{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/105258"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/105258","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"The politics and identity of fashion changes in early-twentieth century China","abstract":"Incorporating gender as a category of historical analysis, this article will take a look at the debate on the symbolic meaning of women’s fashion in early-twentieth century China. Women’s fashion has been perceived as an important site of normative prescription in Chinese history. In the beginning of the twentieth-century, China was beleaguered by the threat of foreign invasion, territorial loss, economic depression, a collapsing empire and the pressing need for industrialization and modernization. The task of women’s emancipation was at the core of the ideological attack on the traditional Confucian patriarchal system, which is said to have confined women to the inner chambers. Regulating women’s dressing and transforming how women present their body formed an integral part of the attack on feudalism and Chinese tradition. The Chinese approach to modernization created a discourse of liberal conservatism that fuses modernity appearance with a tradition core. Although women’s emancipation was much eulogized during the revolutionary period, the discourse was more often used as an ideological weapon for political purposes of nation-building and modernization. On the other hand, through public debates on fashion reforms, many female writers were using fashion as a site of contention and negotiation to express their own understanding of tradition, modernity, and nationalism.","abstract_html":"Incorporating gender as a category of historical analysis, this article will take a look at the debate on the symbolic meaning of women’s fashion in early-twentieth century China. Women’s fashion has been perceived as an important site of normative prescription in Chinese history. In the beginning of the twentieth-century, China was beleaguered by the threat of foreign invasion, territorial loss, economic depression, a collapsing empire and the pressing need for industrialization and modernization. The task of women’s emancipation was at the core of the ideological attack on the traditional Confucian patriarchal system, which is said to have confined women to the inner chambers. Regulating women’s dressing and transforming how women present their body formed an integral part of the attack on feudalism and Chinese tradition. The Chinese approach to modernization created a discourse of liberal conservatism that fuses modernity appearance with a tradition core. Although women’s emancipation was much eulogized during the revolutionary period, the discourse was more often used as an ideological weapon for political purposes of nation-building and modernization. On the other hand, through public debates on fashion reforms, many female writers were using fashion as a site of contention and negotiation to express their own understanding of tradition, modernity, and nationalism.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Wang, Lu"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.A.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"East Asian Studies","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Shao, Dan"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2019,"date_issued":"2019-08-23T20:48:25Z","date_published":"2019-08-23T20:48:25Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:44Z","subjects":["fashion","Republic of China","public discourse","state power","gender"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2019 Lu Wang"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105258","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Shao, Dan"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Wang, Lu"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2019-08-23T20:48:25Z","2021-08-24T09:15:28Z","2019-04-26","2019-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["East Asian Studies"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.A."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["fashion","Republic of China","public discourse","state power","gender"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2019 Lu Wang"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105258"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Incorporating gender as a category of historical analysis, this article will take a look at the debate on the symbolic meaning of women’s fashion in early-twentieth century China. Women’s fashion has been perceived as an important site of normative prescription in Chinese history. In the beginning of the twentieth-century, China was beleaguered by the threat of foreign invasion, territorial loss, economic depression, a collapsing empire and the pressing need for industrialization and modernization. The task of women’s emancipation was at the core of the ideological attack on the traditional Confucian patriarchal system, which is said to have confined women to the inner chambers. Regulating women’s dressing and transforming how women present their body formed an integral part of the attack on feudalism and Chinese tradition. The Chinese approach to modernization created a discourse of liberal conservatism that fuses modernity appearance with a tradition core. Although women’s emancipation was much eulogized during the revolutionary period, the discourse was more often used as an ideological weapon for political purposes of nation-building and modernization. On the other hand, through public debates on fashion reforms, many female writers were using fashion as a site of contention and negotiation to express their own understanding of tradition, modernity, and nationalism.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2021-05-01","The student, Lu Wang, accepted the attached license on 2019-04-24 at 10:56.","The student, Lu Wang, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2019-04-24 at 11:03.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2019-04-26 at 07:10.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13872 on 2019-08-22 at 16:23:48","Made available in DSpace on 2019-08-23T20:48:25Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 WANG-THESIS-2019.pdf: 1485175 bytes, checksum: 40b5c313f4fe763411ddcebd901b32fc (MD5) LICENSE.txt: 4204 bytes, checksum: 5b30f18b536efc9cb1450a2e2c869939 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2019-04-26","Embargo set by: Seth Robbins for item 112380 Lift date: 2021-08-23T20:48:32Z Reason: Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Limited Restriction Lifted for Item 112380 on 2021-08-24T09:15:28Z."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["The politics and identity of fashion changes in early-twentieth century China"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Shao, Dan"],"dc:creator":["Wang, Lu"],"dc:date":["2019-08-23T20:48:25Z","2021-08-24T09:15:28Z","2019-04-26","2019-05"],"dc:description":["Incorporating gender as a category of historical analysis, this article will take a look at the debate on the symbolic meaning of women’s fashion in early-twentieth century China. Women’s fashion has been perceived as an important site of normative prescription in Chinese history. In the beginning of the twentieth-century, China was beleaguered by the threat of foreign invasion, territorial loss, economic depression, a collapsing empire and the pressing need for industrialization and modernization. The task of women’s emancipation was at the core of the ideological attack on the traditional Confucian patriarchal system, which is said to have confined women to the inner chambers. Regulating women’s dressing and transforming how women present their body formed an integral part of the attack on feudalism and Chinese tradition. The Chinese approach to modernization created a discourse of liberal conservatism that fuses modernity appearance with a tradition core. Although women’s emancipation was much eulogized during the revolutionary period, the discourse was more often used as an ideological weapon for political purposes of nation-building and modernization. On the other hand, through public debates on fashion reforms, many female writers were using fashion as a site of contention and negotiation to express their own understanding of tradition, modernity, and nationalism.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2021-05-01","The student, Lu Wang, accepted the attached license on 2019-04-24 at 10:56.","The student, Lu Wang, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2019-04-24 at 11:03.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2019-04-26 at 07:10.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13872 on 2019-08-22 at 16:23:48","Made available in DSpace on 2019-08-23T20:48:25Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 WANG-THESIS-2019.pdf: 1485175 bytes, checksum: 40b5c313f4fe763411ddcebd901b32fc (MD5) LICENSE.txt: 4204 bytes, checksum: 5b30f18b536efc9cb1450a2e2c869939 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2019-04-26","Embargo set by: Seth Robbins for item 112380 Lift date: 2021-08-23T20:48:32Z Reason: Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Limited Restriction Lifted for Item 112380 on 2021-08-24T09:15:28Z."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105258"],"dc:language":["en"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2019 Lu Wang"],"dc:subject":["fashion","Republic of China","public discourse","state power","gender"],"dc:title":["The politics and identity of fashion changes in early-twentieth century China"],"dc:type":["text"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["East Asian Studies"],"thesis:degree_level":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["M.A."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:44Z"}