Section B01, reading analysis, human record, 132-136, Lauren Graycar
Apr 27 2009, 1:25 AM EDT
| Post edited: Apr 27 2009, 1:25 AM EDT
1. Lessons For Women
2. Bah Zhao (45-116 CE): She served as an imperial historian and completed the "Han Annals." She was the daughter of Ban Biao, a widely respected writer and administrator. Her most famous work, "Lessons for Women," is an instructional manual and behavioral guide originally written for her daughters. Overall, she sought to fill the void left for women by Confucianism.
3. She wrote it during the Han dynasty in China, probably sometime around 100 CE. During the Han dynasty, Confucianism was the prominent school of thought, and it emphasized the subservience of women to men, while according them less status and less practical guidelines, the latter of which Ban Zhao responded to.
4. It contains the three customs a girl must observe, those of humility, industry, and ancestral worship. It emphasizes the fact that she must be lowly and weak, and places importance on the control of her husband over her. Ban Zhao uses the example of yin and yang as representing man and woman; the yang is rigidity and the yin is yielding. There are also four qualifications a woman must possess: womanly virtue, womanly words, womanly bearing and womanly work. Women must also observe implicit obedience and must be a shadow to her parents-in-law.
5. This text exemplifies the poor status of women in Han China. We can see how the teachings of Confucianism sought to reduce women to nothing more than a set of customs and qualifications, depriving them of any resemblance of equality to men, and subjecting them to the will of the all-powerful male figures.
6. The author's intention was to teach women the proper way of acting and treating the prominent male figures in their lives. Initially, Ban Zhao wrote "Lessons for Women" to teach her daughters how they should behave, and it soon became a popular how-to manual. Ban Zhao endorsed the inequality of women, and supported their role of subservience and humility toward men
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