Spring 2007

WGS 340-18 • Women and Gender in China

Course Description

This course aims at understanding the role of women in twentieth-century Chinese society. We will devote the first three weeks to readings in general theories of gender, sexuality, and women history. After an overview of the situation of Chinese women in the Late Imperial period, we will then focus on the early women liberation movements in the Republican years (1911-1949) and finally turn to the Maoist regime (1949-1987) and the post-Mao period. In the course of the semester we will address such issues as gender/role constructions, the situation of women in the workplace and in the family, their role as producer and reproducer, their participation in the Communist Revolution, first, and, later, in the "four modernizations" program. The course will favor a comparative approach using China as a case study for understanding important issues in the wider context of women studies.

back