The Anglo-American term and historical concept of “domesticity” does not translate easily into Chinese. Although Confucianism had long connected the household to the state through ideology and prescriptive practices, Anglo/American ideas about “domesticity” were translated into Chinese first by way of Japan in the late nineteenth century, and second by way of American missionary educators in the twentieth century. This history of translation reveals that “domesticity” as an ideology and as a pedagogical practice never became popular in China, and also that Euro-American historiographical frameworks, which were once thought to be universal map poorly onto other places. Thus, this talk explores the ways in which women’s history has adopted the power structures of Euro-American historiography, and calls for more inclusive frames to de-colonize gender history.