From the mid-19th century on, East Asian women’s lives have been marked by modernizations, imperialism, revolutions, warfare, and new roles in the workforce and within the family home. Women claimed their autonomies and rights through different avenues, be it liberalization, feminism, and the idea of the “new” or “modern” woman. Various state initiatives uplifted and/or appropriated women, affecting their day-to-day lives. This institute offers secondary teachers the opportunity to work with scholars and specialists and investigate primary sources to better understand Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Taiwanese women’s voices and experiences. What were their challenges and successes across time and place in modern East Asia?
- Instructor: Cathy Ishida
- Instructor: Lynn Kalinauskas
Current scholarship and primary sources challenge traditional narratives of women as one-dimensional and having little agency in premodern China, Japan, and Korea. In fact, their experiences varied depending on time, place, and class. From premodern times through the 19th century, women led diverse lives and played active and crucial roles in governing and in economic and cultural practices of the family, community, and state. How did they navigate within the confines and constraints of established norms and power structures?
This institute offers secondary teachers an opportunity to work with scholars and specialists to re-center historical studies of premodern East Asia on women’s lives and their voices. Exploring written and visual sources, teachers will gain an understanding of how East Asian women exercised agency within the frameworks defined by key documents, philosophical norms, institutions, and customs.
This book group engages secondary teachers with historian Jonathan Spence’s book The Death of Woman Wang. Explore the lives of the non-elite in 17th century China’s Qing dynasty as they face climactic catastrophes, famine, banditry, taxation and a complex legal system. Through the lens of the peasantry and the illiterate learn about the daily struggles of those history often forgets, with a special focus on women. This book interweaves Spence’s historical writing and tales from the 17thcentury writer, Pu Songling. The course is offered in memory of Jonathan Spence (1936-2021), in honor of his significant contribution to our understanding of Chinese history.