| Summary/Abstract |
The emergence of the individual is one of the most profound and significant evolutions of Chinese society that has accompanied economic reforms since the late 1970s. Existing research frequently uses a dual concept of ‘individualist’ versus ‘collectivist’ societies to approach the lives of urban Chinese. In the case of same‐sex attracted persons, as they often hide their sexual orientation in most of their social life and must respect social norms of filial piety and marriage, it is easy to conclude that today's urban China continues to be primarily a ‘collectivist’ society where the individual remains fragile. Using a long‐term ethnography of same‐sex attracted migrant men who gather in a public park to create a community of friends and invent some shared cultural and social traits, this paper proposes to deepen the analysis by borrowing the distinction between three different attitudes towards individualism developed by Michel Foucault. It will argue that these men actively construct specific spaces where they can live a private life, as well as experiment and explore their self. Therefore, these men display a more complex articulation between some aspects of a ‘collectivist’ ethos and the strengthening of individual traits.
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