Framing the Discourse of Pregnancy and Childbirth: A Content Analysis of WeChat Public Account Posts from the Postfeminist Perspective

Abstract

In light of the introduction of the three-child policy and the current decline in birth rates in China, there remains a lack of a comprehensive understanding of how the discourse surrounding pregnancy and postpartum is publicly addressed, framed, and navigated within Chinese social media. This study delves into the portrayal and framing of childbirth-related topics on WeChat public accounts, which serve as an open online media platform where Chinese users predominantly access daily information. Employing content analysis with the Complementary Explorative Data Analysis framework, we examined 155 posts about pregnancy and childbirth from diverse WeChat public accounts. This analysis revealed the identification of four generic and four issue-specific frames. Our research sheds light on a postfeminist ideology embedded within the discourses of motherhood on WeChat public accounts, marked by two distinct characteristics. First, it manifests in the juxtaposition of two narratives: the idealization of celebrities and the portrayal of self-independent ordinary women. Second, it operates within the bounds of state censorship, given the substantial influence of the Chinese government in shaping and restricting discussions on gender, reproduction, and motherhood.

Keywords:

• Pregnancy
• childbirth
• content analysis
• China
• postfeminism

Disclosure Statement

The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

Notes

1 For two millennia, Confucianism has been utilized to uphold harmony, social order, and the dominance of state bureaucracy. Confucianism delineates several principles that govern family dynamics, with a particular focus on gender roles within the family structure. One primary precept is the “three obediences,” signifying that a single woman should obey her father, a married woman should obey her husband, and a widow should obey her son (Gao, 2003). Despite significant progress in terms of gender equality during the socialist revolution, China has witnessed a resurgence of neo-Confucianism that reinstates patriarchal power relations in the post-Mao era (after 1976) (Yang, 2011).