Footbinding In The Late Tang Dynasty

I was nine they started to bind my feet again and they had to draw the bindings tighter

According to Mackie (1996: 1001) the practice of foot binding spread from the imperial palace, transmitting down through the classes until it was nearly universally adopted. Thus, foot binding can be seen as symbolising one's status. Foot binding came to symbolise gentility, and it was only the absolute lowest of the lower class who were the exception to the convention. Such destitute individuals could not afford for female family members to be foot-bound when their manual labour was needed (Mackie 1996: 1001). However, to avoid such disgrace, many poor families preferred to “struggle along for a precarious living, bringing up their daughters with small feet” (Doolittle 1865: 201). This is in keeping with Veblen's (1934) view that foot binding is a costly display of a family's wealth (Mackie 1996: 1002). Likewise in Africa, female mutilation reportedly spread partly due to individuals wanting to emulate their higher status neighbours who had already adopted the practice (Mackie 1996: 1004). In addition to symbolising wealth, Mackie suggests that female mutilation symbolises a family's commitment to values of purity and chastity (Mackie 1996: 1000, 1008). Given the costs and risks associated with female mutilation, that a family would choose to commit to the practice shows how willing they are to ensure that males can be confident in terms of paternity. With this intention, female mutilation can be seen as symbolising a female's purity and future fidelity (Mackie 1996:

Women controlled many of the in house affairs, such as dealing with servants, family resources, and money. In terms of authority, a man’s mother and wife were treated with a higher level of respect than other women. Although, throughout both dynasties, when a women entered marriagehood, she became part of her husband's family; the women were also not able to obtain their dowry. During the Song Dynasty, confucian beliefs and social norms were much more present. Surrounding women, confucian beliefs generally say a women should stay at home and had the lion’s share of work. The custom of footbinding throughout the Song Dynasty further depressed women's role and social standing. Footbinding began at the higher class and elite; the custom was in place to make womens feet smaller and more attractive. This was a painful process of binding feet with cloth to achieve beauty and luxury, which became so socially acceptable that it was even forced by many parents onto their daughters. The fear was not being able to find a husband if the daughter had big feet. Over time, the status of women negatively declined between each dynasty.

Furthermore, Lee uses Atticus as her main ingredient for change. This is echoed in the novel, When A Girl Is Born when Han-lao and the reformers challenge the Chinese traditions as a result, this allows the Chinese women to be free from the cruelty of these traditions. This is shown when Ko- chin decides to unbinds her feet. "You Chinese girls cannot go on being deliberately crippled to make you into playthings for men and fit for nothing else... Child, forget the story that we women desire small feet in emulation of a girl some long- dead emperor loved. Remember only, as your husband does, that they are cruel device to keep women imprisoned in their homes." This quote shows the cruelty of binding your feet and that by unbinding her feet she escapes the cruelty of the traditions and represent her advancement to freedom. In a way, the bandages that bound her feet symbolized their traditions that crippled their freedom and limited their life, and when she decides to unbound them, she has finally accepted that the traditions were not right. When the bandages were removed, she lets go of the past and make way for her

The most prevalent symbol in the poem “Flower Feet” by Ruth Fainlight are the feet of Chinese women who were forced to bind their feet. Foot binding is an old Chinese trend in which young girls had their feet broken in

Foot binding is now considered a very extreme and cruel form of body modification. It is almost near impossible to find information on the subject without it being shed in a negative light. The important thing to remember, however, is that body modification in different cultures is usually viewed as a right of passage and honor, not a form of torture. To be able to have your body altered to the definition of beauty in China’s society was a great privilege, and surpassed any pain that went along with the modification.

Mutiliations has always has been an intergral part of human history. For example, In China, from the Tang dynasty (AD 618–907) until the 20th century, many Chinese girls during early childhood had their feets binded together very tightly, which deformed the feet to a very small size compared to a “normal” feet to convey aesthetic ideal. Like the foot binding tradition of China, “the lottery” has been an integral part of many communities in the USA for

In the article, Ko highlights the many misconceptions modern people have on footbinding such as keeping a woman’s foot bound, kept them in a hobbled and subservient domestic state or as sex objects . Afterwards, she states that our “certainties may turn out to be dead wrong” suggesting to readers that she is going to shine a positive light on footbinding. Ko goes more in depth about the three things men believed footbinding was, and why the tradition of binding ones foot was important at that time. The Chinese believed that wearing shoes differentiated and distinguished them from beasts as well as savages

The Tang Dynasty is an important aspect of Chinese history.  Lasting from 618 AD to 907 AD, it received the nickname “The Golden Age of Ancient China” because it was a very prosperous time.  This powerful empire came into control when the reign of the Sui Dynasty before it ended.

Plastic surgery is a very commonly done operation. Foot binding was a fearful mechanism which started later in the 19th century and ended in 1912 due to being outlawed and was very usual to young girls. When you want cosmetic surgery done to you, you can have it done to any part of your body. If you get foot bounded as a young girl, it is only done on your feet to make your feet much smaller. In the present, we have painkillers and Anesthetics that can help you ease the pain on the cosmetic surgery. Back in the 19th century, they did not have the type of medicine that can help soothe the pain of the bound foot, so they would use hot water. With this approach on the plastic surgery, it is the doctor's decision whether or not if it were possible to have it done. It is your family's decisions whether or not you would have to get bound feet. Both of these operations are immensely distinct and have many individual aspects to prove

"Upon marriage, woman became the legal wards of their husbands, as they previously had been of their fathers while still unmarried" (Martin, 68). It was common for a father to sell his young daughter into marriage and the young women had no say in her preference of her suitors (Mahaffy, 48). This was done while the girl was in her young teens while the groom was ten to fifteen years older (Martin, WEB2). As the father, or guardian, gave the young girl away he would repeat the phrase that expressed the primary aim of marriage: "I give you this women for the plowing [procreation] of legitimate children" (Martin, WEB2). The woman’s role was primarily in the home. "Households thus depended on women, whose wok permitted the family to economically self-reliant and the male citizens to participate in the public life of the polis" (Martin, WEB2).

Beauty of a woman was very important to men because it often showed wealth. Footbinding was a cruel way to show a woman’s beauty in Ancient China, especially during the Song dynasty. It is thought that foot binding began in around 900 AD during the Tang dynasty and continued until 1911 when it was finally banned. "The practice of binding feet was originally introduced about a thousand years ago, allegedly by a concubine of the emperor. Not only was the sight of women hobbling on tiny feet considered erotic, men would also get excited playing with bound feet, which were always hidden in embroidered silk shoes” (Wild Swans) Footbinding was considered very attractive and was very common. Many times, a girl who did not have bound feet were rejected by

Parent understand that their girls are a burden and their sons are a gift, and this is what their sons and daughters grow up believing. The dowry placed on girls plays greatly into the sex-selected abortion rate in India. Boys are plainly and simply a better financial investment. Boys will not cost the parents money for marriage, in fact, with a marriage, they are guaranteed to make the parents money. Parents forced with the decision to have a girl and deal with the financial consequences, or abort and hope and pray for better luck in the gender of their child next time around. Quite often they chose the

In many of the cultures in these parts of the world honor is of vital importance. It is a great shame to one’s family for a girl to have sex outside of marriage, consensual or otherwise. Women who have sex outside of wedlock are ostracized from their communities and at times even killed in order to cleanse the family honor. Based on these beliefs, a father (as it is almost always the men of the family who arrange marriages) may marry his daughter off early in an effort to protect her and the family. In Yemen there is a proverb that says “To guarantee a happy marriage, marry a nine-year-old girl” (Ali 74), and in Nigeria it is “considered shameful for a girl to menstruate more than once while still residing in her parents’ home” (Haberland

Daughters are considered to be an economic problem to her parents mainly because of the heavy dowry payment demanded by the groom's family, as well as the high cost of the wedding,