Labelling state feminism: the discursive construction of female actors at the China National Museum of Women and Children

This article critically examines how state feminism is discursively constructed by the China National Museum of Women and Children (CNMWC), a state-controlled institution administered by the All-China Women’s Federation. Drawing on van Leeuwen’s framework for the representation of social actors and Ravelli’s approach to museum texts, the study conducts a comparative critical discourse analysis of two CNMWC exhibitions: one focused on historical representations of Chinese women, the other on contemporary female roles in the People’s Republic of China. While the contemporary exhibition introduces more agentive portrayals than its historical counterpart, the analysis reveals how the CNMWC employs discursive strategies that simultaneously promote women’s visibility and constrain their autonomy by aligning female agency with state-defined purposes. By situating the CNMWC within broader debates on feminist museology and Chinese state feminism, this article demonstrates how museums function as ideological instruments in the discursive (re)production of state-sanctioned gender roles in contemporary China.