By way of introducing the articles to follow, this essay provides a brief overview of studies of femininity and feminism in China and the West, from the early 20�蓊entury up to the present, focussing mainly on Chinese/Western comparative studies carried out by Chinese scholars. Two dominant Western influences on Chinese theories have been henrik lbsen and Virginia Woolf: chinese comparative studies have responded to these “feminisms”in various ways. Also we find laid out here the two fundamental “differences”with which any such comparative study is concerned: that of chian/west and that of male/female. As for the former, Tam distinguishes the Chinese process of identity formation-identity is formed through relation-to-others-from the Western-identity formed through distinction-from-others. As for the latter, one of the more recent studies is that of Gilligan, who distinguishes a female focus on the context of human relationships from a male focus on competition and the drive toward success of individual egos. The contributors to this volume, whose essays follow this one, are thus set here within both an historical and a theoretical context.