Sex, City, and the Maid: Between Socialist Fantasies and Neoliberal Parables

Sun, W

Sex, City, and the Maid: Between Socialist Fantasies and Neoliberal Parables

Sun, W

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Publisher:: GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, 2010, 39 (4), pp. 53 - 69
Issue Date:: 2010-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Sun, W https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8687-3739	en_US
dc.date.issued	2010-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, 2010, 39 (4), pp. 53 - 69	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	1868-1026	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/15930
dc.description.abstract	Of the many rural migrant workers who go to Chinese cities as cheap labourers, the one who interacts most intimately with urban residents is the domestic servant. In fact, precisely because of this intimate stranger status, the figure of the maid has captured the imagination of the urban population. This fascination is evidenced by the plethora of television narratives centring on the fraught relationships between the rural migrant woman and her male employer. This paper analyses a range of television narratives from the genres of dramas and documentaries. It shows that in these narratives, sex functions as the metaphor of social inequality between two social groups. It shows that if we explore how love, romance and marriage are constructed, we may gain some insight into processes of social and ideological contestation in the domain of cultural production.	en_US
dc.publisher	GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Journal of Current Chinese Affairs	en_US
dc.title	Sex, City, and the Maid: Between Socialist Fantasies and Neoliberal Parables	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	4	en_US
utslib.citation.volume	39	en_US
utslib.for	1608 Sociology	en_US
utslib.for	1605 Policy and Administration	en_US
utslib.for	1606 Political Science	en_US
dc.location.activity	Perth, Western Australia
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences/Public Communication Program
utslib.copyright.status	closed_access
pubs.consider-herdc	true	en_US
pubs.issue	4	en_US
pubs.volume	39	en_US

Abstract:

Of the many rural migrant workers who go to Chinese cities as cheap labourers, the one who interacts most intimately with urban residents is the domestic servant. In fact, precisely because of this intimate stranger status, the figure of the maid has captured the imagination of the urban population. This fascination is evidenced by the plethora of television narratives centring on the fraught relationships between the rural migrant woman and her male employer. This paper analyses a range of television narratives from the genres of dramas and documentaries. It shows that in these narratives, sex functions as the metaphor of social inequality between two social groups. It shows that if we explore how love, romance and marriage are constructed, we may gain some insight into processes of social and ideological contestation in the domain of cultural production.

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http://hdl.handle.net/10453/15930