Affiliation:
1. University of British Columbia
Abstract
This article examines new conceptions of gender and sexuality in China, asking how and why they have become so integral to the organization of service work regimes there. Drawing on ethnographic data collected in three urban Chinese retail settings, this article demonstrates how essentialized conceptions of gender and sexuality powerfully communicate class distinctions in service settings through associations with the imagery of China’s shift from socialism to a marketized society. A shift from the socialist “iron rice bowl” to the “rice bowl of youth” infuses youthful, feminine, urban bodies with value while simultaneously devaluing middle-aged and rural women. This article argues that an essentializing discourse of gender legitimates new inequalities in urban China by masking the class distinctions simultaneously produced.
Subject
Sociology and Political Science,Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous),Gender Studies
Cited by
67 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献