Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth-Century China [Paperback]

Dorothy Ko (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995 | ISBN-10: 0804723591 | ISBN-13: 978-0804723596 | Edition: 1

Rejecting both popular image and accepted Western and Chinese scholarship on the status of women in premodern China, this pathbreaking work argues that literate gentrywomen in seventeenth-century Jiangnan were far from being oppressed or silenced. The author reconstructs the social, emotional, and intellectual worlds of these women from the interstices between ideology, practice, and self-perception.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Ko challenges simplistic depictions of women as victims and argues that within their social and cultural constraints, a women’s literary culture developed that transcended public and private spheres and redefined womanhood. . . . This multifaceted book is a breakthrough in the study of women as part of Chinese cultural and social history.”—Choice

Language Notes

Text: English, Chinese --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Stanford University Press; 1 edition (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0804723591
• ISBN-13: 978-0804723596
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #482,782 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Thorough and thoughtful, April 5, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth-Century China (Paperback)

When it was written, Ko's book was one of the first to reconsider previously accepted views about women's status in China. The traditional readings had been that women were deprived, subjugated, and prisoners in their culture. While not attempting to paint a revisionary too-bright picture of women's lives, Ko considers the factors of class and economic status in the study of women. Her observations about women's reading and interaction are especially insightful and fascinating reading.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Necessary Book, December 22, 2008

By 

Anna L. Glaze (Northern California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth-Century China (Paperback)

Ko's book is an excellent resource for discovering more about the all-too-often ignored world of women in imperial China. Instead of dismissing women in China's history as "sustainers rather than innovators," Ko has taken the time and effort to delve deeper into the role of women by focusing on China's pivotal seventeenth-century.