Gender and Sex Roles 1000 b.c.e . – 1250 c.e .

1. Gender and Sex Roles1000 b.c.e. – 1250 c.e. Rachel Mallari April 16, 2010 Mr. Kelly APWH; Period 1

2. China – Qin, Han, and Zhou • Downgraded the status and potential of women • Agricultural civilizations were patriarchal • Husband determined conditions and made decisions while the woman gave obedience to the male

3. India – 1600 B.C.E. – 535 C.E. • Dominance of husbands and fathers remained strong • A wife should worship her husband as a god • As agriculture became better organized and improved technology reduced women’s economic contributions, the stress on male authority expanded • Women enjoyed hunting cultures • Featured clever and strong-willed women’s status as wives and mothers, in contrast to China

5. Rome and Greece – 1000 B.C.E. – 476 C.E. • Also patriarchal • Women played vital roles in farming and artisan families • In the upper classes, women often commanded great influence and power within a household; but in law and culture women were held inferior • “The husband is the judge of his wife”

7. Abbasids – 700 C.E. – 1200 C.E. • Lower class women farmed, wove clothing and rugs, or raised silkworms while rich women were allowed almost no career outlets beyond the home • Women we raised to devote their lives to running a household and serving their husbands

9. Western Europe – 500 C.E. – 1450 C.E. • Women in the West had higher status than their sister under Islam (less segregated in religious services) and less confined to the household • urban women often played important roles in local commerce and even operated some craft guilds • Women were not assured property rights • Patriarchal structures seemed to be taking deeper root

10. China – Tang and Song • Position of women improved under the Tang and early Song eras and then deteriorated steadily in the late Song • Male-dominated hierarchy promoted by Confucius • Women remained subordinate to men; practiced footbinding • Opportunities for personal expression increased • Tang women could wield considerable power at the highest levels of Chinese society

11. Foot binding

12. Mongol gender roles – 1270s • Women remained aloof from Chinese culture • Refused to practice footbinding • Retained rights to property and control within household and freedom to move about the town • they hunted; i.e. daughter of Kubilai’s cousins went to war

14. Africa in Atlantic Age - 1400 • The enslavement of women was a central feature of African society • Excess of women led to polygamy • The position of women was lowered in some societies • Trans-Saharan slave trade concentrated on women as concubines and domestic servants but the Atlantic slave trade focused on men • African societies preferred to sell men and keep women and children as domestic slaves or extend kin groups

16. Early Latin America - 1450 • Sexual exploitation of Indian women and occasional alliances formed by the giving of concubines and female servants • Slave owners exploited their female slaves or took slave women as mistresses, and then sometimes freed their mulatto children • A mestizo who married a Spanish woman might be called white

17. Muslim Empires - 1450 • Akbar legally prohibited sati • Seclusion was more and more strictly enforced for upper-class women, both Hindu and Muslim • Muslim women rarely went from their homes unveiled • The birth of a girl was increasingly seen as an inauspicious event • Only the birth of a son was greeted with feasting and celebrations