"Women in East Asian History" Seminar, Prof. Morgan Pitelka

Thank you for your post on footbinding. We are easily drawn into believing that atrocities such as footbinding had their place in the scheme of things. It is in examining the details, like the description you posted of Mr. Jung's grandmother where the truth lies. A global look at a society is one thing, the close up look at Mrs. Jung's feet is another. What's hidden and stinking under the bandages, the part that men never saw, that is the truth of footbinding.

pswearingen:

Thanks for your query...it has helped sharpen my views.

My analogy was not between the torture, and it was torture, of footbinding and "...the enslavement of African Americans", But between the torture of footbinding, the maiming of a girl by her mother or surogate within the context of a mysogenistic male-dominated feudal society AND the whipping of a black slave by another black slave within the context of a racist, white male controlled society of the ante bellum American south.

I disagree with the alternatives you posited for not footbinding a girl and not whipping a slave. With regard to not footbinding a girl [a life time of torture], the alternative could very probably be drowning, suffocation, or an other form of death because non footbound girls did not have value in certain families.

The alternative to a slave refusing to whip a fellow slave, would probably be harsher physical punishment not death because slaves were a valuable commodity which death would render nul.

As I said before I don't know what a "third wave feminist " is. But I was outraged and incredulous that the torture and life-time maiming of girls could be called "cultural grooming".

If this is possible then I think it is easily possible that some future "third wave" ante bellum historian could portray the condition of American slavery as "happy darkies" [bitter tone intended] working under a benign "marsa" who is sipping mint juleps while his slaves strum banjos and eat watermelons.

Just as the racist legacy of the political economy of the ante bellum south casts a long shadow over contemporary American society, so too does the misogynist legacy of footbinding cast its shadow over contemporary China.

In their book "China Wakes" (1994) by the award-winnning authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn discuss this point. Chapter 8 is entitled "Where Have All the Babies Gone?" (pp 210-240). Incidently this chapter begins with a photo of women being offered for sale as wives.

The "...Communist Party virtually eliminated female infanticide after 1949....China had a normal sex ratio in its 1953 census and its 1964 census." [104.9 boys/100 girls and 103.5 boys/100 girls]

By 1992 the sex ratio was 118.5 boys/100 girls. That means about 1.7 million girls go missing each year. It does not mean "...that 1.7 million girls are killed each year." Some are born and not reported ,[ loss of education?], some are aborted by the use of ultrasound scanners, "...some are drowned in buckets of water that some midwives keep at the bedside in case the baby is a girl." Nobody knows the number of girl babies killed..".10,000 ...100,000, or 300,000 or more".

Population control and quality of life are important issues facing all societies...but in China it falls on baby girls.

This, I feel, is the shadow that the torture of footbinding casts on contemporary China ...the devaluation of girls to the point of death.

pswearingen..Thanks again for your thoughts and comments. Here are some more thoughts and random musings....

I used the hyperbole of "happy darkies" etc. for two reasons: one was to provoke a reaction against what I feel was an absolutely inane comment which nobody else seemed to want to discuss. But wait until the Obama McCain campaign gets under way. I think you will be surprised at the language that emerges.

The second is the "bitterness" that you perceived that is derived from studying Chinese history for the last thirty years and seeing the contradiction between Chinese rhetoric and the China's reality and in participating in struggles here in the U.S.

Remember almost 20 years ago the Chinese government massacred thousands of its students and workers all over China because they wanted a freer and more democratic society. Please see "Beijing Spring" by Melissa Liu (a Newsweek correspondent), an introduction by Orville Schell, and photos by David and Peter Turnley.

I really wish our class could have spent some time discussing the issues facing contemporary China, Korea, and Japan.

I recently saw the movie "Blind Mountain" [see my posting] and one of the scenes in the movie was of a group of farmers standing around a pond in which the body of a baby girl was floating ...naturally that scene was one of the scenes the Chinese government wanted deleted.

I recently bought a book of photographs of China called "From One China to the Other" by the famous French photograher Henri Cartier Bresson who was in China in 1948-49. One of the sad photos of the body of a baby girl,"..abandoned by her family on the pavement, wrapped in red cottton padding..."( 32)

Also if you have the time try to read some of the books regarding women in China which I have posted about....Thanks again for taking the time to continue the discussion.

Michael

Satire: Irish babies, Archie Bunker, "The Prince", et al.

One of the problems with satire and irony is that is often taken literally causing the object of the satire to be reinforced or the message to be misdirected.

This happened to Nicolo Machiavelli and his famous pamphlet "Il principe" [The Prince]. The weight of historical opinion has been to see it as an essay on political science of power. However there has also long been a minority view that this was a satire aimed at Medici. Machiavelli dedicated his essay on the methods of a ruthless, amoral sucessful prince to the person who had just had him arrested and tortured within an inch of his life...Add to this, at this same time he wrote The Prince, he had just finished another satire La Mandragola [The Mandrake] that made ridicule of the corruption of men, especially of the clergy.

The Prince was written as a brillant satire on th ruthlessness of brutal ruler, but because it so accurately described the political reality the irony was lost.

Jonathan Swift, a master of satire, wrote his celebrated "A Modest Proposal" "...in which he ironically suggested that Irish children..'...in the present deplorable state of the kingdom..' should be fattened up, sold, and easten, as food for'...very proper landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the title to the children'".

The same thing that happened to The Prince also happened somewhat with character of "Archie Bunker" in the early episodes of the sitcom "All in the Family" because the bigoted and ignorant statements of Archie Bunker reflected views that many white Americans, consciously or unconsciously, subscribed to, so that show's purpose of satire was almost lost.

I tried to satirically juxtapose a "third wave" ante bellum historian's view of the south with the characterization of the maiming and torture of footbinding as mother and daughter bonding or "social grooming".

Incidently, while I was writing this I happened to be watching a wonderful movie, "Iron Jawed Angels", (2004) about the "first wave" feminist that fought for the vote while enduring brutality and torture by the police. It is an excellent movie!

[Edit by="mwhittemore on Jun 9, 10:10:07 AM"][/Edit]
[Edit by="mwhittemore on Jun 9, 10:25:22 AM"][/Edit]

Welcome to the thread!!! The more the merrier!

I don't think Prof. Pitelka's point was about "...the empowering of historical subjects and not making them victims of their realities."

If it was then I feel it really missed the mark. I can't see how a mother or surogate maiming and torturing a young girl with "footbinding" "empowers" her...except as a concubine, almost a form of chattel slavery since wives and daughters could be sold. In addition her physical mobility was limited by this "social" or "competitive grooming". Her daily pain and suffering was a constant reminder of who was in charge...and at whose beck and call she must answer... And who further who could sell her in a whim.

Prof. Pitelka also described the Ukiyo "Floating World" as a 'Dream World'....for whom? The women and girls who were kidnapped or sold into sex slavery/prostitution. I really can't imagine them viewing their experience as a 'dream world'.

"...Ukiyo...described the urban life style, especially the pleasure-seeking aspects of Edo Period Japan(1600-1867)." "...This view of the Floating World is centered on the Yoshiwara, the licensed red-light district of Edo (modern Tokyo). The area's brothels, teahouses and kabuki theaters were frequented by Japan's growing middle class". [Wikipedia]

I thought some time could have devoted the question of why women/girls are in this same position to various degrees all over the world. Is it sex, paternity, property rights, physical strength, or what ?

Dear Pamela and Michael,
I am responding to your very engaging dialogue at a much later date, and I don't know if you will ever read this.
I have a hard time however accepting (and I think Pamela does too) the idea of comparing the tragedy of foot-binding with the horror of african-american slavery. I would compare foot-binding to corsets of the late 19th Century. There exists a long list of mutilations and sacrifices that woman (so-called) voluntarily subjected themselves to. I am not a scholar in these things, but I think of all the girls today that are victims of anorexia, girls that starve themselves to death so they match their idea of what men want. Is that "cultural grooming"? I know that in South Africa there are tribes where woman successively place rings around their necks in order to create a long giraffe-like neck. I don't know to what extent these girls are doing this voluntarily. I saw a documentary once where girls without the rings were outcast from society. In that same movie, girls with the rings were coerced to keep the for tourist dollars (white dollars). What I liked about Professor Pitelka's presentation, was the fact that he tried to give us another perspective of the situation. Before hearing Pitelka, I naturally assumed that what happened to these Chinese girls was a forced mutilation. His presentation made me want to find out more about the situation. I don't think that Pitelka categorically stated that the girls volunteered. Rather, from what he said, I gathered that there must have existed a whole spectrum of possibilities - from volunteering to coercion.
To compare foot-binding to American slavery however, does not jibe with me very well. It is obvious that if not the girl, so at least the girl's family gained something from the mutilation. An African-American slave gained absolutely nothing from being mutilated. So the two really should not be compared at all. I agree with Pamela that Michael slings these painful terms into the discussion. We really don't need to be spelling out these words at all, unless it is a very serious historical analysis of black slavery, maybe by someone like Lerone Bennett. I really wish that white American males were more compassionate with what happened to African Americans in this country. White America still has not fully conceded the scale of the tragedy and is still in denial about it. Because of that we whites always tend to downplay the enormity of what happened. There are still no official government apologies (there is official acknowledgment). Black people still feel that most white Americans don't understand what really happened. They are right, we don't. If we did, reparations would be forthcoming and whites would never question why they are not allowed to use the "N" word while young blacks are using it so freely. We would understand.
But what does this have to do with China? Maybe we need to do some housecleaning on our own, before we can judge another culture. There is so much that has not been processed; the genocide of native Americans, slavery has received some attention, but we still don't fully comprehend the period of segregation, buses and water-fountains are just the tip of the iceberg. I haven't seen the story of Emmet Till in American history text books. The general public doesn't know about our involvement in El Salvador and Nicaragua, Colombia etc.. But speaking of East Asia, Very few Americans know about the carnage we created in the Philippines after the Spanish-American War. I guess want I want to say, unless we do some serious housecleaning of our own, we can't really judge other cultures. All we can really do is learn with open eyes, ears and hearts; all we can really do is learn.
Alfons[Edit by="agreber on Jun 16, 3:21:17 AM"][/Edit]

To agreber:

Thank you, Alfons, for your reply. More than anything else, I appreciate hearing this from a non-african american.

Your comment:
"I agree ...that Michael slings these painful terms into the discussion. We really don't need to be spelling out these words at all, unless it is a very serious historical analysis of black slavery, maybe by someone like Lerone Bennett. I really wish that white American males were more compassionate with what happened to African Americans in this country. White America still has not fully conceded the scale of the tragedy and is still in denial about it. Because of that we whites always tend to downplay the enormity of what happened...."
is BASIC summation of what I was attempting, although unsuccessfully, to say!!

I am fully aware of the subtleties and purpose of satire. There isn't an iota of it that I don't grasp. Raised in a family household of twelve (kids), me being the youngest, I was weaned on it!

I don't think there will ever be a public apology or other form of contrition for what was done to the ancestors of African Americans, any more than I expect the oppressors of women to do likewise. But...

I DO think that united we, women, can bring about substantial change in how our young girls are treated - physically, socially, and emotionally - firstly, by not mistreating them ourselves (educate, not perpetuate), and secondly, by refusing to accept (ie, receive)this mistreatment from others. Remember "Woman's Suffrage"? the Sexual Revolution? We are now in that third "wave" of feminism Michael is talking about. As Betty D. would say,"Hang on. It's gonna be a bumpy ride".