Locating Footbinding: Variations across Class and Space in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century China*

In this article I look at footbinding as a social and cultural practice embedded in the daily life conditions of women and their families. I sketch a picture of variations based primarily on regional and class differences in nineteenth and early twentieth century practices of footbinding and in efforts to eradicate them. The period in question is one of interest precisely because it is a time of transition. I look simultaneously at footbinding as a practice and as a target of criticism, defense, and transformation. This allows me to consider the ways in which it was practiced by women to represent, shape, and constrain their own, their daughters,' and their families' cultural, social, economic, and political lives. Relying largely on missionary journals, personal histories, diaries, and travel writing, I examine the practice and the demise of footbinding in various social and spatial locations. Although sources which permit a close look at embedded social practices of footbinding are scarce, it seems clear that both the practice of various forms of footbinding and the process of its eventual demise involved strategies, conflicts, and habits which differed along gender, class, and geographic lines of distinction. I suggest that the variety of forms the practice of footbinding took in lived experience of women's social lives is not incidental to its conceptualization and meaning, but rather central to it.     

Discontinuity and/in the Early Twentieth Century Ontario Juvenile Court

Abstract  Canada's juvenile court has become axiomatic. As such, it demands critical and historical questioning of its hegemony. It is in this spirit of critique that I highlight its arbitrariness. Two ruptures in the ostensibly smooth telos of Ontario's juvenile courts are discussed in this paper. First, I examine the precarious and uncertain inauguration of the Juvenile Delinquents Act. Second, I explore the Act's implementation in Toronto; particularly as it relates to the adversity juvenile court judge E.W. Boyd experienced. This examination provides a convenient backdrop against which to highlight the juvenile court's foible. I conclude with a call for a socio-historic strategy of open ended practico-critique of law and juvenile courts; informed by the emancipatory logic of "justice" to come.     

Chinese Women Images in the American Literature in the Early Twentieth Century

二十世纪美国文学中的中国形象大概有两种,一种是“黄祸论”,另一种是典型的中国女性形象。在赛珍珠之前,没有小说对中国形象进行过正面描写,赛珍珠开之先河。她因对中国农民生活的真实描写获得了诺贝尔文学奖。本文则运用女权批评理论分析中国女性形象。赛珍珠笔下的女性多为沉默的女性。     

Chinese Women Images in the American Literature in the Early Twentieth Century

二十世纪美国文学中的中国形象大概有两种,一种是黄祸论,另一种是典型的中国女性形象。在赛珍珠之前,没有小说对中国形象进行过正面描写,赛珍珠开之先河。她因对中国农民生活的真实描写获得了诺贝尔文学奖。本文则运用女权批评理论分析中国女性形象。赛珍珠笔下的女性多为沉默的女性。     

Career Prospects in the London Metropolitan Police in the Early Twentieth Century

Abstract One of the strategies increasingly used by employers in the nineteenth century to make work more efficient was the promise of internal promotion, based on uniformity of treatment and selection by merit. The Metropolitan Police had pursued this strategy since the establishment of the force in 1829. Presentations of the promotion system were couched in challenging language, promising to reward all conscientious officers with a rise to a higher rank. Promotion brought with it increased pay, better work conditions, greater authority and prestige, and for some officers real social and economic mobility. This paper examines the principles underlying the promotion system in the Metropolitan Police, the terms in which they were formulated and their application. Of crucial importance are these questions: Who benefitted from the opportunity offered by the Metropolitan Police? What was the relationship between rhetoric and policy? What personal factors helped determine upward mobility? Did the police offer real equality of opportunity? A computer-based analysis of the careers of all recruits to the Metropolitan Police at the turn of the century provides firm answers and suggests patterns of mobility outside the Metropolitan Police.     

Gender and Ethnic Differences in Marital Assimilation in the Early Twentieth Century1

Historical research on intermarriage has overlooked how distinctive patterns of ethnic settlement shape partner choice and assumed that the mate selection process operated the same way for men and women. This study utilizes a sample of youn married adults drawn from the 1910 Census IPUMS to examine 1) whether ethnic variation in partner choice was shaped by differences in group concentration and distribution and 2) if factors shaping outmarriage were gendered. About one fifth of young married Americans had spouses of a different ethnic background in 1910, though there was considerable ethnic variation in outmarriage propensities. Barriers to intermarriage fell at different rates, depending upon ethnic grou, sex, and region of settlement; they were weakest for first‐and seconl eneration English men. Structural factors such as group size operatef differently for men and women; while larger group representation increased men's odds of outmarriage to both native stock and other white ethnic wives, women from the ethnic groups with the largest presence were significantly more likely to wed fellow ethnics than the native stock. Ultimately, even if they resided in the same location, the marriage market operated in different ways for ethnic women and men in search of mates.     

Women Succeeding in Science in the Twentieth Century

Sociological Forum -     

A Sociological Look at Biofuels: Ethanol in the Early Decades of the Twentieth Century and Lessons for Today

Abstract This article develops a broad sociological understanding of why biofuels lost out to leaded gasoline as the fuel par excellence of the twentieth century, while drawing comparisons with biofuels today. It begins by briefly discussing the fuel‐scape in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, examining the farm chemurgic movement, New Deal agricultural policies, mechanization trends within agriculture, and, finally, the invention of leaded gasoline. The second half of the article applies insights from that historical analysis to the biofuel craze currently under way. By employing a political‐economy interpretation of the socioeconomic context combined with a path‐dependency‐informed analysis of the technological trajectories, the article reveals the social forces that structured the trends and outcomes in biofuel innovations across the two eras.     

Twentieth Century Urban Growth: An Ecological Approach

Abstract

This research involves a longitudinal analysis of a large number of urban areas for two distinct historical periods during the Twentieth Century. The study indicates that while human ecology's general assumption that sustenance activity regulates community growth is correct, the theory overemphasizes the role of industrial capacity in this process. Growth appears to be more a function of a community's managerial activity than its production capacity. Basic-non-basic activity theory fails to predict a community's growth potential. Nevertheless one aspect of sustenance activity, the city's role in coordinating goods and services flows, has a significant impact on growth. Several other ecological variables, region and the extent of transportation activity, influence urban growth. Yet none of these factors show consistent relationships with growth through time.     

The Rise of Associational Activity: Early Twentieth Century German Sailors' Homes and Schools in Antwerp and Rotterdam

This case study focuses on the functioning of German immigrant organisations in Antwerp and Rotterdam in the early twentieth century. It is often assumed that patriotism is central to a good understanding of German associational life abroad. Based on case studies of the sailors' homes and German schools in Antwerp and Rotterdam, I argue that a focus on opportunity structures may provide a better understanding of associational life than an emphasis on its supposed patriotic character. The strongly differing opportunity structures, then, can be explained by both looking at the type of organisation and the political environment in the country of settlement.     

Residential Segregation by Race and the Black Merchants of Northern Cities During the Early Twentieth Century

During the early 20th century, many Blacks in northern cities entered the retail trade, supposedly because residential segregation was advantageous to Black merchants. Building upon historical studies of Blacks in the urban North and upon the sociological literature on Black business enterprise, I use census data to analyze the relationship between (1) the spatial isolation of Blacks and (2) the representation of Blacks in the retail trade. I find that between 1900 and 1930 the association between these two variables became significantly positive. This finding corroborates historical case studies, and I conclude that after segregated Black communities emerged in northern cities at the end of the study period, spatial isolation did increase the participation of Blacks in the retail trade.     

Open Windows: Jewish Refugee Artists in Scotland during the Twentieth Century

This case study on the work and influence of four Jewish artists in Glasgow during the early years of the Second World War reviews cultural transfer within the wider context of Jewish history in Scotland. This review suggests that this incidence of cultural transfer was mainly achieved through personal contacts and networks and emphasises the importance of the presence of an established Jewish population. It also shows that parts of Scottish society were prepared to absorb refugee influences, while the Jewish artists under review adopted novel forms of cultural production, incorporating their individual and group experiences as well as the influence of the wider society.     

Defiant Haiti: Free-Soil Runaways,Ship Seizures and the Politics of Diplomatic Non-Recognition in the Early Nineteenth Century

Uncomfortable with the potential influence of the Haitian Revolution on their slave populations and unwilling to deal on equal terms with non-white ambassadors or heads of state, the European colonial powers and the USA refused to formally recognize Haitian governments following the country's declaration of independence in 1804. For some British slave owners and US merchants, this policy of diplomatic non-recognition came at a cost. When slaves from surrounding British colonies escaped to Haiti, and when American merchants demanded restitution for ships and cargos seized by Haitian rulers, early Haitian regimes were free to rebuff and ignore the claims of unrecognized governments. Uneasy relations between British and US governments and the early Haitian Republic offer evidence of both the relative strength and autonomy of President Jean-Pierre Boyer's régime and the nature of the emancipationist policies that made Republican Haiti an attractive destination for hundreds of fugitive slaves from surrounding islands.     

Kings and Scapegoats in Twentieth Century Families and Corporations

No abstract available for this article.     

The School System and Special Education: Causes and Effects in the Twentieth Century

The article delineates a line of development in which special education and the increasing need for it are connected with the gradual institutionalisation of the modern school model in the school system. In a model of this type the teacher must use the limited time available efficiently to attain the set objectives, which means that any interruptions or disturbances jeopardise the possibility of achieving important goals with the time-limit, and diversity among students becomes a problem. In other words, the more modern the school, the stricter the criteria for normality, the finer the evaluation system, the finer the screening used and, as a result, the greater the amount of deviance which must be handled by special measures.