Barlow documents the history of "woman" as a category in twentieth century Chinese history, tracing the question of gender through various phases in the literary career of Ding Ling, a major modern Chinese writer.

Acknowledgments vii
Introduction 1
1 History and Catachresis 15
2 Theorizing “Women” 37
3 Foundations of Progressive Chinese Feminism 64
4 Woman and Colonial Modernity in the Early Thought of Ding Ling 127
5 Women under Maoist Nationalism in the Thought of Ding Ling 190
6 Socialist Modernization and the Market Feminism of Li Xiaojiang 253
7 Dai Jinhua, Globalization, and 1990s Poststructuralist Feminism 302
Conclusion 355
Appendix to Chapter 1: Histtoriography and Catachresis 365
Notes 373
Works Cited 443
Index 471