This chapter establishes the historical, contextual, and theoretical foundations for analysing gender, (post)feminism, and female identity in China. It traces the evolution of female subjectivity from the androgynous ‘iron girl’ of the socialist era, shaped by state-driven expectations of public labour and national construction, to the postsocialist refeminisation of women and resurgence of sexual difference. Postfeminism is examined as a distinctive sensibility and transnational culture adapted to the Chinese context, emphasising individual agency, self-empowerment, and self-transformation (Dosekun, Fashioning Postfeminism: Spectacular Femininity and Transnational Culture, University of Illinois Press, 2020; Gill, European Journal of Cultural Studies 10:147–166, 2007). These postfeminist discourses closely align with the Four-Selves Spirit Campaign, which positions self-esteem, self-confidence, self-reliance, and self-improvement at the core of new female consciousness in postsocialist China. The chapter introduces the concepts of ‘postfeminism with Chinese characteristics’ and ‘Chinese postfeminist sensibility,’ situating them within the Four-Selves Spirit Campaign, the One-Child Policy, and the rise of consumer culture in the 1990s. Cosmopolitanism emerges as a defining feature of the postfeminist subject, reflecting cross-cultural engagement and the interplay of global and local influences. By contextualising postfeminist themes within these historical, political, and cultural frameworks, the chapter provides the theoretical groundwork for exploring how young women in contemporary China interpret and negotiate female subjectivity, particularly through mediated experiences such as reality dating television.