Mother's role in China

Before 1950, the role of the Chinese mother was based on the satisfaction of their husbands and bearing children. However, since this date, many factors such as the political environment, economic development and migration have been considerably responsible for changing the role of the mother in China. In fact, the rise of technology and the economic development of China resulted consequently in an increase of women's status, rights and opportunities. However, women's status is still slowed by the Chinese society who does not endorse completely its role in some essential areas such as childbearing. This essay will discuss how role of the Chinese mother has changed over almost sixty years and is still in changing.

In feudal China, the status of women and in particular the mother's role in the family was very different from nowadays. Indeed Confucian philosophy was mainly based on women's inferiority to men. Women had to obey their fathers first, their husbands after marriage and their sons if they were widowed. Moreover, weddings were arranged and the responsibility of the woman was to remain married because divorce was not allowed (Heng, 1994). The main role of women was to be assimilated as the private property of men and was to satisfy their husbands and to bear children. What is more, the symbol of women's subservience was the practice of binding women's feet, "this practice lasted nearly 1,000 years and during the Ming and Qing dynasties to be eligible for a husband" (Heng, 1994).
However, from 1949 to 1979, the role of women changed dramatically in particular with the installation of the People's Republic of China. In fact, the Chinese Communist Party admitted that the liberation of women was essential for the country to achieve complete emancipation (Heng, 1994). As a result of this, the new government established several reforms, laws, and policies that protected women. The Chinese Constitution of the early 1950s affirmed undoubtely that