Constructing soft masculinity: Christian conversion and gendered experience among young Chinese Christian men in Beijing

Abstract

Abstract Considering the influence of religion on the gendered experiences of men, this article explores how “soft masculinity” is constructed among college-educated young Chinese Christian men in Beijing. This article argues that Christian conversion encourages Beijing’s young Christian men to embrace and achieve a relationship-oriented, emotion-centered, and humility-driven masculinity. As these young Chinese men convert to Protestant Christianity, they learn to express their emotions through crying and laughing, to build intimate relationships with God and Christian brothers and sisters, and to confess their weaknesses before others. New masculine virtues revolving around the ideas of emotionality, intimacy, and humility provide insight into how religious practices can be enacted to create soft Christian masculinity in a Chinese urban context in contrast to a more common hegemonic masculinity.