Ms. Zheng traced back the Western/Japanese origin of Slash/ Yaoi to the localization of Danmei/BL fiction and its current commercial transformation in China, highlighting its role in carrying heterosexual female prosumers’ pursuit of idealized intimate relationships by applying queer and transgressive plots to male characters. By addressing the issue within a model of “personality (人設)” and “couples (CP)”, she noticed the recent popularity of the dominant male characters’ femininity, known as Sajiao Gong (撒嬌攻).

The word “Sajiao” (acting in a cutesy manner to gain affection) in the modern Chinese context carries the paradoxical and misogynic interplay of “virtue” and “stigma” all at once. However, by reading the Danmei fiction, Ms. Zheng indicated that a positive possibility provided by the dominant persona, “Gong (攻方)”, might untie the passive implication of “Sajiao” as they proactively perform femininity and softness to intentionally promote the romantic same-sex relationship and dissolve the anxiety about the femininity of passive persona “Shou (受方)”.

With the rise of neoliberal and feminist consciousness in modern intimacies, Ms. Zheng posed that Danmei fiction provides an experimental field for heterosexual women-dominant imaginaries and pursuits of intimacy, constantly responding to their realistic anxieties as known as what Dai Jinhua called “the dilemma of Mulan” of Chinese women maintaining subjectivity and independence only through performing the extreme masculinity.

Echoing former studies’ interpretation of “soft masculinity”, Ms. Zheng used “Sajiao Gong” to illustrate that women’s preference for male femininity in the production and consumption of Danmei fiction could be related to their real-life reflection on female identity, and gender temperament. This study provides a feminist perspective different from a male-dominant one through the re-imagination of intimacy and the resignification of femininity.

Written by: HUANG, Minyan