Dr. Liang Shi's article entitled “Constructing a New Sexual Paradigm: Emergence of a Modern Subject,” will be published in the upcoming issue of Prism: Theory and Modern Chinese Literature, a peer-reviewed journal.

ABSTRACT:
At the turn of the twentieth century Chinese sexuality underwent a metamorphosis, resulting in the replacement of a rich indigenous discourse by imported Western theories. This article traces the evolution of a modern subject and episteme emerging from the historical transformation in the area of same-sex relations and delineates the perspectives and values that clashed in the encounter of cultures. A key text the author examines is an official decree of 1912 that outlawed xianggong houses in Beijing, signifying the death of the custom of xianggong, which it condemned, in new Western terms, as decadent, immoral, and disgraceful. The study analyzes indigenous terms such as mojing (mirror rubbing) and nanfeng (male wind) and compares them with their replacements, for example, tongxing’ai (same-sex love) and tongxinglian (homosexuality), to illuminate the differences in their social-historical significations. The author concludes that the Republican era witnessed the construction of a new sexual taxonomy centered on the dichotomy of heterosexuality and homosexuality.