“Leftover women,” media discourses, and gender and class in post-socialist China

Women remaining single in their late 20s or after 30 years old in China are known as “shengnü,” and the most widely used English translation is “leftover women.” This dissertation investigates the media representations of single women as a culturally and politically loaded discursive construct in post-socialist China. Exploring the discourses around single women across diverse media and social contexts, including mainstream television dramas, transnational commercial campaigns, online matchmaking discourse and feminist digital activism, this study examines how the images of single women function as a contested site through which gendered governance is enacted, negotiated and challenged. Drawing on a multi-sited discourse analysis informed by theories of intersectionality and neoliberalism, the project highlights the contingent and hybrid nature of China’s neoliberal formation, where governance increasingly occurs through the entanglement of market rationalities, patriarchal traditions, and state imperatives. Ultimately, the dissertation reveals how gender and class function not merely as categories of difference but as dynamic axes through which power is produced, contested, and sustained in post-socialist China.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communications and Media

Grantor

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2025

Author dc:creator

• Peng, Anqi

Contributors dc:contributor

• McCarthy, Cameron
• Valdivia, Angharad
• Ciafone, Amanda
• Martin, Jeffrey

• Leftover Women
• Neoliberal Governance
• Gender
• Class
• Post-socialist China
• Critical Discourse Analysis

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2025 Anqi Peng

Language dc:language

en, eng

Handle dc:identifier

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/130124

OAI record oai:identifier

https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=etdms&identifier=oai%3Awww.ideals.illinois.edu%3A2142%2F130124