The Change Of Family Organizing Patterns Mirrored In Pearl Buck's Works

China after the Opium War (1840-1842) was just like a battlefield for cultural collision between the Chinese culture and the Western one. The invasive characteristics of the Western culture, the ethnocentrism of the Chinese and the terrific difference between the Chinese culture and Western culture in source and nature all together lead to the prolonged and sweeping cultural collision, which influenced China deeply. One of the results of the collision was the disorganization of the traditional family based upon the Chinese patriarchal clan system.The patriarchal clan system played a vitally important role in the history of China as an effective supplementary force to the governments. The pressure from both the inside and the outside weakened the control of the central government over the bottom-rock society after the Opium War, and the function of the patriarchal clan system protruded. At the same time, the religious conflicts, the liberal reform, the anti-Confucianism movement etc. aroused by the cultural collision, brought civilians then a psychological disorder, and changes both in ideas and institutions. Additionally, the economic invasion of the Western countries destroyed the economic foundation of the traditional family. All these factors nibbled and swallowed the patriarchal clan system and finally disorganized the traditional family.A writer and observer, Pearl Buck described in her works for us the change of Chinese family organizing patterns with the standpoint as a "foreigner". Pearl Buck favored the traditional family for its wonderful order and security. Her suffering in the family where she was brought up also counted for the shaping of the feeling. Certainly, Pearl Buck didn't ignore the defects and shortcomings of the traditional Chinese family: It was ordered yet cold and lacked democracy. Pearl Buck claimed that a communication between the Chinese culture and Western culture should be carried out, so that the two kinds of family cultures might learn from each other and finally reach a wonderful effect: orderly and warm, democratic and comfortable.