Nüshu is A feminine and spiritualistic performance on women’s grief, memory, and connection, rooted in Nüshu, the world’s only female script.
Writer and performer Jiayi Chen brings to Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2025 this vanishing language on stage, with a ‘letter to the women she has lost’. Nüshu: Written for Her, on Her, by Her combines contemporary dance and music from young Chinese performers, with Jiayi’s self-narration.
Originating in the rural county of Jiangyong, China, Nüshu writing system was created by women for their own use, in an attempt to connect and tell their stories, after being silenced for generations.
Giving voice to the women of her life, she tells stories such as those of her grandmother and cousin, and how they were hidden by China’s patriarchal society.
SNACK caught up with her following a performance, which, even among the bustle of the Edinburgh Fringe, managed to immerse the audience in a new spiritual world.
Can you explain what Nüshu is for those who are not familiar with the term?
The language was created by women and for women to tell their stories and comfort each other. Most of them are suffering from arranged marriages in exchange for something. Society has been cultivating us like that, but we can use this language to show our sufferings. Last year I visited the Nüshu village to learn it from the women there: my teacher, who was teaching Nüshu for free; before having a motorbike she was walking everyday for one hour and half, just to keep her grandmother’s stories alive through the language. Even if you can’t understand Nüshu, you can know the feelings. We don’t talk about feminism in Chinese, you’ll bring trouble. But I say ‘uprising, Nüshu: female language’, that’s it.
How did you discover Nüshu?
I discovered it in 2023 at Edinburgh College of Art: there was a display there and one day I saw something very inspiring, but I could not understand what it was. I sent a picture to my friend who was doing calligraphy art work and she said ‘that is not Chinese calligraphy, that is Nüshu’, so she encouraged me to learn it and do more.
You described this performance as a letter to the women you lost. Can you tell us more about it?
My cousin, like many other women, was deprived of medical treatment, because she was a female, but this story has been a secret in my family. My grandmother can’t speak because of Alzheimer’s disease, she burnt her hands in the fire and we had to cut them. My mum took all the responsibility, and said that if grandma would not have survived, she would have gone with her.
Many Chinese people criticise [the show], they come here to see my performance to know more about Nüshu, and then they regret it when they see it’s more about the stories. I share about my grandmother and cousin, because you can find articles online about Nüshu. This is about how so many females were deprived of their voices.
Why the choice of covering your face during the performance?
I wanted to be the storyteller, this story is not about me, but about the women disappearing in my life, and in history. This is not only happening in my family, but everywhere. It is all about females on the stage.
Why do you write Nüshu on the skin?
Traditionally you write on red paper on the ground, and the knees are the table. I wanted to use ink, and do it on the skin to make it more provoking. I was writing on the other performers and telling them to show the pain, because we were writing about suffering.
Does it make you vulnerable to share such a personal story?
Yes, I was crying on my grandmother’s part because I was impersonating my mum. My grandma only cried twice: when my mum cut her hands and when my grandad passed away. She cried and I saw she could still feel things, so this is also about her.
Jiayi is also organising Nüshu workshops in Edinburgh, for anyone who wants to learn this unique female language.
All photos, credit Veronica Buccino
