Theorising Chinese Masculinity
Society and Gender in China

This book is a comprehensive analysis of Chinese masculinity.

Kam Louie (Author)

9780521806213, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 1 April 2002

248 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.54 kg

'In [the book], Kam Louie offers us a very clear and concise analysis of the cultural models of Chinese masculinity from ancient imperial times to the present age of transnational contact … Louie's book could be considered a pioneering effort to provide a rather comprehensive study of this subject. Besides describing in detail the historical development of the male image from premodern to contemporary times, Louie also focuses on the ways in which Chinese men have been represented under the Western gaze and how these representations have negotiated with the dominant Western culture.' Philosophy East and West

This book is a comprehensive analysis of Chinese masculinity. While there is a vast Eurocentric scholarship on gender and sexuality, there has been little work addressing these issues within the Chinese context. Kam Louie uses the concepts of wen (cultural attainment) and wu (martial valour) to explain attitudes to masculinity. This revises most Western analyses of Asian masculinity that rely on the yin-yang binary. Examining classical and contemporary Chinese literature and film, the book also looks at the Chinese diaspora to consider Chinese masculinity within and outside China. Its use of a largely indigenous framework to analyse Chinese masculinity makes it an exciting addition to this burgeoning field.

1. Introducing wen-wu: towards a definition of Chinese masculinity
2. Portrait of the God of War Guan Yu: sex, politics and wu masculinity
3. Confucius as sage, teacher, businessman: transformations of the wen Icon
4. Scholars and intellectuals: representations of wen masculinity past and present
5. The working-class hero: images of wu in traditional and Post-Mao fiction
6. Women's voices: the ideal 'woman's man' in the twentieth century
7. Lao She's The Two Mas and foreign wives: constructing wen masculinity for the modern world
8. Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Chow Yun Fat: internationalising wu masculinity
9. Wen-wu reconstructed: Chinese masculinity hybridised and globalised
Notes
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography [JHMC], Ethnic studies [JFSL], Gender studies: women [JFSJ1], Cultural studies [JFC], Regional studies [GTB]