Between Empire and Screens: Coloniality and ‘Unpublic’ Pedagogy in Chinese Lesbianism

• In Event: Disruptive Historicizing and Futurity in Curriculum Theorizing

Abstract

On RedNote—China’s women‑oriented social media platform—Sinophone lesbians curate “unpublic” pedagogy, a hidden curriculum forged in the overlap of colonial memory and algorithmic surveillance. Grounded in theories of decolonial feminism public pedagogy, this qualitative case study analyzes 300 high‑engagement posts and 30 interviews from China’s mid-tier cities such as Wuhan, Zhongshan, and Dali. Multimodal discourse and small‑story analysis reveal four entwined practices: ghost‑hashtag translation that localizes Western queer idioms; emoji‑driven affective economies that circulate care; fluid dyadics that exceed the legacy T–P (buth-femme) binary; and monetized commodity loops that fund mutual aid. Together, these practices show how marginalized communities transform platform capitalism into future‑oriented curricula, extending understandings of culture, place, and the hidden curriculum in transnational digital life.

Author

• Xun Ril Li, University of Toronto - OISE