Sino-African marriages in Guangzhou - exploring women’s choices, dilemmas, and resilience

It explores how personal agency and structural constraints shape their decisions and lives. Challenging dominant discourses of global hypergamy, the study highlights instances of downward mobility, where Chinese women marry African men with less economic capital.<br><br>Using ethnographic fieldwork and narrative analysis, the research investigates the women’s motivations—including resistance to local patriarchal norms, urban loneliness, and family pressures—and the challenges they face in marriage, such as legal uncertainties, cultural differences, and child-rearing difficulties.

The study reveals how these women exercise resilience and agency as they navigate these issues.<br><br>Overall, the dissertation offers insights into the complexity of transnational marriages in China, contributing to scholarship on gender, migration, and family in a globalising world.<br><br>T<i>hesis is embargoed until 31 July 2030.</i>