Seeking Western Men: The Case of China’s Email-Order Brides

• In Event: 1567 - Mate Selection and Relationship Formation

Abstract

This article examines the life histories and decision-making processes of Chinese women who seek marriages with Western men through transnational cyber-dating agencies. In particular, I focus on the experiences of middle-aged women, who are often called China’s “unlucky generation.” As traditional gender ideologies emphasizing feminine youth become rejuvenated in post-reform China, many middle-aged women now face disadvantages in both the marriage and labor markets. Through 17 months of ethnography at three different transnational cyber-dating agencies in southern China, I explore how these cultural and structural changes facilitated women’s shared desire to marry foreign men. At the same time, I also analyze how differences in the women’s individual class background led them to develop vastly different mate-selection strategies, despite their shared nationality. Through the unique window of transnational cyber-dating, this article delineates how age, gender, class, and national culture intersect to construct various inequalities, which in turn shape new patterns of marriage and migration across borders.

Author

• Haiyi Monica Liu