semantic separation from the new urban middle class. Focusing on the analysis toward Xiaozi discourse, this study explores how the evolution of the new urban middle class as the subject of consumer society took place.

This study employed critical discourse analysis toward Xiaozi discourse on the three main newspapers in China and reached the following major conclusions. First, the reason why the concept of Xiaozi experienced a separation from urban middle class lies in the weakening of Xiaozi subject in the discourse space. Second, the Xiaozi subject weakened because the dominant mass consumer ideology―― which followed the development of consumer society ―― frustrated the distinction strategies of the new urban middle class. Based on the analysis above, we can conclude that the correlation between the evolution of the new urban middle class and such characteristic of the development of consumer society epitomizes the specificity of late starter countries for modernization.