Women in China

Common card · No. 410676

Women in China make up approximately 49% of the population. In modern China, the lives of women have changed significantly due to the late Qing dynasty reforms, the changes of the Republican period, the Chinese Civil War, and the People's Republic of China. Like women in many other cultures, women in China have been historically oppressed. For thousands of years, women in China lived under the patriarchal social order characterized by the Confucian teaching of "filial piety". Achievement of women's liberation has been an agenda of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) since the 1949 proclamation of the People's Republic of China. Following the Chinese Communist Revolution, Mao Zedong replaced the common use of the term "女人" [nüren] with "妇女" [funü] as he famously said "妇女能顶半边天" (Women hold up half the sky). "妇女" [funü] is a term for labouring women, which signifies the revolutionary role that women play in the liberation of China. The first celebration of "妇女节" (International Women's Day) in...

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