Abstract: The subject of the study is the civilizational uniqueness of gender signs and symbols that are part of the archetypal structure of codes in Chinese culture at the level of ancient traditions and modern morphology, including the latest socialist doctrine. The constancy of the basic attributes of gender semiotics is expressed in all key areas of culture, including art and painting, which determined the goal and objectives of the research: to substantiate the iconographic images of the "male" and "female" in Chinese socialist realism through a connection with the ancient tradition of sanjiao, whose archetypes and symbols fix the cultic reverence for the "man-Father" as the head of the clan and the founder of the nation; to reveal the causes and consequences of the establishment of socialist realism in Chinese painting of the 20th-21st centuries; to overcome the narrow definition of "socialist realism" as an artistic method and recognize it as a specific manifestation in the culture of the PRC and the USSR of ideological faith in the optimistic future of the socialist society based on labor heroism, equality of men and women, social justice, and the absence of classes. The methodological toolkit of the study included a combination of methods and techniques of semiotic analysis of cultural texts, oral and written tradition, images of painting, and digital analogs of artistic visualization. Descriptive, historical, comparative, structural, and formal-logical methods were applied in combination with each other to provide a comprehensive understanding of socialist realism art. The research results yielded conclusions that are novel and relevant in the field of cultural and art theory: it has been proven that socialist realism in the PRC and the USSR was a type of culture with characteristic attributes of a system of collective values and a communist worldview that affirmed faith in the just future of the new type of person; the morphological structure of gender images in the paintings of realist artists from the "Great Leap Forward" period (1958-1960) and the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) to the present has been identified; gender images in socialist realism paintings have been classified according to the archetypes of the Father-Man, the Sage, the Righteous, the Hero, the Mother-Woman, and the Young Beauty; social and political components of changes in the creation of the iconography of the "male" and "female" in the context of the established historical and cultural situation have been established, and a connection with archetypal structures of the cultural code has been justified. The conclusions obtained can be recommended for practical application in the fields of cultural theory and history, cultural semiotics, and realistic art.

Abstract: The subject of the study is Chinese traditional culture within the system of national "codes," while the object is the ritual practices of women's gender identity. The aim of the research is to identify the symbolic architecture of the cultural code in the socio-religious practices of gender image transformation using the example of Taoist teachings on "female alchemy" and the foot-binding tradition. The authors see the tasks of the study as: defining the "cultural code" in the system of traditional Chinese rituals and ceremonies, identifying symbols of gender differences in "female alchemy" and in the tradition of "golden lotuses," describing the sacred significance of the state of "xianei" in women; representations of gender and cultural identity in the foot-binding tradition; and the symbolic reconstruction of the ideal image of the "lotus woman." The authors sequentially reveal the content of the scientific discussion on key issues of the topic, explaining the symbolic significance of "female alchemy" as a Taoist ritual practice, they also justify the connection between the ritual of "decapitating the Red Dragon" and ancient archetypes of "Hero" and "Victim"; they consider the socio-cultural norm of foot-binding as a marker of gender identity, revealing the archetypical nature of "chan zu" in the image of the sacred rebirth of a girl and the symbolism of her "dying." The methodological basis of the research consists of the principles of semiotic analysis of cultural phenomena in the context of the Jungian concept of archetypes, which dictated the use of methods of cultural-analytical theory to identify unique cultural "codes" responsible for normative regulation, gender behavior ethics, adherence to accepted ideals and values. As a result of the research, the authors have produced new scientific positions and evidence that two practices of gender institutionalization – "nuy dan" and "chan zu" – simultaneously exist in Chinese traditional culture as types of ritual transformation of the female nature. The cultural interpretation of the foot-binding tradition as a practice of symbolic sacrifice during the initiation of a girl and preparation for her gender roles as "wife" and "mother" is new. The connection of the ritual complex of "female alchemy" with the "revivification" in the collective memory of ancient archetypes of the "Dragon," "Victim," "Hero," and the sacred symbolization of "blood" as the life energy of being has been substantiated in a new way. For the first time, through the method of amplification, an interpretation of the hidden psychodynamic processes of transformation of the symbolism of the female gender and "blood" has been conducted by referring to the practices of "dying," "punishment," and "guilt."