中國婦女在婚姻中的角色

摘 要：《中國婦女在婚姻中的地位》以探索和歷史的方法對中國婦女在婚姻中的角色從奴隸社會到當前的演變過程進行研究，指出：中國婦女只有用知識武裝自己達到獨立，才能擺脫被剝削、被統治的枷鎖，變成完整的個體。

關鍵詞：中國婦女;獨立;完整的個體

中圖分類號：C93 " " " "文獻標志碼：A " " "文章編號：1673-291X（2014）31-0295-03

1.Stimulus

Three articles about marriage gave me some enlightenment. They are：Marry—for what？ which subtly delineates the central point about marriage; Divorce—A New Social Phenomenon in China，which demonstrates the reality of divorces existing in China; For Woman，There Is a Long Way to Go，which talks about the essential factors for the achievement women. These articles lead me to a consideration of Chinese women’s role in marriage.

2.Chinese Women’s Role in Old Marriage

Historically Chinese women played subordinate and dominated roles in society. It was very common that women were bought and sold freely at the market just like commodities. It was no surprise that women could be spoiled and redistributed among the new tribes when being plundered from other tribes. Even in the more progressive society—the Feudal society，women still couldn’t extricate themselves from the yoke of facing endless bullying and humiliation. When a girl baby was born，if she wasn’t killed by any possible means，a long duration of sufferings would be imposed on her. Being called “Peiqianhuo”，that is，the article due to sustain losses，she was forced to do all kinds of work from her earlier youth. Another wretched life began when she was old enough to get married—16 years old or even younger，just as her mother had experienced：do the heavy household chores under the pressure of her husband’s tyrannical violence with whom her marriage had been arranged by her family and whom she might have never met before with the mentality “men are superior to women” as well as all the principles strictly made for women’s actions when being called “Zaokang”. And there were still worries about the baby she was going to give birth to. If it wasn’t a boy baby，then it would mean that she had brought a chain of trouble to herself as well as a new circulation of a miserable life：she would be regarded as “a comet” by the family members—a thing that can cause disasters and her status would become even lower. Even though she had satisfied her husband in this aspect—that is，she has made up for the “fault”，he could still have excuses to marry another wife or even three and four—they were called “concubines”. Indeed there were no principles restricting men to do so. To be worse，men could even at random cast off their wives and send them home without any reasons even though their wives had done well enough according to the principles and couldn’t be found at fault unless the women could be granted a fabricated charge by their husbands. The women cast off would always have no way but to end their lives in great grief and indignation，as at that time，it was the most humiliating case. As to the widows who wanted new lives—a new marriage，it would always turn out to be tragedies. Being regarded as the severest case of public moral corruptions，it was strictly forbidden. The film Big Red Lanterns Hang High drove home this point only too well. And the novel New Year’s Sacrifice written by Lu Xun just reflected the miserable life of a woman who married twice in the old days.

3.Chinese Women’s Role in Present Marriage

Great changes in women’s status have taken place since the foundation of the People’s Republic of China after their long struggle for liberation since the May 4th Movement. “Men and women have equal rights.” “Men and women get equal pay for equal work.” were written into the constitution，women began to take up all kinds of professions freeing themselves from the miscellaneous burden on them，to become breadwinners just as men used to do.

When a girl baby is born，she is granted the right to live，to be brought up，and to be educated—all the rights of being a citizen of the republic and can’t be discriminated against in any way—when growing up，being educated，finding jobs，etc. And any offence can cause trouble to the offenders.

“A husband and a wife in a family” is solemnly stipulated by law and more and more measures are being used to protect women’s rights. In the nationwide there appears a new atmosphere that has smashed the old tradition which had lasted for thousands of years，that is，a husband and a wife cooperate in their family with equal rights when they get married through the freedom to choose one’s spouse. There’s no longer the pressure from the old principles and moralities，and there’s no longer the tragedies of Yinglian and Sister Xianglin. （They are the characters of Big Red Lanterns Hang High and New Year’s Sacrifice. ）

4.The Problem Existing in the Society about Women’s Role in a Present Marriage

Although women’s rights and interests are really protected by law，and slogans about that are repeated from time to time by the government，there always occur events in which women are discriminated against and hurt in one way or another. Of course we must admit on one hand that it’s inevitable since the old wrong has run through almost the whole Chinese history and New China has only an age of 65 years old. And on the other hand we can’t deny the fact that the real crux of the problem has been ignored while we look into the whole problem.

On our side we can always be informed by news about women’s rights being offended，such as the case like this：a man forsook his wife and children to marry another woman. This old and probably never ceasing phenomenon in the world has become a common sight for us and makes us ponder over it. To some extent it undoubtedly reflects the corrupting morals and quality of some men，which should be ruthlessly blamed by all the society and sometimes by law. In another way it also gives us some enlightenment. Looking at those women’s wan and sallow faces and listening to their mournful complaint，I feel pity for them but meanwhile moreover sober and fierce thoughts fill my heart—when will this kind of tragedy die out in the world？ Will our fate still be controlled by men under the influence of some deep-rooted feudal malignant tumors around us？ It impels me to the thought that it’s pressing for women to gain more education.

5.The Solution to the Problem Existing in the Society about Women’s Role in a Present Marriage

In the feudal society，Chinese women were mentally bound by the mentality that “a woman without learning is moral” and in action bound by foot-bindings，so fundamentally they must be subordinate to their husbands，otherwise they wouldn’t be able to live in this world. In this sense we can say that women can never shake off the yoke if they can’t even be economically independent. It’s sad to see that nowadays some women aren’t aware of that yet and willingly become appendages to their husbands in one way or another. As soon as they get married，they begin throwing all their energies into the construction of their families considering family as the most important factor in their lives while putting others aside. Jobs and learning of knowledge are far from their concerns. And the limited knowledge they acquired earlier fades as time flies. It’s not until the time when their husbands suddenly put forward the idea of divorce that they begin to realize their serious situation. The only thing they can do now is to vent their fury down towards their husbands—but they won’t be their husbands any longer in reality. It’s too late for them. Can all this be attributed to their husbands？

There are some statistics which indicate that women make up about 70 percent of China’s 200 million illiterates. And girls make up an estimated 70 percent of the dropouts in the countryside. From above and the present divorce proportion we can estimate the alarming number who are suffering and are going to suffer from divorce.

The century sees only one way for us to choose—to seek help from education.

The experience of women’s movements at home and abroad tells us that it’s more important to stress actions rather slogans if we want real liberation—that is，to grant women more education，arm ourselves with knowledge so that we can contend with men. Otherwise even though a woman is appointed a top job，if she is incompetent and not able enough to run，even under the forgiveness of other men colleagues，her job won’t be permanent and the different treatment can only mean a high-level inequality. As regards family life，it’s just the same.

A woman，with self-supporting skill through education，is independent whether she’s married or not. It goes without saying that she’s not subordinate to her husband. Whenever she feels that her martial life isn’t as ideal as she has imagined，she can advance the idea and then divorce her husband.

There has been a debate on the topic whether divorce represents social progress. I don’t want to say more about it，but the statistics in it interest me a lot. That is，about 60 percent of divorce cases are initiated by women rather than men nowadays in China. And furthermore，the proportion of highly educated women are even more in it—in any way the statistics imply the advance of women’s independence，and meanwhile the power of education given to women.

5.Conclusion

Yes，we marry for love，we divorce also for love （real love），but really there’s still a long way for us to go towards full self-development since we are Chinese women.

Bibliography：

[1] "Wu Zhenfu.Oral Workshop：Argument （Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press，2013.

Chinese Women’s Role in Marriage

GE Qun

（Vocational University，Dongbei University of Finance amp; Economics，Dalian 116025，China）

Abstract：Chinese Women’s Role in Marriage gives an exploratory and historical approach to how Chinese women’s role in marriage has changed from a slave society to the present. It points out that，only if Chinese women arm themselves with knowledge to be independent，can they extricate themselves from the yoke of being oppressed and dominated by men and become complete individuals.

Key words：Chinese women;marriage; independent; complete individual

[責任編輯 " 陳 鶴]