Raise the Red Lantern Essay -- Women Raise Red Lantern Essays

Raise the blood-red LanternAll the worlds a stage all of us atomic number 18 taking the elements of plot, character, and costume and turning into performances of possibilities(Ward1999 5) Raise the Red Lantern tells a compelling and sorrowful story of a young woman whose manner is destined to be ruined in a male-dominated society. This can be an awakening of some sort to any woman. As Ward states in her text, women learn the rules of our half of the world as well as those of the otherwise half, since we regularly move in and out of the male world. There she specializes womens culture. The term has also been used in its anthropological sense to embrace the familial and friendship networks of women, their affective ties, their rituals. It is important to understand that womans culture is never a subculture. It would hardly be appropriate to define the culture of half of humanity as a subculture. Women travel genial existence within the general culture. Whenever they are confined by patriarchal restraint or segregation into separateness, they transform this restraint into complementarily and redefine it. Thus, women live a duality- as members of the general culture and as partakers of womans culture. (Lerner 1986242)Much like the quote stated, Raise the Red Lantern is set in Northern china in the 1920s. For thousands of years the people of China take h aging formed family life around patrilineal decent. The assessment of traditional China life was patriarchal. A basis of this set up would be from Confucius. In childhood, Before marriage, Obey your fatherIn adulthood, During marriage, Obey your husbandIn widowhood, After marriage, Obey your sonStates in the text, the lowest moment of a womans life was her wedding day. Cut off from her indigenous family, the young bride was an outsider and the object of deep suspicion in her unseasoned husbands household. The only was to earn a place for herself was to make water sons. Songlian quits co llege after her father has passed away and becomes Zuoquian Chens stern wife. When Songlian, who chooses to walk from her house to Chens house instead of travel in the wedding carriage, arrives at Chens house, there is no sign of a celebration, an omen of things to come. Bound by tradition and aggravate with jealousy, none of the three wives come out to greet the new bride. An old housekeeper welcomes and acknowledges ... ...y. Much as the film was, as it was structured, this film could be a parable of some sort. Songlian would be the individual, the woman. The master would be the government and the customs duty of the house are the laws of the country. It is an archaic administration that always rewards those that play and correct but destroys those who violate.One thing I found appealing well-nigh Red Lantern is that while the film portrays a brutally patriarchal system in which women are clearly very oppressed and dependent on their lord and master for everything, i t does not idealize the women or turn them into doe-eyed, sweet, angelical victims. The wives and concubines are resourceful, smart, competitive, and very determined to make the best of their situation... in any way they can. They can even be cruel and downright evil. provide the cliche that men are interested in agency and women are interested in love. These women are definitely interested in power and status -- though, of course, the only way they can obtain it is by fetching the husbands favor. Yet their power struggles are just as ruthless as anything that happens in the male world of politics, business, or war, and just as absorbing to watch.