Supervisor: Fan Liang, Assistant Professor of Media
Student Researchers: Hanyang Zhou (Class of 2026), Yixin Gu (Class of 2027)
About the Project:
The research project aims to address three main gaps in the current academic literature. First is the lack of investigation of the gender variance in the food delivery industry. Men are traditionally considered the dominant group in this physical labor industry. Previous studies on delivery riders and platform controls mainly focus on male riders’ features and engagement in the algorithmic system (Sun 2019; López-Martínez et al. 2023; Yu, Treré, and Bonini 2022). Yet, they underestimated the intersectionality of women riders who encountered more challenges and gender constraints: both as digital workers and women. Especially under the circumstances that the food delivery industry develops continuously in contemporary China and more and more female riders appear after the pandemic. Revealing female riders’ invisible conditions not only implies reality meaning but may further uncover the algorithmic mechanisms of reproducing gender variances – how differences are generated while the demographic indicators are originally eliminated in algorithmic settings.
Secondly, based on the mechanism of re-producing gender variance in the workspace where gender is algorithmically eliminated, the group of female delivery riders provides a crucial case for studying their interactions with algorithmic controls. For instance, how do they resist the systems? How do female riders internalize traditional gender norms or re-practice new gender performance? Besides, as the online degenderized algorithmic mechanisms appear to be intertwined with off-line gendered community, the research will further navigate how gender exclusivity and new forms of interactions are re-practiced throughout the working network in the man-dominated industry. The research will contribute to a deeper understanding of how female workers reinterpret and reshape gender performances in the masculine digitalized workspace.
Thirdly, the research will theoretically contribute to re-examining China’s current shifting labor relationship with a concrete focus on female delivery riders, largely constituted by unskilled female migrants who may also suffer from domestic work. It may indicate algorithmic constraints induce invisible risks and responsibilities that are patriarchal with hidden unpaid work and exploitation. The analysis examines flexibility, freedom, and vulnerability, as representative notions of digital labor but from the perspectives of neglected women riders’ life experiences.
In conclusion, it is important to uncover the unique situations of female delivery workers and the invisible social mechanisms. This contributes to understanding gender issues in China of both invisible new challenges and possible crevices of opportunities under the emerging algorithmic influence. Furthermore, echoing an in-depth investigation of undocumented challenges, we will engage with female delivery riders to initiate ethnographical research, including participatory observations, semi-structured interviews, and field observations. The field knowledge will also be valuable to understanding the invisible groups in contemporary China and their marginalized wisdom.
