Although there may not be an extremely extensive amount of knowledge about the Empress Dowager Cixi, she is often considered one of the most powerful women in history. She ruled for almost fifty years, maintaining and expanding her own power. During her ‘behind the curtain’ reign, she made all decisions and always had the final say. Though she was very sharp and understood and executed politics well, she was (what some might consider today) corrupt. She was insistent on keeping her power in the Qing dynasty, to the point of (being suspected of) killing others. Though this seems despotic, recent reports say that she was just like any other ruler, and was blamed for events that would also have occurred under any other’s rule. Perhaps the saying …show more content…
As stated previously, she was the first to produce a male heir to the Emperor. In 1861, the Xianfeng Emperor died. Cixi’s son (who would become the Tongzhi Emperor) was only five years old. Under these strange circumstances, the Empress Dowager Ci’an (who was the Empress Consort before the Xianfeng emperor’s death) and Cixi were named co-regents. Ci’an’s “rank gave her a traditional right to authority” but since Cixi was the heir’s birthmother, she was given “precedence over the eight seasoned regents…[of] the Board of Regents that Xianfeng created on his deathbed.” On November 1, 1862 Cixi, with the help of Prince Gong (Kung) and his brother Prince Chun (Ch’un), “stripped the regents of all their offices, blamed them for the recent troubles of China and arrested them” : a successful coup. This was known as the Xinyou Palace Coup. Although the Empress Dowager Ci’an had precedence traditionally, she did not like to involve herself in politics. This left much room for Cixi to thrive, especially because, during this time, “no one saw anything more in the twenty-six year old mother of the T’ung-chih [Tongzhi] Emperor than a pleasant, quite pretty, quite bright …show more content…
Many foreign powers ravaged China in search of wealth, brutally destroying land and violently fighting people. After much of the devastation, the Dynasty was ‘forced’ to acquiesce to the foreign powers (-only after they assured Cixi that her position and power would be held in place). The results of these was called the Boxer Protocol – which would later be considered one of the “Unequal Treaties.” Among the stipulations of the Boxer Protocol, China would have to pay an enormous amount of money, for indemnity, to about 14 countries (in different proportions). Furthermore, foreign powers were given the right to seize and inhabit certain places in China. Moreover, they had to formally apologize to the foreign powers. These apologies were especially painful to the Chinese, who believed that they were the ones who held utmost power – and might have even considered themselves divine. This was a blow to their ego and their reputation. They also had to suspend violence against foreigners (and those who did not would be punished). Empress Cixi began some of the other reformations after the Protocol, including the elimination of examinations. “Ironically, Cixi sponsored the implementation of a reform program more radical than the one proposed by the reformers she had beheaded in 1898” (including the Reforms created by her arrested nephew). She had so much power, that no one disputed
“The Death of Woman Wang”, written by Chinese historian Jonathan Spence, is a book recounting the harsh realities facing citizens of Tancheng country, Shandong Province, Qing controlled China in the late 17th century. Using various primary sources, Spence describes some of the hardships and sorrow that the people of Tancheng faced. From natural disasters, poor leadership, banditry, and invasions, the citizens of Tancheng struggled to survive in a devastated and changing world around them. On its own, “Woman Wang” is an insightful snapshot of one of the worst-off counties in imperial Qing China, however when taking a step back and weaving in an understanding of long held Chinese traditions, there is a greater understanding what happened in
Some of the more fascinating documents of the Han period in ancient China were arguably those written by women. The writings were at once contradictory due to the fact that they appeared to destroy the common perceptions of women as uneducated and subservient creatures while simultaneously delivering messages through the texts that demonstrated a strict adherence to traditional values. Those are the paradoxical characteristics of prominent female scholar Ban Zhou’s work called Lesson for a Woman. Because modern opinions on the roles of women in society likely cloud the clear analysis of Zhou’s work, it is necessary to closely examine the Han’s societal norms and popular beliefs that contributed to establishing the author’s perspective and intent.
Most outcasts of history had a particular, exclusive life; full of struggles against the society ever since birth and grew up with a heart made out of steel from the harsh criticism they have endured. They differ from the community within their beginning to their end, and many of their stories end up becoming legends and gaps of the past that nobody will be able to reincarnate. China’s first and last female emperor, Wu Zetian, was one of these exclusives. Ever since birth, her history of tactics to the people around her; in order to ascend the throne, juxtaposed towards society’s attitudes of women at the time; through her breakdown of gender stereotypes and quick knowledge, and offered a new perspective to the world of just how cruel and beautiful women can be. She successfully destructed all accumulated views of women in the Tang Dynasty, and created her future in the way she wanted it – on top of every man in her country. She was an outcast – somebody who juxtaposed against the demands of her. She was history.
Chapter 4: China's Qing Dynasty & Its Collapse." East-Asian-History Home. Penn State. Web. 06 Apr. 2011..
In today’s world, many societies would treat the children indifferently, caring for them and respecting them as an individual. However, in the Qing Dynasty, the gender of the child made a huge difference. This is viewed in The Story of the Stone by the children of the several concubines and how they are able to progress through society. Boys born through concubines are able to reach a place of power in the instance that a male child that is going to be the heir of a royalty or family dies. Therefore, the next male child would fill in to place, including concubine’s children. This is another example throughout The Story of the Stone of the differences in gender relations. Men are able, despite being the child of a mistress, to prevail in society during the Qing Dynasty due to their gender. Males are able to assume positions of power in their life despite who their mother is. Women who are born from a concubine, however, do not have such opportunities, and are viewed as just another girl in the family, and will never have the chance to excel from just being the daughter of a mistress. This shows the Dynasty’s lack of respect for women as a gender in a powerful position as the head of a family or ruling. Girls in the Qing Dynasty did not get the same opportunities as men, as seen above when it comes to positions of
Smarr, Janet. “Emperor Wu”. Making of the Modern World 12. Ledden Auditorium, La Jolla, CA. 17 Feb. 2012. Lecture.
Because they did not have a traditional role in government, women had work their way around the system to gain any type of political leverage. Empress Lu violated every cultural and social norm by retaining power as a regent throughout the reins of her son, grandson and adopted grandson. Tradidtionaly regents ruled from behind the scenes while the emperor himself was unable to make decisions, usualy due to age or heath complications, however Empress Lu eradicated any competitors for the thrown. As the end of her reign was nearing, she expected her nephews to succeed her. Even as the first empress, not unfamiliar with disrupting tradition, she left the emperorship to the next male in her bloodline (Doc. 5) not a female. Though Empress Lu defied all expectations of women, her power as an Empress was still undisputed due to the Mandate of Heaven, an idea originating in the Shang dynasty....
No other woman in the Early Han held the same amount of influence as Empress Lü throughout her various titles as Empress, Empress Dowager, and then Grand Empress Dowager. Stories recounting her manipulative nature paint a picture of a scheming empress using her imperial power to bestow favors and political positions to her own clan. This essay argues that Empress Lü used the lack of precedence for her position as Empress Dowager to manipulate court officials into granting power to her clan, which caused political unrest late in her life and resulted in the destruction of the Lü clan. To support this claim, this essay will discuss the exceptional nature of Empress Lü's power and the extent of her ability to manipulate the court, and then this paper will provide evidence of a Lü clan extermination after the death of the empress that held power for fifteen years after her husband died – in a nation with no precedence for this kind of rule.
...naries, Cixi’s death was a cue for reformers to act quickly and make the transformation to a democracy quicker, especially while the little 6 year old Puyi was made Emperor. Therefore, the backward ideologies of Cixi and the reluctance to reform did not go down well with the people and their national pride, especially at a time when China was being carved up by foreigners.
Chapter 1: The Wan-Li Emperor, begins by explaining the major premise of the work: The concept of looking at a single year in the history of the leadership of China and evaluating the implications for understanding other aspects of history, including the decline of the Ming Dynasty. In this initial chapter, Huang provides an anecdotal history of some of the events that occurred, and includes within it a discussion of the set up of the leadership, the repercussions that occurred in the event of certain actions, including the prospects of an audience with the emperor. Huang reviews these issues as he considers that actions taken by the Wan-li emperor, who was only twenty-four in 1587 and who had been a veteran of ceremonial proceedings, and considers his history as an element of understanding the progression of leadership.
The China depicted in New Woman features a progressive veneer, replete with bustling urban centers and a glamorous elite, but a Confucian social structure underlies this cosmetic modernity. In New Woman, the most pervasive aspect of this structure is its rigid gender hierarchy. Confucianism, as a religious philosophy and cultural tradition, relies on a system of familial and communal obligations; this system mandates the subservience of the female gender, requiring women to obey, in turn, their fathers, husbands, and sons. A youthful Wei Ming’s conflict with this structure, occasioned by an illegitimate pregnancy, illustrates its tendency to objectify women and reduce them to the status of family heirlooms. Educated in a Chinese university’s “department of music,” Wei Ming possesses a keen intellect and, as New Woman illustrates at periodic intervals, a gift for teaching. But Wei Ming’s father, a man so traditional that he convenes his family atop the “sacred ground of the Wei family,” hands her a rope, instructing her to commit suicide. Endowed by his society with such great authority over his daughter, he easily objectifies Wei Ming, viewing her not as a talented, beloved heir gone astray but as spoiled goods that must be discarded. By linking this breakdown of paternal love to Confucian cultural mandates, New Woman indicts the social order that permits such
Wu Zhou’s childhood was educated but short as she became a junior concubine at a short age. “Wu was given a good education [and] was taught to read, write, and to play music” (“Empress Wu Zetian”). In that time, it was not common for women to gain an education. Her father urged her to gain an education, and living in a wealthy family, Wu could become well educated. “Wu Zhou entered he palace of the Tang Emperor Taizong, at the age of 14, as a junior concubine” (FitzGerald). Being very beautiful in her youth, Wu caught the eye Emperor
Baker, Caroline. "Position of Women in Chinese History - Chinese Culture." BellaOnline -- The Voice of Women. 2011. Web. 28 Feb. 2011.
Furthermore, Han officials were especially adept at rhetoric and used hyperbole to criticize and restrict the power of consorts and their interference in state affairs. Han historians commenced blaming women for the downfall of each dynasty. [5] 2063. With the passage of time, this rhetoric of woman as evil heightened to the point where women were caricatures. Mo Xi a beauteous consort of Emperor Jie was reputed to have led the dynasty to its ruin due to her overindulge and extravagance. It was claimed that she allowed the common people starve while they hanging meat, from trees, as decoration. [6]
12. Twitchett, Denis and Loewe, Michael. The Cambridge History of China: Volume 1. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, England, 1986; 61- 63.