In early 20th century China, women were forced into marriage. This was known as arranged marriage. In China, women were not equal to men due to their patriarchal society. Often arranged marriages in China had a negative effect on women. Amy Tan portrays how women were mistreated in marriages in her book, The Joy Luck Club. In the chapter,“ The Red Candle” Lindo Jong was forced into an arranged marriage at a very young age and was treated horribly( Tan 23). Arranged marriages portrayed in Amy Tan’s “The Red Candle” clearly exemplify the culture of early 20th century China and its negative impacts on women.
Lindo’s arranged marriage forced her to perform tasks obediently. When Lindo arrived at her new home, Huang Taitai came to get her and pushed
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Lindo’s status in the family was considered equal to a servant. Lindo had diminished her self-worth. She thought everyone’s opinions were more important than her own opinion. "I came to think of Tyan-yu as a god, someone whose opinions were worth much more than my own life."(Tan 27). Lindo felt Tyan-yu’s approval was the most important thing in her life. She was physically abused for not sleeping with her husband. "All of a sudden she stood up from her chair, walked over to me, and slapped my face."(Tan 30). She was just used to create offspring for her husband’s family. "My son says he's planted enough seeds for thousands of grandchildren."(Tan 30). "Her position and security within her husband's family remained ambiguous until she produced male heirs."(Hays par 14). It shows that wives had not status until they had children. Lindo had many negative impacts during her arranged marriage.
In the journal,"The Impact of Chinese Cultures on a Marital Relationship", shows an example of a Chinese arranged marriage with negative impacts. The wife is treated as if she is a servant. "Treat me like a nanny."(Scharff 2). Her husband doesn't see her as a wife, he sees her as a worker. The wife needed to produce babies for the husband. "I needed to have a child for him."(Scharff 8). This marriage clearly represents how women were negatively
Yan Zhitui states that, "women take charge of family affairs, entering into lawsuits, straightening out disagreements, and paying calls to seek favor...the government offices are filled with their fancy silks." (Differences between north and south, 111). Yet, even in the Qing dynasty women were still restricted by and expected to uphold more traditional ideals, especially in the public eye. So, in the end, through her virtue, Hsi-Liu’s two children we able to become upright. Here, there is a split between what a woman is supposed to be according to old Chinese tradition, and the realities facing women in Tancheng. The loss of her husband, and economic hardship had forced His-Liu to behave in a different way, as if she were usurping the power from the eldest son so she could teach the two boys a lesson about being good family members. While she still maintains the ideals of bearing children, and being loyal to her husband, even after he dies, out of necessity she is forced to break from Confucian ideals of being only concerned with the domestic issues. This too put her at odds with the more traditional society around her, as the villagers pitied her sons, but vilified the Hsi-Liu for being so strict with them (Woman Wang, 65). Had she remarried, she would have been looked down upon even more because she would had broken her duty to remain faithful to her deceased