Gendered Bodily Performance in Historic Museums

Abstract

This article looks at gender performance and bodily regulation in historic museums in China where cultural commercialization has accompanied tourism. Cultural tourism has become a favourite local strategy of development since China's economic reforms began in 1978. As in other host countries, historic museums in China are some of the most-visited places for tourists. With an influx of increasing number of tourists, historic museums in China no longer function exclusively as an ideology state apparatus. Most of them are in transition, becoming more market-oriented institutes of representation. The article points out that mostly the female staff of these museums consciously compare themselves with other guides from tourist agencies and illegal services and recognize the changing nature of their work, which influences their interpretation of highly gender identity and other bodily performance. This article considers representation in museum through the bodily performances of guides under the tourist gaze. It argues that these bodily performances are under official and unofficial regulation on labour process and cultural politics. Based on qualitative research conducted in Shaanxi province in China, this article analyses the controls and regulation over museum-staff guides' bodies and their responding bodily performance in order to understand how the cultural representation of museum-based tourist site is articulated in the gendered bodily performance of tour guides. The discussion is informed by feminist theories on body politics.