| dc.description.abstract | The thesis is a study on the women thought of Yu Zhengxie (1775-1840), an Anhui scholar of Qing Dynasty. Because of the influence of Song Neo-Confucianism about chaste women “dying of hunger is trivial compared to losing one’’s chastity” and the eulogy of government to chaste window in Ming and Qing Dynasties, woman’s chastity had been highly praised, even came to a degree of ritualization. However, the opposition to this concept also came to surface at this time and scholars began to argue about this matter. Yu Zhengxie had an outstanding performance in this argument. He not only opposed the idea of virgin widowhood but also raised many new ideas in this aspect. The present thesis is an inquiry into Yu’s concept, including his background and the contents of his thought on woman.
This thesis is composed of three parts. The first part discusses Yu Zhengxie’s life, career, and scholarship. Because of his failure in civil service examination, he made living by writing books on other’s behalf. This difficult background made its dent on Yu’s thought. The second analyzes how Yu’s thought on woman was shaped. The contemporary thought on women was influenced by the economic development and people began to review their attitude toward women. The last part explores the Yu’s theory on women chastity which includes opposition to virgin widowhood, defense for women with talents, and advocacy of remarriage of widow. All of them were quite revolutionary and hence made him outstanding in the Qing period.
Yu’s thoughts on women were quite unique in his time and also influenced later scholars of the May Fourth period. However, there have been little studies on him and few people have written any thesis on his thoughts. In order to make up this deficiency, the present thesis will give a general review of Yu’s thought on women. | en_US |