|
Showing 1 - 3 of
3 matches in All Departments
This memoir offers a rare insight into everyday life during the
first year of the reform movement that created the China of the
twenty-first century. The book interweaves personal encounters with
records of the democracy movement in Shanghai, revealing a vast
outpouring of grievances by ordinary people at a time of dramatic
social change.
This is the first in-depth study of Chinese bridal laments, a
ritual and performative art practiced by Chinese women in premodern
times that gave them a rare opportunity to voice their grievances
publicly. Drawing on methodologies from numerous disciplines,
including performance arts and folk literatures, the author
suggests that the ability to move an audience through her lament
was one of the most important symbolic and ritual skills a Chinese
woman could possess before the modern era.""Performing Grief""
provides a detailed case study of the Nanhui region in the lower
Yangzi delta. Bridal laments, the author argues, offer insights
into how illiterate Chinese women understood the kinship and social
hierarchies of their region, the marriage market that determined
their destinies, and the value of their labor in the commodified
economy of the delta region. The book not only assesses and draws
upon a large body of sources, both Chinese and Western, but is
grounded in actual field work, offering both historical and
ethnographic context in a unique and sophisticated approach. Unlike
previous studies, the author covers both Han and non-Han groups and
thus contributes to studies of ethnicity and cultural accommodation
in China. She presents an original view about the ritual
implications of bridal laments and their role in popular notions of
""wedding pollution."" The volume includes an annotated translation
from a lament cycle.This important work on the place of laments in
Chinese culture enriches our understanding of the social and
performative roles of Chinese women, the gendered nature of China's
ritual culture, and the continuous transmission of women's
grievance genres into the revolutionary period. As a pioneering
study of the ritual and performance arts of Chinese women, it will
be of interest to scholars and students in the fields of
anthropology, social history, gender studies, oral literature,
comparative folk religion, and performance arts.
|
|
Email address subscribed successfully.
A activation email has been sent to you.
Please click the link in that email to activate your subscription.