Ambivalent desiring subjects: young women, agency and post-(socialist-)feminist sensibilities in China

Abstract

In this article, I propose the novel concept of ‘post-(socialist-)feminist sensibilities’, which is embodied in the experiences of the one-child generation of Chinese urban young women who live as ambivalent desiring subjects. Post-(socialist-)feminist sensibilities denote women's recognition of and response to the gendered culture and regulations of heteropatriarchy in post-socialist China and transnational post-feminism. This conceptualisation of ambivalence does not follow a progressive or linear logic; indeed, post-(socialist-)feminist sensibilities have inherited both forward and backward momentum. With reference to 50 female participants of danmei, Chinese male–male romances and/or erotica, I suggest that on the one hand these young women desire independence, while on the other hand their visualisation of femininity/masculinity and intimate relationships is ineluctably affected by the heteropatriarchy. Post-(socialist-)feminist sensibilities are also embodied in these young women's deliberate distinction between an oppressive, backward-looking reality and a sustaining forward-facing fantasy. Notably, it is precisely such a reflexive recognition that grants these women transformative momentum towards an alternative future.