In a study of personal music reception in communist China, Rey Chow gives these theorizations of the potential of the Walkman's immediate political significance. For Chow, the Walkman gives each Chinese citizen "the possibility … to be a missing part of history, to which I say: 'I am not there, not where you collect me'" (139-40). Here the Walkman becomes a "hiding place for the music-operator … 'to be produced everywhere it is possible to produce it … by anyone who wants to enjoy it'" (ibid). For Chow, listening joins talking as a political activity; it becomes "a 'silent' sabotage of the technology of collectivization with its own instruments" (140). Thus the Walkman acts as a tool of resistance, a way to retain some sort of individuality in the face of involuntary submission.