Lesbians in China's mainland: a brief introduction

This paper describes and introduces lesbians' lives and the relevant research in China's Mainland. The first part shows the slow development of lesbian culture in the form of literature, films and documentaries. Although lesbians' lives were reflected more or less in modern literature, the "true" lesbian novel was published only recently. Relevant films and documentaries were never shown to the public in China. Lesbian culture is still unevenly developed and remains negligible. The first part also describes lesbian research in the field of literature, psychiatry and sociology. The relevant research in literature is relatively systematic and rich, while that in psychiatry is fraught with discrimination and that in sociology is relatively weak. The second part presents the observation and analysis of lesbian Internet communities. It deals with lesbians' self-identity, role differentiation, sentiments and sexuality. Among them, role differentiation plays an important part in lesbians' lives though few researchers have studied it. Most lesbian organizations founded on the strength of Internet communication lack experience and resources and have little influence on the masses. Some lesbians are accepted by the public, but in return, they compromise to some popular values. This is extremely disadvantageous to those who are unwilling to give in. At the end of the paper, the first author expresses her future plan that she will continue her study on lesbian culture under the help of Internet observation and various activities. doi:10.1300/J155v10n03_08.