| Women's foot-binding formed in the late Tang dynasty.To cling to the men in the patriarchal society,women who are attached to the men cater to the preferences of men,they curved their feet to let them smaller,gait more graceful,so foot-binding gradually evolved from a concept into practice.With the passage of time as well as men's esteem,foot-binding group penetrated from the initial dancing group to all classes,and was given the symbol of civilization.It has become a kind of inherent vitality custom of women.Female internal strife and competition makes the size of foot-binding more and more small,and the pattern is various.Although dynasties tried to ban women's foot binding,but the trend intensified finally,and reached the peak in the late Qing Dynasty.Because of the revolution of the Taiping in the late Qing Dynasty,their doctrine of "gender equality" spread out widely.Although they shout out the slogan just for political need,but this is the first time to challenge the male patriarchal society authority.In mid nineteenth Century,a large number of missionaries do missionary work in China,some compassionate missionaries shocked by the horrors of foot-binding girl and initiated an anti-footbinding movement within a small range.Firstly,the missionary suggested Chinese congregation and their daughters not binding,and issued a lot of leaflets advocating the equality between men and women in the "love of god".In the beginning of 1870 s,many newspapers appeared propaganda that against women's footbinding,it claimed that binding injured female body,and made man's "gender equality" to support it.Because the scale of congregation is small and Chinese people also have their own preferences in the faith,it is hard to cover more audiences.From the beginning of 80 s,some authors replaced the western “God” to Chinese “heaven”,the meaning was totally changed,and the equality between man and woman was gradually based on the Chinese “heaven”.The introduction of "Heaven" roused a widely concern that woman footbinding may against the order of nature,although in the past thousand years of woman footbinding history,the Chinese Confucian moral standards did not change.The infiltration of Western civilization became an opportunity,and improving women become a hot word,it promoted the discussion that footbinding may have influenced on moral order.It is obviously unable to reach the purpose of forbiding woman footbinding and improving women's only in literal.In 1874,missionary Mai Jiawen established the “Xia Men anti-women footbinding” based on the church,it is the first organization of the Chinese anti-women footbinding,and then the anti-women footbinding organization that organized by missionary slowly carried around the church in the flowing decades.In 1895,the leading lady Lide established the “naturally foot union” that discarded the teachings of the Catholic Church.The meaning of "Tianzu" was changed from given by God into natural feet and its influence enhanced.In 1897,Liang Qichao and Kang Guangren who advocate the improvement of women founded the “anti-footbinding union” in Shanghai,in which the members can not marriage with footbinding women but can marriage each other,it solved what most parents concerned for their unfootbinding daughters.The influence of the “anti-footbinding union” is much greater than previously established varieties of anti-women footbinding union.The later established union was always named with “anti-footbinding union” and add the toponym in front of it.After the "civil rights" and "human rights" and other words appeared in China,the word "women's rights" appeared in various anti-footbinding union's brochure and improving women's article,such as the right to education,the right to female body autonomy,and freedom of women have been mentioned.The meaning of “gender equality” is extended from the physically equality to the equality of rights,the use of the words changed to the “right equality”,which emphasize men and women have the same rights.The “right equality” also with the tendency in the use of Zheng Guanying,and Liang Qichao,they try to achieve the goal of improving the nation by the way of support "anti-footbinding" and "arising female education".So they extensively use the word “right equality”,intending to improve the status of women in the national.In 1900,the term "feminism" officially appeared in China,while "feminism" means not only contains the autonomy and freedom of the female body,also including women's right to education,property rights,and monogamy,prohibit the sale of maidservant etc.The frequency of using "feminism" is not high,because it likely to cause resentment against men in the patriarchal society in the late Qing Dynasty for its opposite meaning,which can not achieve the intention of intellectuals class that enhance the strength of the nation by improving women.The essence of anti footbinding movement is the process of feminism came up in China,which occured before the emergence of feminist ideas.The anti footbinding movement of women caused the emergence of "gender equality",which is the Chinese feminist sprout.Then,with the spread of the movement,women's demands are not limited to the "anti footbinding" and develop more appeal,such as "body autonomy" ? "freedom of body right" and "right to education".It can be said that women's anti-footbinding movement promote the budding of feminist in China,and laid the foundation of feminist rapidly admitted in China when introduced. |
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