Pui Yan Geneta Lo

Proposed title

Rethinking Relationships in Non-Patriarchal Contexts: Intimacy, Equality, and Feminist Theory

Supervisors

Principal Supervisor: Donna Bridges
Co-Supervisor: Catherine Weiss
Co-Supervisor: Emma Atherton

Research

This project examines how intimacy, labour, and social organisation can exist outside patriarchal structures of domination. Drawing from feminist philosophy and anthropology, particularly the work of Paola Tabet, Adrienne Rich, Catharine MacKinnon, Christine Delphy, and Monique Wittig, it brings institutional analyses of heterosexuality, domestic labour, and sexual-economic exchange into conversation with ethnographic accounts of matrilineal societies, specifically the Mosuo (China) and the Amis (Taiwan). The project challenges the assumption in Euro-American feminist thought that heterosexuality, domestic life, and economic relations are inevitably and universally hierarchical, asking what non-patriarchal arrangements of intimacy and kinship reveal about the possibilities for rethinking equality in care, labour, and social life.

The research proceeds in two stages. The first builds a cumulative account of heterosexuality as a political institution through feminist philosophy, identifying the limits of these frameworks beyond the Western patriarchal contexts in which they were developed. The second engages cross-culturally with the Mosuo and Amis as philosophical reference points, examining how property, care, and cooperation are organised in these societies, and how these arrangements are being transformed under tourism, state policy, and capitalist integration. Rather than idealising these societies as utopian alternatives, the study asks what possibilities for rethinking equality they open up.

Why I chose Charles Sturt

I came to CSU through a word-of-mouth recommendation within my academic network. While preparing my research proposal, I was put in touch with my current supervisors, whose specific theoretical expertise perfectly aligned with my project. Finding a highly supportive and engaged supervision team was my main priority, and CSU offered the ideal fit for both my research and my professional development.

Publications

ORCID