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Elements of Chinese Culture and The Effect on Chinese Women

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Title: Elements of Chinese Culture and The Effect on Chinese Women


1
Elements of Chinese Cultureand The Effect on
Chinese Women
  • ENG 120
  • Introduction to Literature
  • Mrs. Organ

2
The Importance of Family
  • Chinese people put their family in a very
    important position.
  • They regard it as a means to keep the family
    blood stream continuously running. And the
    running family blood stream maintains the life of
    the whole nation. That is why children production
    and breeding in China becomes a focus of all
    members of families.
  • There is a Chinese saying that of all who lack
    filial piety, the worst is who has no children.

3
Pregnancy
  • The fact that Chinese people pay great attention
    to children production can be supported by many
    customary practices. Many traditional customs
    about preproduction of children are all based on
    the idea of children protection.
  • When a wife is found to be pregnant, people will
    say she "has happiness," and all her family
    members will feel overjoyed about it.

4
Pregnancy
  • Throughout the whole period of pregnancy, both
    she and the fetus are well attended, so that the
    fetus is not hurt in any way and the new
    generation is born both physically and mentally
    healthy.
  • To keep the fetus in a good condition, the
    going-to-be mother is offered sufficient
    nutritious foods and some traditional Chinese
    medicines believed to be helpful to the fetus.

5
Birth of Baby
  • When the baby is born, the mother is required to
    "zuoyuezi" or stay in bed for a month in order to
    recover from the fatigue. In this month, she is
    advised to stay at home and not to go outdoors.
    Cold, wind, dirty air, and tiredness are said to
    exert bad effect on her health and thus her later
    life.

6
Children
7
Importance of Sons
  • Needed to carry on the family name
  • Needed to care for the elderly family members
  • Needed to run the land
  • Girl babies were often euthanized as a result of
    poverty/population control measures.
  • To date, there are significantly higher number of
    boys than girls born in China. Ultrasound is
    used to selectively abort girl babies as a result
    of Chinas current one child policy.

8
One Child Policy
  • The one-child policy is the population control
    policy (or planned birth policy) of the Peoples
    Republic of China.
  • The Chinese government introduced the policy in
    1979 to alleviate the social and environmental
    problems of China. The policy is controversial
    both within and outside China because of the
    issues it raises because of the manner in which
    the policy has been implemented and because of
    concerns about negative economic and social
    consequences.

9
  • The policy is enforced at the provincial level
    through fines that are imposed based on the
    income of the family and other factors. However,
    there are still many citizens that continue to
    have more than one child, despite this policy.
    In Feb. of 2008 Chinese Government official Wu
    Jianmin said that the one-child policy would be
    reconsidered during the Chinese People's
    Political Consultative Conference in March 2008,
    but at that time a representative of China's
    National Population and Family Planning
    Commission said that the policy would remain in
    place for at least another decade.

10
Naming a Newborn
  • Another custom is to find the newborn baby's
    Eight Characters (in four pairs, indicating the
    year, month, day and hour of a person's birth,
    each pair consisting of one Heavenly Stem and one
    Earthly Branch, formerly used in fortune-telling)
    and the element in the Eight Characters.
  • It is traditionally believed in China that the
    world is made up of five principal elements
    metal, wood, water, fire, and earth.
  • A person's name is to include an element that he
    lacks in his Eight Characters. If he lacks water,
    for example, then his name is supposed to contain
    a word like river, lake, tide, sea, stream, rain,
    or any word associating with water. If he lacks
    metal, then he is to be given a word like gold,
    silver, iron, or steel.

11
One-Month Celebration
  • The first important event for the newly born baby
    is the one-month celebration. In Buddhist or
    Taoist families, on the morning of the baby's
    30th day, sacrifices are offered to the gods so
    that the gods will protect the baby in his
    subsequent life.

12
Birthdays
  • Traditionally, Chinese people do not pay a lot of
    attention to birthdays until they are 60 years
    old. The 60th birthday is regarded as a very
    important point of life and therefore there is
    often a big celebration. After that, a birthday
    celebration is held every ten years, that is the
    70th, the 80th, etc, until the person's death.
    Generally, the older the person is, the greater
    the celebration occasion is.

13
Age
  • The Chinese traditional way to count the age is
    different from the Western way. In China, people
    take the first day of the Chinese New Year in
    lunar calendar as the starting point of a new
    age. No matter in which month a child is born, he
    is one year old, and one more year is added to
    his age as soon as he enters the New Year. So
    what may puzzle a Westerner is that a child is
    two years old when he is actually two days or two
    hours old. This is possible when the child is
    born on the last day or hour of the past year.

14
Funeral Ceremony
  • There are two main traditions that are observed
  • 1. The funeral ceremony, which traditionally
    lasts over 49 days, the first seven days being
    the most important. Prayers are said every seven
    days for 49 days if the family can afford it. If
    the family is in poor circumstances, the period
    may be shortened to from 3 to 7 days. Usually, it
    is the responsibility of the daughters to bear
    the funeral expenses. The head of the family
    should be present for, at least the first and,
    possibly the second, prayer ceremony. The number
    of ceremonies conducted is dependent on the
    financial situation of the family. The head of
    the family should also be present for the burial
    or the cremation.

15
Funeral Ceremony
  • 2. In the second tradition, the prayer ceremony
    is held every 10 days. The initial ceremony and
    three succeeding periods of ten days until the
    final burial or cremation.
  • After 100 days a final prayer ceremony is
    conducted, but such a ceremony is optional and
    not as important as the initial ceremonies.

16
Closing Thoughts for Discussion
  • Consider the treatment of girls and women
    throughout their lives in China
  • Birth Childhood Adulthood Death
  • How did Tan have to deal with the aftermath of
    her mothers Chinese upbringing?
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