content outline for essay #1
This is the way that I conceive of essay structure. It is in the traditional form of Introduction/Body/Conclusion, but I feel that there are other structural possibilities as long as the following points are covered:
expression of the problem and possibilities inherent in the issue
organization of the relevant data and related analysis of that data
synthesis of all of the elements in a coherent conclusion.
Question #1: How has the status and role of women evolved in Chinese society since the Shang times?
I think that this question implies that we would consider the status and role of women from the Shang times through the Han dynasty. That is as far as our course has taken us so far. There would be no way for us to judge the role and status of women in modern China.
The issue in this question is the relative change of the role and status of women in Chinese society since the Shang times. This is a difficult question, yet there is enough information from our lectures and our readings to make an assessment or at least define the difficulty of an assessment.
1) Setting up the essay (expression of the problem and possibilities inherent in the issue)
The Shang period was a transition period between the early and the late Neolithic period in China. We know from our lectures that women lost status as the Neolithic revolution progressed in the river civilizations around the world. China was no exception and as the Confucian ideology develops during the warring states period and the Qin and Han periods, we see evidence women's loss of status and role, especially in politics, compared to evidence in the Shang period.
2) organization of the relevant data and related analysis of that data
2a) There is archeological evidence in the Shang period that is representative of a period of the transition between early and late Neolithic periods and corresponding loss of status of women with the rise of civilization. The grave of Lady Hao evidences the late Neolithic, Shang period, when noble women had more power than they would have in later periods. The artifacts of the tomb and inscriptions found on bronze vessels show that at least one Shang noblewoman of the late Neolithic period has significant power in keeping with this view. According to inscriptions on bronze vessels, she even lead military campaigns.
2b) During the Warring states period, we see in the debates between leading schools, Taoist, Confucianist, and Legalist, that the role of the role and status of women begin to take the shape of Chinese civilization. Within Taoist thinking, which was against developments in civilization, laws, and the like, women were conceived of in the traditional early Neolithic sense, of an interdependent part in the cosmic interplay of Yin and Yang. The Yin, or female entity, was not perceived at this time in negative terms. Rather it was an essential part of the dynamic with Yang. Yin, the feminine side, was also the creative, the earthly, moist, mysterious side; whereas the Yang, the masculine side, was the destructive, dry and hot side. Taoism, however, did not influence the evolution of Chinese civilization in the Qin/Han period. Legalism and Confucianism were the directing influences. Within these schools, the role and status of women began to erode relative to the Shang times.
2c) During the Qin and Han periods there is evidence that women became the property of men, with no rights of inheritance. Confucian writings at the time stressed the superior status of men in the five relationships and women were trained to be subservient to men. Even in the only writing by a woman, Ban Zhao's Admonitions For Women, the subservience of women is stressed more than anything -- customs that convey "the unchanging path for women and the ritual traditions [of Confucianism]. The rituals of putting the new-born girl-child below the bed, giving her a potter shard to play with, and announcing her birth to the ancestors are sited.
2d) Politically, women gained an increasingly bad rap because of the male dominated structure of the home, in particular the practice of taking more than one wife and concubines. Competition between wives and concubines vying to place their boy in line to power resulted in Confucian proverbs against women in politics. Even in the Biographies of Heroic Women by Liu Xiang (79-8) places women in a subservient role to men, counseling their men, preserving their chastity, etc.
3) Although it is arguable that the role and status of women appears to have declined with the rise of Confucian Chinese civilization, within the Taoist tradition, the case is less clear. Because the status of the female in the universe remains complimentary to the male and equal in the Yin Yang dynamic promoted in Taoist medical tracts, it is possible to argue that the role and status of women is at least preserved despite the birth of Confucian-based civilization. It remains to be seen what new combinations would arise between the various schools. Deeper studies of the Confucian classics and the social history through the Han period might reveal a more sophisticated view of the role of women and a status equal to men, but according to our readings, the status appears subservient and less than it was during the late Neolithic Shang period.