Paper short abstract:

This article focuses on 'how do #MeToo movement(s) manifest and evolve in China' and aims to find out the specificity of its manifestations in China through analysing two archives and my autoethnography with Chinese situated concepts and theories.

Paper long abstract:

As a victim-survivor and a feminist activist who participated in the #MeToo movement in China, I always have confusion and questions generated from experiences and observations. The limited literature on the #MeToo movements in China rarely applies China situated frameworks, affecting the effectiveness of the understanding. This article focuses on 'how do #MeToo movement(s) manifest and evolve in China' and aims to find out the specificity of its manifestations in China. Through analysing two archives and my autoethnography with He-Yin Zhen's feminist analytical concepts 'nannü' and 'shengji', Confucian moral outlook and Chinese characteristics, I find that the #MeToo movements in China are influenced by the underlying nannü-ed Confucian moral outlook, which contributes to their Chinese characteristics. I also find that there is not one monolithic #MeToo movement in China but many diversified ones with different agendas, and the mobilisation and formation highly depend on the initiating and participating individuals. These findings stress the importance of the historic-cultural context and understanding personal perspectives in studying social movements. This article illustrates that we need to explore more on situated feminist research to reconstruct the feminist studies in the global south context, and that feminist movements need to challenge the historic-cultural context and the dominant romanticising and elitising discourses to develop sustainably.