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Technology and Gender

Fabrics of Power in Late Imperial China

Häftad, Engelska, 1997

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In this feminist history of eight centuries of private life in China, Francesca Bray inserts women into the history of technology and adds technology to the history of women. Bray takes issue with the Orientalist image that traditional Chinese women were imprisoned in the inner quarters, deprived of freedom and dignity, and so physically and morally deformed by footbinding and the tyrannies of patriarchy that they were incapable of productive work. She proposes a concept of gynotechnics, a set of everyday technologies that define women's roles, as a creative new way to explore how societies translate moral and social principles into a web of material forms and bodily practices. Bray examines three different aspects of domestic life in China, tracing their developments from 1000 to 1800 A.D. She begins with the shell of domesticity, the house, focusing on how domestic space embodied hierarchies of gender. She follows the shift in the textile industry from domestic production to commercial production. Despite increasing emphasis on women's reproductive roles, she argues, this cannot be reduced to childbearing.Female hierarchies within the family reinforced the power of wives, whose responsibilities included ritual activities and financial management as well as the education of children.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum1997-07-03
Mått152 x 229 x 25 mm
Vikt544 g
FormatHäftad
SpråkEngelska
SerieUniversity of California Press
Antal sidor444
FörlagUniversity of California Press
ISBN9780520208612

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List of Illustrations and TableList of Chinese DynastiesAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: The Framework of Everyday Life:Technology, Women and Cultural HistoryPART ONE / BUILDING A TRADITION:THE CONSTRUCTION OF CHINESE SOCIAL SPACE1 House Form and MeaningSpaces and SourcesThe House in Late Imperial China: Material DesignSome Aesthetics of House DesignRusin DomoThe Convergence of Architecture2 Encoding PatriarchyA Walled DomainA Moral Building BlockThe Heart of the House: Altar and StoveContinuing the Family Line: The Coffin and the BedInner Divisions: Marking the Moral Order3 The Text of the Chinese HouseWriting the TextTextual ExpertsPART TWO / WOMEN'S WORK:WEAVING NEW PATTERNS IN THE SOCIAL FABRIC4 Fabrics of Power: The Canonical Meanings of Women's WorkThe Concept of "Womanly Work": Women as SubjectsCloth and SocietyMedieval Divisions of Labor and the Value of Female Work5 Economic Expansion and Changing Divisions of LaborWealth, Fashion and a New Elite: Changes in the Song Silk IndustryThe Cotton BoomSilk Production in the Ming and Qing6 Women's Work and Women's PlaceSkills, Knowledge and StatusWomanly Virtue and the Preservation of the Social OrderWomen's Work and Family StatusConnection and Seclusion: Cloth and the Separation of SpheresWomen's Work and PatriarchyPART THREE / MEANINGS OF MOTHERHOOD:REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES AND THEIR USES7 Medical History and Gender HistoryThrough a Glass Darkly: The Question of EfficacyWhat is a Body?Physicians, Orthodoxy and PowerCase Histories: Whose Voices?8 Reproductive Medicine and the Dual Nature of FertilityGeneration in Medical TheoryOrthodox Uses of AbortionMenstrual Regulation, Fertility and Health: A Dual Imageof Womanhood9 Reproductive HierarchiesChildren: A Qualified BlessingNature, Nurture and the Bond between Mother and ChildMaternal Doubles: Wives, Concubines and MaidsThe Wifely RoleConclusion: Gynotechnics and CivilizationGlossary of Technical TermsReferences CitedIndexList of Illustrations