Gender and Sexuality Stream

Research Stream: Gender and Sexuality

The research stream on gender and sexuality at the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies explores the complex interplay among gender, sexual, and cultural/national identities in contemporary China. We draw on interdisciplinary expertise across gender and sexuality studies, cultural and media studies, Chinese studies, and political science to explore how ideas and practices of gender are transformed in mediated and unmediated realities.  We are also keen to join public debates on gender issues in China and participating in the making of counterculture. The stream aims to foster transformative understandings and practices of gender and sexuality through a combination of scholarly inquiry, creative expression, and social engagement, contributing to ongoing debates on identity, representation, and social justice in the region.

Stream Coordinators: Lin Song and Ling Tang

Latest Publications

  • Ling Tang. 2026. Burnout Market Feminism: Urban Chinese Businesswomen in the Internet Age. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  • Ling Tang and Yihuan Zhang. 2026. ‘Questions Facing Chinese Feminism: Anti-Feminism and Anti-LGBTQ Politics in China since the 2010s.’ European Journal of Women’s Studies 33(3): 398–405 . Link.
  • Yihuan Zhang and  Ling Tang. 2026. ‘Postfeminism with Chinese Characteristics: The Rise of the Postfeminist Intellectual Celebrity in Digital China.’ Feminist Media Studies, online first. Link.
  • Ling Tang. 2025. 'Gender-Critical Chinese Feminisms: From Critical Socialism to Post-Utopia.' Made in China Journal 10(2): 224–31. Link.
  • Yihuan Zhang and Ling Tang. 2025. '“Rat Rat” Culture and Digital Misogyny: Extreme Misogyny, Problematic Feminisms, and the Governmentality of Gender in Post-socialist China. Feminist Studies, 50(3): 376–405. Link.
  • Ling Tang. 2025. ‘No Success No Queer: Burnout Queerness for Queer Female Entrepreneurs in Post-Socialist Urban China.’ Media, Culture & Society 47(7). Link.
  • Le Cui and Song Lin. 2025. 'The Im/Possibility of Home: Chinese Queer International Students’ Homing Experiences in New Zealand.' Mobilities. Link.
  • Ling Tang and Yihuan Zhang. 2025. ‘Invoking Humor: The Digital Making of Queer Affective Solidarity through Gaoxiao Vlogs in China.’ Communication, Culture & Critique 18 (3). Link.
  • Hongkun Wang, Yihuan Zhang, and Ling Tang. 2025. ‘Indigenizing Feminist Rage: The Affective Formation of Rad-Feminist Politics in Digital China.’ International Journal of Cultural Studies. Link.
  • Song Lin and Tingting Liu. 2024. 'Can China Really Ban Sissies?: Situating "Sissiness" between State and Popular Discourses in Trans/national China.' Nan Nü: Men, Women and Gender in China 26: 326–49. Link.
  • Le Cui and Song Lin. 2024. 'Queer Migration, Heteronormativity, and the "Ethnic Closet": Chinese Queer International Students’ Intersectional Experience in New Zealand.' European Journal of Education. Link.
  • Runze Ding and Song Lin. 2023. 'Digital Sexual Publics: Understanding DIY Gay Porn and Lived Experiences of Sexuality in China.' International Journal of Communication 17: 2463–78. Link.
  • Song Lin and Shangwei Wu. 2023. 'Walled Cosmopolitanization: How China’s Great Firewall Mediates Young Urban Gay Men’s Lives.' Journal of Computer-mediated Communication 28(2). Link.

Upcoming Events

SEMINAR: 'Female Same-Sex Hatred': Reimagining Queer Female Relationships in Chinese Popular Culture

In Chinese popular culture, queer female relationship is often depicted as lesbianism (女同性恋). However, the recent popularity of the term 'female same-sex hatred' (女同性恨) on Chinese social media updates and complicates (if not subverts) this narrative. This term originates from fan discussions about pairing the two female characters Zhen Huan and An Lingrong in one of China's most popular TV drama Empresses in the Palace. Unlike other discussions on same-sex pairings that emphasise romantic relationships, fans view Zhen Huan and An Lingrong as embodying 'female same-sex hatred', a complex relationship characterised by emotional connections intertwined with admiration, affection, antagonism, resentment, and even persecution. Through a critical discourse analysis of online discussions about the 'female same-sex hatred' between Zhen Huan and An Lingrong, this seminar will argue that 'female same-sex hatred' not only challenges heteronormative dominance but also broadens the imagination of female same-sex desires.

About the Speaker

Dr. Egret Lulu Zhou is an Assistant Professor and associate head in the Department of Literature and Cultural Studies at the Education University of Hong Kong. Her research interests encompass television drama, celebrity and fandom, gender and age. She has received the Early Career Scheme (2018-2020) and the General Research Fund (2021-2024) from the Hong Kong Research Grants Council. Her articles have appeared in the European Journal of Cultural Studies, Critical Studies in Television: The International Journal of Television Studies, and Adaptation: Journal of Literature on Screen Studies. She and her PhD student co-authored the first monograph specifically on Hong Kong television dramas: The Sun Also Rises: Hong Kong Television Dramas and Mainland-Hongkong Relations (2024, in Chinese).

Information

Date and venue: Monday December 7, 2:00–3:30pm, 4th floor Linkway, John Medley Building

Organised by Asian Cultural Research Hub

Registration and enquiries: Fran Martin, f.martin@unimelb.edu.au

Past Events

MOVIE SCREENING: Chengdu Rainbow (3 September 2026)

Chengdu Rainbow is a non-profit organisation focused on the LGBTQ community originally known as Chengdu Milk. The film documents the organisation’s restructuring, its efforts to rebuild, and its subsequent decline. The film’s principal subject, Matthew, is the organisation’s founder and a member of the LGBTQ community. His initial motivation for establishing the organisation was to help LGBTQ people experiencing mental-health challenges. Ultimately, however, he also left because of his own mental-health struggles. The screening was followed by a discussion with director Li Yaqi.

SEMINAR: Communicative Sexuotechnical Assemblages: The Material Mediation of AI Intimacy and Embodied Sexual Desire (7 August 2026)

In this seminar, Dr Tingting Hu, Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communication at Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, explored AI-mediated sexual intimacy among female users, analysing how the convergence of generative AI and haptic hardware produces technological self-sufficiency. Adapting the Sexual Interaction Illusion (SII) model beyond its original heterosexual-male, gynoid-robot framing, we examine how Chinese platforms Monster Party and SELO enable female users to experience digital personas as genuine sexual partners through communicative reciprocity.

WEBINAR SERIES: Confronting Online Gender-Based Violence in China (November and December 2025)

This three-part webinar series was organised by the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Melbourne in collaboration with Global China Lab as part of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence in November and December2025. Bringing together survivors, advocates, legal experts, journalists, and international scholars, the series examined how technology-facilitated sexual violence unfolds in China, who bears the brunt of it, and where legal and policy gaps persist, while also drawing on global experiences and promising practices. Full program here.