Decoding Chinese Millennials: The Culture of Singles in the Post-Mao Era

Abstract

ABSTRACT Though China has long served as a prototypical collectivist culture, the growing number of individual and unattached adult singles is gaining currency in the country. While previous studies of Chinese singles are typically geared toward the country’s so-called “leftover women”, and treat singledom as pejorative or problematic, this study focuses on the emerging demographic of young urban singles and their distinctive social role in reform-era China. Based on semi-structured interviews with 18 singletons from Guangdong Province who are entering the workforce, this study provides an exploratory overview of this new generation of young Chinese singles. The interviews reveal how this emergent single culture is prompting changes in individual autonomy, interpersonal attachment, marriage, gender norms, and family dynamics in contemporary China.