Women in Tokugawa Japan

Paper Summary:

This paper refers to 'The Life of an Amorous Woman' and other Tokugawa period literature to explain the different roles played by women in a rigid 18th century society led by the samurai class, rigid conformity, and subservience of women respectability in contrast with prevalence of different forms of prostitution. According to this paper, women were held to hold dangerous ulterior powers and thus their lives needed to be ordered to fit with respectability, including respectable and less respectable forms of prostitution.

From the Paper:

"Introduction Twenty-first century Western ideas of women and the freedom of the individual do collide with the very limited choices and frequent low status of women in Tokugawa Japan (1603-1867). This essay refers to literature in commenting on the Tokugawa courtesan or prostitute, in relation to her sister in more respectable society, towards a conclusion arguing that women's roles were prescribed, however varied, and their legacy may continue still in a much changed Japanese society. Elizabeth Kanematsu explains how women were stripped of their rights in the Tokugawa period and became subservient to men until the advent of the Meiji Era. (1993)."

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