A Comparative Study On The Women Lessons In Chinese Ming And Qing Dynasties And Japan’s Edo Period

Chinese Ming&Qing Dynasties as well as Japanese Edo period was the heydayof feudal society, but also a peak period of the patriarchal society. With the extremedevelopment of the feudal patriarchal society, the social status of men peaked, incontrast, women became the private property of men as accessories. Meanwhile, thewomen lessons about ethics and codes of behavior developed rapidly during theperiod. Compared with the previous era, the women lessons in Ming&QingDynasties and Edo period were more stringent. And, in both of the periods, thewomen’s status and living conditions were reflected accurately through the typicalbooks. The women lessons in Japan contacted with China’s closely, in other words, itcan be said that the Instructions for Women in Japan was developing under theinfluence of China’s all the time. With the comparison and analysis of therepresentative books, the similarities and differences of the living conditions ofwomen can be understood accurately in both countries. In this paper, the author hadcompared the women lessons of Ming&Qing Dynasties with Japanese Edo periodfrom the perspective of the differences, contact, women’s living conditions reflected,historical influence in both China and Japan.The article is divided into five chapters as follows:The first chapter is the introduction section. In this part, the author summarizesthe current research situation of the topic, analyzes the emphasis of previous studies,in final, discovers the breakthrough of the paper.The second chapter is an overview of the development of the women lessons inboth China and Japan. This part reviews the development process, reveals relationsbetween Chinese women lessons and which of Japan’s. During the Ming&QingDynasties and Edo period, the development of the women lessons reached the highestlevel, what’s more, affected by China, those of Japan’s experienced prosperity.The third chapter mainly compares the literary styles and ideological sources ofthe women lessons in China and Japan. On the one hand, the literary styles mostly follows Biographies for Women and Woman Precepts, on the other hand, they alsohave its own unique characteristics. For example,“oraimono” in Japan’s Edo period isingenious style. Confucianism which influenced the Instructions for Womenprofoundly is the main source of ideas, furthermore, Buddhist thought had a bit ofimpact.The fourth chapter is the comparison in contents of the women lessons in Chinaand Japan. Both of them, the main contents emphasized that filial piety toparents-in-law, chastity, fertility heirs, virtue of woman, etc. With the specificrequirements, there were some slight differences in all aspects, especially in theaspects of chastity and fertility heirs.The fifth Chapter is the historical influence and inspiration from the womenlessons in Ming&Qing Dynasties and Edo period. The women lessons as restrictiontools caused the women living in that era tremendous damage, but it promoted thedevelopment of ancient women’s education, more importantly, it had play a positiverole in maintenance of family harmony and social stability. In addition, many contentsof the Chinese women lessons have been important parts of our traditional culture.Therefore, it still has a very important reference value, especially in the education ofwomen nowadays.