Cultivating Femininity: Women and Tea Culture in Edo and Meiji Japan

Rebecca Corbett

Open Access Published by University of Hawaii Press 2018

Cultivating Femininity

Women and Tea Culture in Edo and Meiji Japan

Rebecca Corbett

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824873486

Overview
Contents

About this book

The overwhelming majority of tea practitioners in contemporary Japan are women, but there has been little discussion on their historical role in tea culture (chanoyu). In Cultivating Femininity, Rebecca Corbett writes women back into this history and shows how tea practice for women was understood, articulated, and promoted in the Edo (1603–1868) and Meiji (1868–1912) periods. Viewing chanoyu from the lens of feminist and gender theory, she sheds new light on tea’s undeniable influence on the formation of modern understandings of femininity in Japan.

Corbett overturns the iemoto tea school’s carefully constructed orthodox narrative by employing underused primary sources and closely examining existing tea histories. She incorporates Pierre Bourdieu’s theories of social and cultural capital and Norbert Elias’s “civilizing process” to explore the economic and social incentives for women taking part in chanoyu. Although the iemoto system sought to increase its control over every aspect of tea, including book production, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century popular texts aimed specifically at women evidence the spread of tea culture beyond parameters set by the schools. The expansion of chanoyu to new social groups cascaded from commoner men to elite then commoner women. Shifting the focus away from male tea masters complicates the history of tea in Japan and shows how women of different social backgrounds worked within and without traditionally accepted paradigms of tea practice. The direct socioeconomic impact of the spread of tea is ultimately revealed in subsequent advances in women’s labor opportunities and an increase in female social mobility. Through their participation in chanoyu, commoner women were able to blur and lessen the status gap between themselves and women of aristocratic and samurai status.

Cultivating Femininity offers a new perspective on the prevalence of tea practice among women in modern Japan. It presents a fresh, much-needed approach, one that will be appreciated by students and scholars of Japanese history, gender, and culture, as well as by tea practitioners.

Author / Editor information

Corbett Rebecca :

Rebecca Corbett is the Japanese studies librarian at the University of Southern California.Rebecca Corbett is the Japanese studies librarian at the University of Southern California.

Reviews

Eric C. Rath, University of Kansas:
Rebecca Corbett has not only written the best book on women in premodern tea history, but the most informative book on the history of the tea ceremony in early modern Japan.

Gaye Rowley, Waseda University:
There is room for just one more book on Japanese women and tea with a corrective focus, and Cultivating Femininity is that book.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	I
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction Open Access Download PDF	1
Chapter 1. Women and Tea Culture in Early Modern Japan Open Access Download PDF	25
Chapter 2. A Handbook for Elite Women’s Tea in the Eighteenth Century Open Access Download PDF	56
Chapter 3. A Handbook for Women’s Tea in the Nineteenth Century Open Access Download PDF	74
Chapter 4. Guides for Cultivating Femininity Open Access Download PDF	98
Chapter 5. Guides for Modern Life Open Access Download PDF	122
Epilogue Open Access Download PDF	141
Notes Open Access Download PDF	145
Bibliography Open Access Download PDF	169
Index Open Access Download PDF	185
About the Author Open Access Download PDF	190

Language: English
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 202
Illustrations
- Other: 10 b&w illustrations, 3 color plates

eBook

Published: January 14, 2019
ISBN: 9780824873486