Staff profile

I am a PhD candidate in Chinese History at Durham University. My thesis examines how menstruation and the menstruating female body have been understood, managed, and governed in the People’s Republic of China from 1949 to the present. Rather than treating menstruation as a purely biological process, I approach it as a historically constructed site through which women’s bodies, labour, and reproductive capacities have been regulated through public health initiatives, political campaigns, and everyday practices. My research is based on archival materials, oral history interviews, magazines, medical and administrative records, and propaganda publications. It explores how menstruation and women’s embodied sensations and experiences were shaped by socialist welfare institutions, state investigations, developments in menstrual technologies, and later processes of post-socialist menstrual consumerism. By tracing these shifts, my work contributes to the history of gender, public hygiene, and technology in modern and contemporary China, while engaging with broader discussions of biopolitics and socialist governance.

Before joining Durham, I had studied in China, Taiwan, Korea, and the United Kingdom, with a focus on history and gender studies. I am also interested in the intellectual history of modern China, particularly the research of Hu Shih and the New Culture Movement.

Presentations:

“Managing Bleeding: Menstruation and Women’s Regulated Bodies in 20th Century China”, at the British Association for Chinese Studies 2025 Annual Conference, University of Leicester, Leicester, 3 September 2025.

“For Him or For Me?: Contraceptive Diaphragms, Menstrual Discs, and the Politics of Vaginal Technologies in Twentieth-Century China and Beyond”, at the Oxford International History of East Asia Seminar, University of Oxford, Oxford, 26 November 2025. (Revised version was presented at the 31st Columbia University Graduate Student Conference on East Asia, Columbia University, New York, 27 March 2026.)

“Absorption vs Outflow: Technopolitics and Medical Logics of Four Menstrual Products in Contemporary China”, at the Centre of the History of Science Technology and Medicine Seminar, University of Manchester, Manchester, 3 March 2026.

For further information or collaboration, please contact me at ruoyu.jia@durham.ac.uk

• Menstruation
• Body
• Gender and Sexuality
• Feminine Technology
• China under Mao