Difference between revisions of "328 2010--Week 3 Questions/Comments"
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I agree with many of the comments above regarding money and how at the time it was quite a large amount to spend but I found interesting how the numbers were so precise, ie. with Loi Yau her amount was $503 for four and half years(p. 238). How did the mistresses come up with the numbers, was $503 the exact amount for travel, lodging, etc.? I also question if the women really understood everything they were in for, like kokeefe mentioned America was the land for opportunity-it may have been a better life here than in China. '''The women were able to live in America without debt and be free to do as they pleased once their servitude was complete.''' I do not think prostitution is the way to go or an ideal life choice, but for the women maybe it was a means of escape. -Megan W. | I agree with many of the comments above regarding money and how at the time it was quite a large amount to spend but I found interesting how the numbers were so precise, ie. with Loi Yau her amount was $503 for four and half years(p. 238). How did the mistresses come up with the numbers, was $503 the exact amount for travel, lodging, etc.? I also question if the women really understood everything they were in for, like kokeefe mentioned America was the land for opportunity-it may have been a better life here than in China. '''The women were able to live in America without debt and be free to do as they pleased once their servitude was complete.''' I do not think prostitution is the way to go or an ideal life choice, but for the women maybe it was a means of escape. -Megan W. | ||
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| + | Super-disturbing. Particularly in the first contract where, on page 238, it lists all of the ailments that would justify a return of the product. First of all, pregnancy is mentioned as one of these "great sicknesses" and also the really hilarious, "'stone-woman,' i.e, inability to have carnal intercourse with men." What sort of inability would this be? If women were willing to do this in order to leave China, even if prostitution played a different social role there, then they must have been escaping some bad situations. Or else, they had been persuaded that much better conditions waited for them in America than actually did. -Erin B. | ||
== Zitkala-Sa Travels to the Land of the Big Red Apples, 1884 == | == Zitkala-Sa Travels to the Land of the Big Red Apples, 1884 == | ||
