Bodies in China：Philosophy, Aesthetics, Gender, and Politics

This book seeks to engage Chinese philosophy to reframe existing Western scholarship in the fields of gender, body, and aesthetics. The assembled essays cover traditional and current global issues related to Chinese female bodies by addressing the following questions: Does Confucianism rule out the capacity of women as moral subjects, and hence, as aesthetic subjects? Do forms of Chinese philosophy in some ways contribute or correspond to the patriarchal Confucian culture? In what ways can Chinese philosophy provide alternative perspectives sought by Western feminist scholars?

The first section brings in theoretical and philosophical discussions of Western traditions such as those of Plato, Descartes, and Kant to examine their views on body and mind and how the Chinese philosophical ideas offered by Confucians and Daoists provide alternative body ontologies for critical feminist practices. The second section reviews female aesthetical representations in classical traditional Chinese works ranging from The Books of Songs, women's embroidery, sexuality and suggested ways of kissing, and the contemporary body art represented by the controversial body artist He Chengyao. The third section aims to unfold the changing perceptions of femininity from imperial China to contemporary China. Case studies touch on female body ideals in the literary fantasies in late Ming, the iron girls in Communist China, and the 2008 Beijing Olympics. This section also discusses Hong Kong women's fashion in the 1960s and how bodies were shaped by colonial politics. Finally, the subject of sex and emotion in the development of ethical discourse of Chinese female sex workers from late Qing to contemporary society is discussed alongside the impact of the global economy on female beauty today. It advances new conceptual models that feminist scholars are using to displace dualism and emancipate notions of the body from Cartesian mechanistic models and metaphors.

Eva Man is professor of humanities and creative writing at Hong Kong Baptist University. She publishes widely in comparative aesthetics, feminist philosophy, cultural studies, art, and cultural criticism.