Abstract:  The “natural” female body has always been constituted by the spirit of the times. The May Fourth period, an age for the construction of modern individuals, also marks the beginning of the liberation of Chinese women. An investigation of the Women Magazine, a central forum for public opinions of this period, demonstrates that the female body, including both the body parts like hair and breasts and its trappings like clothing and ornaments, became a focus of attention among different circles and also a locus of power where multiple discourses vied for domination. Hence, a new aesthetics of the female body gradually emerged during this period. At the same time, the cultural construction of the female body by the mainstream discourse of the May Fourth movement, as an intellectual current of modernity, has greatly inspired the new vernacular literature in its literary imagination and narration of the woman.

Key words:  female, body, mainstream discourse, cultural construction