Yunyun Zhou

Associate Professor
Image of Yunyun Zhou
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Room 342
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Visiting address Niels Henrik Abels vei 36
Postal address Postboks 1010 / Blindern 0315 Oslo

Dr Yunyun ZHOU is a feminist researcher, a political sociologist, a Chinese Studies scholar, an ethnographic filmmaker, and associate professor based at the University of Oslo, Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages. You can follow her academic work via: Twitter  / ResearchGate / Google Scholar.

Background

Following her undergraduate studies in Beijing (BA in Literature and BSc in Psychology), she completed her master's studies (MSc in Sociology) and obtained her doctoral degree (PhD in Contemporary Chinese Studies) at the University of Oxford. Prior to Oslo, she has been an exchange student at the University of California, Berkeley, and a visiting scholar at Peking University. She has previously taught at the University of Oxford, Sciences Po, and Université Paris 8.

Research

Dr Yunyun ZHOU positions herself as a fieldwork based researcher working at the intersection of political sociology, gender studies and cultural studies. Her research takes a critical and interdisciplinary approach to the study of contemporary Chinese politics and society. Her general research interests lie in how individuals negotiate with authoritarian states, when social movements rise, and how gender matters in these political processes. Using a political ethnographic approach, her on-going book project examines three generations of women cadres’ political subjectivities in China’s local party-states. Her book illustrates the process of how the ‘ruled’ are transformed into the ‘rulers’ in everyday practices of China’s post-socialist governance.

Her current research projects cover a range of topics concerning the latest development of Chinese politics and society, such as state feminism and gender lobbying, affective governance, youth politicisation, and political representation. Her latest article dissects the instituional dilemmas that are inherent to 'illiberal state feminism' in China and beyond. Her other recent publications include two articles on Chinese state’s affective governance (情感治理, qinggan zhili) through gendered discourses in two TV series that aimed to mobilise its citizens' self-sacrifice, gratitude and heroism during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Another recent publication of hers compares China's anti-domestic violence and anti-sexual harassment activism and reasons the type of political dynamics and mechanisms that can lead to successful gender lobbying (性别游说, xingbie youshui) and legislation. Her previous research also examines the Chinese Communist Party’s latest mass organisation reforms and its representative crisis, in particular the increasing bureaucratisation and detachment of the Party's ‘women’s work (妇女工作, funü gongzuo)' in the Xi Era.

During her stay at the Centre de Recherches Sociologiques et Politiques de Paris, she was a research associate in the European research group ‘New Political Representative Claims: A Global View’ in Paris. In this project, she explored why and how we need to reconsider the concept of politically 'representing (政治代表性, zhengzhi daibiao)' in classic political theory in China’s linguistic and cultural contexts. From 2022 onwards, she is a research associate of the International Research Group on Authoritarianism and Counter-Strategies (IRGAC) at the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in Germany.

Filmmaking and Curating

Embracing a more creative approach to qualitative research, Dr Yunyun Zhou explores the use of visual ethnography in her research on gender, immigration, social movements in China and Europe. She has received training from the Filmmaking for Fieldwork program coordinated by the University of Manchester and Documentary Storytelling course from UCL. She is also a film curator that specialises in the work of Chinese independent documentaries that focus on socio-political issues, as well as cinematic work of female and queer directors.

She is the co-founder of an Oslo-based NGO that focuses on Asian cinema and art called FRA ØST TIL NORD; she is also an active co-curator of the Berlin-based Chinese cinema screening project C/LENS. For the latter, she curated and convened the online open webinar 'Independent Documentary in China’s Feminist and LGBTQ+ Movements' in June 2022 and a roundtable discussion on Female Gaze and Subaltern Speak in Contemporary China.

Teaching

EXFAC03-EAST – EXFAC for East Asian Studies

KIN4510 – How to Study Chinese Culture and Society at an Advanced Level

KIN4520 – Recent Developments in Chinese Society

Publications 

2024    “When Socialist Legacy Meets International Norms: Gender Quota Adoption and   Institutional Change in China.” Journal of Contemporary China. https://doi.org/10.1080/10670564.2023.2299964. Co-authored with Xinhui Jiang.

2023    “Theorizing Illiberal State Feminism: Institutional Dilemmas and Political Parallelism in China’s Gender Governance.” Women’s Studies International Forum 98 (May): 102734. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2023.102734.

Published in the special issue: Women and Political Power: Progress and Challenges

2022     "Documentary in China's Feminist and Queer Movements." Chinese Independent Film Archive, August 30, 2022. https://www.chinaindiefilm.org/documentary-in-chinas-feminist-and-queer-movements.Co-authored with Jinyan Zeng and Hongwei Bao.

2022   “Gendering National Sacrifices: The Making of New Heroines in China’s Counter-COVID-19 TV Series.” Communication, Culture and Critique 15 (3): 372–92. https://doi.org/10.1093/ccc/tcac014. Co-authored with Kailing Xie.

Published in the special issue: Centering Women on Post-2010 Chinese TV

2022   “Coalition-Based Gender Lobbying: Revisiting Women’s Substantive Representation in China’s Authoritarian Governance.” Politics & Gender 18 (4): 978–1010. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1743923X21000210. Co-authored with Xinhui Jiang.

2021    “The Cultural Politics of National Tragedies and Personal Sacrifice.” Made in China Journal. May 30, 2021. https://madeinchinajournal.com/2021/05/30/the-cultural-politics-of-national-tragedies-and-personal-sacrifice-state-narratives-of-chinas-ordinary-heroes-of-the-covid-19-pandemic/. Co-authored with Kailing Xie.

2019   “‘Being a Good Daughter of the Party’ A Neo-Institutional Analysis of the All-China Women's Federation Organisational Reforms in China's Xi Era?” China Perspectives 2019 (2): 17–28. https://doi.org/10.4000/chinaperspectives.9042.

2019   “ La petite fille modèle du Parti » Analyse néo-institutionnelle des réformes organisationnelles de la Fédération des femmes à l’ère de Xi Jinping ?” Translated by Judith Audin et Valérie Nichols. Perspectives chinoises 2019 (2): 19–32. http://journals.openedition.org/perspectiveschinoises/9605.

Published in the special issue: Mediating the Party-state, Serving the People: Mass and Grassroots Organisations in XXIst Century China.

2019    “From Representation to Dàibiao: A Comparative Study of the Notions of Political Representation in France and China”. Journal of Chinese Governance. 2019(4):4: 295-316. Co-authored with Yves Sintomer. https://doi.org/10.1080/23812346.2019.1672371

Published in the special issue: Reappraisal of Political Representation across Political Orders: New Conceptual and Analytical Tools.

2018   “Writing Prostitution into Modern’s China’s State-building”. Book review in Women and Gender in Chinese Studies Review. 2017 (Nov). republished in Book & Ideas in 2019.https://booksandideas.net/Prostitution-and-Statebuilding.html.

Media

2023  Interviewed by Simone Pieranni and Eleonora Zocca, "La Cina fra repressione interna e nuovo (dis)ordine mondiale". International Journalism Festival. April 23, 2023.

2023  Podcast "为什么恐婚恐育?婚育背后的结构性困境". Weirdo 不合时宜. February 28, 2023.

2022   Interviewed by Valentin Cebron, in «Xi Jinping s'échine à étouffer MeToo». Politis. November 24, 2022.

2022   Interviewed by Stella Chen, in “Will China’s updated Women’s Rights Law actually help women?”. South China Morning Post. November 5, 2022.

2022   Interviewed by Lu Shen, in “Under Xi Jinping, women in China have given up gains”. The Wall Street Journal. November 9, 2022.

2022   Interviewed by Katarina Poensgen, in “Satser alt på null swmitte [Bet everything on zero infection: China's Covid lockdowns]”. Klasskampen. May 6, 2022.

2022   Interviewed by Valentin Cebron, in «Pourquoi le #MeToo chinois inquiète les maîtres de Pékin». Le Temps. January 5, 2022.

2020   Interviewed by Shen Lu, in “Pretty lady cadres: new data shows the limits of women’s advancement in China’s leadership”. ChinaFile. December 21, 2020.

2020   Coauthored with Emilie Frenkiel and Yves Sintomer. «La gestion chinoise de la pandémie est ambivalente». Le Monde. June 2, 2020.

 

 

Tags: China, Chinese politics, authoritarianism, feminism, affective governance, lobbying, political representation, political ethnography.
Published Aug. 5, 2020 9:32 AM - Last modified Mar. 19, 2024 11:38 PM