ABSTRACT
This chapter explores a sexuality education textbook series, Cherish Lives (珍爱生命), that was used for Chinese primary education (students 6–12 years old). First published in 2010, the textbook series caused widespread public panic and was withdrawn in 2019. Using Foucauldian notions of power and feminist critical discourse analysis, the chapter discusses whether and how this book series challenged dominant gender and sexual discourses in Chinese society. Three particular aspects of the textbook are analysed within the Chinese social context. First, the chapter focuses on the manifestation of heteronormativity through marriage compulsion. Second, the ways in which sexual minorities are presented are considered. Finally, the chapter illustrates how social and institutional exclusion in this sexuality education textbook series produces exclusion for sexual minorities while reifying heteronormativity. This chapter provides significant insight into the challenges of attempting comprehensive sexuality education in China, particularly regarding ideological and institutional surveillance and regulation through textbooks.
