The politics of intimacy: Chinese women's marriage migration to South Korea

Abstract

This is a research on Chinese women’s marriage migration to South Korea. I

explore this topic by adopting the perspective of politics of intimacy. It aims to

find out how the broad political and economic transformations in China and South

Korea structure this migration flow and how the operation of transnational

matchmaking as a business shapes marriage relationship. In addition, how

Chinese women negotiate their intimate life and adapt to Korean society. I

highlight the issue of intimacy in Chinese women’s marriage migration.

Capitalist development and the change of economic structure in China and

South Korea generate potential migrants, and the gendered mobility structure

shaped by South Korean immigration policies particularly favors women’s

marriage migration. Transnational matchmaking, organized on market principles,

provides a means for brides and grooms to know each other. However, it also

contributes to generating a marriage relationship without emotional basis, which

contradicts with the discourse of love. Economic political forces and the operation

of matchmaking as a business shape it is particularly difficult for Chinese women

to build up a marriage relationship structured around love and emotion.

However, in a situation that love and emotion are considered as the basis of

“modern” marriage, a relationship without it has to be dealt with. I thus discuss

their negotiation of intimacy in both premarital and marital relationships. In

premarital intimacy, the discourse of love is manipulated by marriage brokers on

behalf of men in a way that entraps women. After marriage, as both parties only

barely know each other, the version of companionship they negotiate is different

from that in other marriages and is often manifested in the issues of money and

reproduction.

However, both money management and reproduction are sites of power

struggle between men and women. Men tend to use money to control women, and

they press women to bear a child. However, when women are not sure about the

relationship, they are usually reluctant to do so. Despite that women possess

certain emotional power; in general they are in a weak position. Thus, they use the

weapons of the weak, secret, non-confrontational methods to deal with the

reproductive pressure. I thus demonstrate that intimacy is not negotiated by

women and men of equal standing, but existing gender conventions are played out

in the process of negotiation.

Overall, I argue that it is important to discuss the issue of intimacy in

transnational marriage as this is a perspective to avoid conflating women’s

marriage migration with labor migration and reveal the emotional and human

aspect of their marriage and experience.