Ciciora 1
Michael Ciciora
Professor Farrell
History 171
15 March 2015
Death of Woman Wang Essay The Death of Woman Wang, by Jonathan D. Spence, paints a vivid picture of provincial China in the seventeenth century. Manly the life in the northeastern country of T’an-ch’eng. T’an-ch’eng has been through a lot including: an endless cycle of floods, plagues, crop failures, banditry, and heavy taxation. Chinese society in Confucian terms was a patriarchal society with strict rules of conduct. The role at this time of women, however, has historically been one of repression. The traditional ideal woman was a dependent being whose behavior was governed by the "three obedience’s and four virtues". The three obedience’s were obedience to
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An example of a great relationship in the story is the marriage of Hsi-lu and Kao. Hsi-lu says to her husband Kao, “Would you be willing to give up attending to our family’s business affairs and let me look after them?” Kao let her take over; for six months everything went well with the family’s affairs, and Kao praised her” (Spence 63). Hsi-lu did such a good job with what Kao asked of her to do that he praised her very much. He let his wife take care of the family’s expenses and pay the bills. During this time woman running the household and paying bills is unheard of. No man would let a woman do the job that he was supposed to be doing, but Kao saw how smart his wife was and let her do her thing. It turned out for the best. Along from this relationship, other women in relationships, along with widows, are treated very poorly. Men were considered higher up and better than women so men and women were not equals. Spence has been able to show throw the novel The Death of Woman Wang the positive and negative sides to these relationships that took place in seventeenth century China. Ciciora 4
The lives of women and experiences they faced were due to the stereotypes that are given to women during the time of the seventeenth century. Women are meant to be married, have children, and to attend to the needs of her husband as well as the needs of the household, not do the work of their husbands like Hsi-lu did.
Shen Fu’s work doesn’t construe the treatment of women during this time, but provides a glimpse into an exception to the rule. Women were harshly treated and received little attention during the Qing Dynasty. They were regarded as property and not allowed to leave the house without a man to accompany them. It was highly discouraged that they learn to read or write and they were not allowed to lead fulfilling lives, as they were bound to their husbands. Shen Fu does express some of these characteristics, such as being with courtesans and other mistresses, but he truly had a heartfelt love
The passage Lesson for Women is a work done by Ban Zhao that goes into detail on the proper ways a lady should act. Not only does the author explain the ways but she also goes into detail to help others understand what it’s like for a woman of that time period. When writing the author provides us with detailed sentences and a lot of informative material. Over the course of this essay we will be breaking down the key elements of this passage to fully understand it.
The novel, The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck, takes place outside of a small village in China during the early twentieth century. Women, during this time period, have little say in anything involving their lives. They are expected to take care of the house, as well as tending to the children and men of the family, whether it be the husband, his father, or brothers. Women possess the skills to provide for and serve the family, and that is what they do. In this novel Wang Lung is a typical, poor farmer. He spends his days tending to the fields and his father. When Wang Lung and O-lan marry, he is pleased that she models an adequate wife by doing what she is supposed to do and more. Lung’s life changes drastically once O-lan enters it. He gradually
“The mind changes, the word changes, time doesn't stay still, history is a verb, it is ongoing, there is no past tense, future tense, history is constant” Hung Liu told interviewer Rachelle Riechart (Riechart). Hung Liu is a Chinese woman who was born in Changchun, China in 1948. She was born during the age which we call the Chinese Cultural Revolution, which heavily impacted her life. She lived in China for 36 years and then left for the United States. She now resides in Oakland, CA, where she teaches art at Mills College (“A World of Art”). A lot of her artwork is based on photographs and memories she has from China and photographs she’s taken in the United
In the book of Wild Swans: Three daughter of China by Jung Chang tells about the experiences of the life of Chang’s Mother, Grandmother, and Chang herself. The book starts off with Chang’s Grandmother Yu-fang. She was forced to be a concubine for a warlord general at a young age. She eventually escapes with her child after marrying a wealthy doctor, she continue to raise her child even rejected by her husband’s family. De-hong a happy girl who grew up normal until she start getting into politics. De- hong joined the Kuomintang party until the communist beat them. She then married Wang, an officer in the army, and they both began working for the Communist party where they are prosecuted for their affiliation and sent to detention camp. Chang is born in the middle of this political turmoil, she grew up through many of the hardship of China. The role of women and family in society was important and it changes throughout the story of each woman. The time of Chang 's great-grandfather “following the custom, my great-grandfather was married young, at the fourteen, to a woman six years his senior. It was considered one of the duties of a wife to help bring up her husband.”(Chang, Jung. ""THREE-INCH GOLDEN LILIES"" In Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China, 2. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991.) Therefore in the lives of the three woman it will tell us about the role of women and family in the society .
As China faced new international pressures and the change to a communist society, gender relations transformed women from servants of men to full independent workers, who finally became soldiers of the communist state. In Jung Chang’s novel, Wild Swans, the three women – grandmother Yu-Fang, mother Bao-Qin and daughter Jung Chang – exemplify the expected gender roles of each generation. I will argue that Confucian society presented few economic opportunities for women to support
Wu Zhao belonged to the Tang Empire, which according to the author which “…was a true empire, encompassing many lands, many peoples, and many ideologies. Multi ethnic and cosmopolitan, Tang China was perfectly suited for the ascent of a historical anomaly like Wu Zhao…” (Rothschild, 2008, p. 11) In a sense, there was a conflict of traditional Confucian values which promoted a patriarchal society and the liberal Steppe culture which gave women more freedom and rights. China at that time was a cocktail of these cultures which led to a significant impact on the lifestyle and values of peoples in that era. Women were bold and tough, and unlike earlier societies, were no longer confined socially and sexually (Rothschild, 2008, p. 12). While did not exist a perfect equality between men and women, women of that era were allowed to live without hiding under the dominance of the male Yang. As the author talks of the Silk Road, it is mentioned that,”…In this free-wheeling milieu, women donned men’s attire and rode horses…” (Rothschild, 2008, p. 15) .This “cosmopolitan” (Rothschild, 2008, p. 16) society was the foundation for the Tang Empire. Another important factor was the prevalence of Buddhism as a religion of the masses. Buddhism, in itself, helped united much of Asia, and was a common platform for men and women, unlike in Confucianism where
The Death of Woman Wang, by Jonathan Spence is an educational historical novel of northeastern China during the seventeenth century. The author's focus was to enlighten a reader on the Chinese people, culture, and traditions. Spence's use of the provoking stories of the Chinese county T'an-ch'eng, in the province of Shantung, brings the reader directly into the course of Chinese history. The use of the sources available to Spence, such as the Local History of T'an-ch'eng, the scholar-official Huang Liu-hung's handbook and stories of the writer P'u Sung-Ling convey the reader directly into the lives of poor farmers, their workers and wives. The intriguing structure of The Death of Woman Wang consists on observing these people working on
Over a span of several decades, Wu Zetian inalterably changed life in China for woman as well the clergy and the poor. By doing so, she left a perpetual footprint on China’s long history that transcends the mere fact that she was the first woman to rule the “Red Dragon”.
Medieval China, as seen in the Stories from a Ming Collection, was characterized by distinct separations between men and women’s abilities, typical old fashioned family structure, and a desire to advance their social status. Throughout all the stories in this book, it dives deep into different aspects of how men and women are treated, how families were structured and how that affects their lives, as well as the values these people held. A very common trend in the stories was how different men and women were treated and the limitations they may or may not had.
In China, women were put in subservient positions to society. They were quiet, obedient creatures who "gathered patience". Song speaks of how women learned to provide for their families, as they were "learning to stretch the family rice". Women were expected to serve a purpose and be seen and not heard.
The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck, tells the story of Wang Lung, a poor farmer, during the turn of the century in China. One important aspect of the novel is the way in which women rise to power. For example, Lotus Flower Flower, a prostitute, uses Wang Lung’s attraction towards her in order to secure herself a higher place in society. Next, Pear Blossom, a slave, uses flattery and sexuality to persuade Wang Lung to take her as a concubine. Finally, O-lan, Wang Lung’s wife, rises to power in her new home by inserting herself into a position usually held by men. Throughout the novel, women carefully navigate the misogyny expressed by men and rise in status and power by taking advantage of Wang Lung’s feelings towards them, exploiting his
Women have been taught from a young age about her their future roles of wife, mother and daughter-in-law. In the book Lesson for Women written during the Han dynasty by Ban Chao a woman for unmarried daughters to prepare them for their duties in marriage teaches women to practice humility, obedience and devotion to her husband (e). This shows that women were expected to work for her husband and his family, thus constantly self-sacrificing by putting other before her needs. Confucianism wanted cosmic order through patriarchal families as the foundation for a stable society where women were not given the freedom to make their own decisions because her role was within the family and her status was not equal to a
Women in the book The Death of Woman Wang, were not seen as equal, they were viewed as lesser human beings than men. Women did not have the same rights; they did not have any freedom really. In this era women were expected to get married, have kids, and stay home with the children. They did the cooking, cleaning, washed clothes, and taught their daughters to do the same thing. “When she was young she worked hard at her spinning, and even when she was old and had bad pains in her
A woman didn’t have much of a life outside of the household. Her responsibilities and roles were all situated within the house. Their first roles and responsibilities were given to them by their parents ordering them to marry a wealthy guy, keep him happy and have many kids, preferably boys. Once married they had to clean the house regularly, cook for the husband and kids, look after the children as well as making sure she is still fulfilling her responsibility of keeping her husband happy. If this did not happen then a man could divorce her, which wouldn’t look good on her, knowing that other men would try avoiding her knowing that she got divorced because of those certain reasons. Confucian taught that a woman’s greatest responsibility in