Paradoxical Tomboyism: Revived female masculinity in Chinese talent shows

Since Hunan TV’s musical talent show Super Girl (2004-2006) had featured high profiling of female tomboyism, presenting numerous female contestants in masculine forms on stage, the tomboyish female celebrity tends to be marginalized, and mostly serve as a foil to the feminine girls who are in the central positions. Until the late 2010s, this curse was broken by Liu Yuxin, a tomboyish female singer in the top Chinese talent show Young With You Season 2 who obtained huge popularity and took the central position in her band. Exemplified by Liu’s case, this essay offers a postfeminist reading of the ambivalent ways in which Liu’s persona is constructed as a paradoxical site by presenting on-stage performance in a non- normatively masculine manner, and an off-stage personality that is traditionally feminine. In doing so, we unveil the masquerade of the contemporary Chinese talent shows, which attempt to convey an impression of their tolerance of non-traditional feminine iden- tities, while disavowing female masculinity when offset by more conventionally feminine traits.