Reframing Socialist Memory: The Transnational Mediation of China’s Zhiqing Fiction in the Anglophone World

Abstract This article examines how the English translation of China’s zhiqing fiction reshapes socialist memory as these works circulate globally. While previous scholarship has focused on social history, literary representation, and translation analysis, it has overlooked translation as a form of cultural mediation influencing the selection, framing, and reception of these narratives. Drawing on historical research and comparative readings of Chinese texts and their English translations, the study argues that English translations reframe zhiqing narratives by emphasizing individual experience and emotional subjectivity, while downplaying broader political and institutional contexts. These shifts result not from individual translators' choices but from structural conditions of selection, translation, and publication. The article highlights translation as a key site in the transnational reconfiguration of socialist memory, revealing the role of cultural mediation in reshaping historical narratives.