INTERVIEW / Turning research into art: Graphic novel on Chinese migrant women in Taiwan

By Teng Pei-ju, CNA staff reporter

Taipei, March 5 (CNA) The idea of turning a 240-page, text-heavy doctoral dissertation into a graphic novel came to sociologist Beatrice Zani when she realized that the findings of her English-language thesis were largely inaccessible to the very people whose lives it documented.

Conducted between 2016 and 2019, the study followed over 140 Chinese women who left rural southern China for factory jobs in industrial hubs, such as Shenzhen, and later moved to Taiwan after marrying Taiwanese businessmen or factory managers working in China.

Zani, currently a visiting professor at National Taiwan University, teamed up with screenwriter Valentine Boucq and illustrator Emilie Garcia on a years-long collaboration to transform her academic work into a visually driven narrative aimed at a broader audience.

One character, many stories

The graphic novel, titled "Women, Bras and Chicken Feet: The Journey of 'Made in China'," revolves around the protagonist, Fujin, a young Chinese woman who moves to Taipei with her Taiwanese husband to start a new life.

After several years working in a factory in China, Fujin finds her independence curtailed in Taiwan, where Chinese spouses are barred from employment under local regulations -- a restriction that remained in place until 2009.

Nevertheless, she builds connections with other Chinese spouses in Taiwan and launches small businesses through the Chinese messaging app WeChat.

Though she initially faces discrimination and other forms of inequality because of her accent and background, she gradually becomes assimilated into Taiwanese society and, by the time she returns to China after a divorce, she is a changed person.

No longer bound by the rural traditions and family expectations that once defined her and having successfully navigated urban life in Taipei and economic precarity, Fujin emerges with broadened social and economic horizons.

Fujin's story is representative of many Chinese spouses who came to Taiwan after marriages between Taiwanese and Chinese were allowed in 1987, Zani, joined by Boucq and Garcia, told CNA during an interview in Taipei in February.

According to data from the Ministry of the Interior, more than 391,000 Chinese spouses (including those from Hong Kong and Macau) had settled in Taiwan by the end of 2025.

"Fujin, like the majority of Chinese women who migrated to Taiwan through marriage, eventually obtains Taiwanese citizenship after spending many years in the territory" and "becomes the mother of Taiwanese children," Boucq said.

For women like Fujin, this represents "genuine upward social mobility," she said. "In addition to finally being able to move freely...they are now seen as 'Taiwanese businesswomen'."

Boucq said she merged the stories of Zani's interviewees into that of Fujin but did not "betray the dissertation or invent [anything]," adding that focusing on a single character helped avoid confusing readers with too many figures.

"When writing a graphic novel, we know that the readers need to immerse themselves in the story. They need to feel empathy for the character and put themselves in [Fujin's] place," she said.

To introduce the socioeconomic contexts of both China and Taiwan, Boucq brought in another character and narrator -- an orange bra, a product that Chinese workers like Fujin make on factory assembly lines and that Fujin herself wears.

At times, the bra takes on the voice of a sociologist to "provide general information -- what the Pearl River Delta region is and how many migrants live there," she said during the interview.

According to Zani, the use of the lingerie item transcends its practical function.

The bras follow rural Chinese women from factory floors in China to Taiwan, where they wear the very products they once made, she said, adding that they were not merely objects but also a symbol of the urbanism and modernity they aspired to.

A story for Taiwan

While the book, after several editorial setbacks, is still awaiting publication this spring, Zani is already seeking opportunities to have it translated into Chinese so it can reach a wider audience in Taiwan.

"This is a story that needs to be told and read here," Zani said, arguing that it would offer Taiwanese audiences a new perspective on Chinese spouses, as well as the treatment of migrants in Taiwan more broadly.

Research on the subject has shifted in recent years toward the second and third generations born to Chinese spouses married to Taiwanese nationals, Zani said, but the issues raised in the book remain highly relevant to Taiwanese society today.

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