Post-colonial Feminist Anthropology of Technology

简单说一下，这本书繁琐的细节让我头痛，但是它所用的人类学和历史学方法，女性视角和后殖民主义认识论很是厉害。学界评价很高的一本书，不明白为什么大多数人给了三星。

In her cultural study of technology, Bray has two themes. First, she revisits the reproduction of gender identity through technology in the late imperial China. With an emphasis on reinterpretation rather than archive, she relies exclusively on secondary literature without visiting China for her anthropological research. Second, Bray criticizes the western-centrism in our understanding of technology by re-conceptualizing the relation between technology and culture.
Bray focuses on artifacts that are mostly related to everyday life: food, shelter and clothing. These objects are not only physical, but also social and imbued with meanings concerning gender and social order. They are not merely practiced upon, but also experienced under the guidance of fengshui knowledge, Confucius teaching and traditional Chinese medicine. Bray chooses these objects of study for two methodological reasons: first, she is interested in the reproduction of cultural tradition through technology, and these objects perform normative functions by structuring Chinese people’s everyday experience. Second, Bray focuses on an ancient period of history so that most material cultures no longer survive. One exception is the textual record of everyday objects that allows Bray to make historical reconstruction.
According to Bray, the domestic space is a micro representation of the social order. The segregation of gender, the generational hierarchy and the warship of ancestors are all embodied in the design and use of the house. The domestic space then becomes a text inscribed in everyday surrounding for regulated interpretation and learning. It is to be noted that such text does not have a definite meaning; the gendering of the domestic space may either denigrate or respect women living inside. In the latter case, Chinese women enjoyed dignity and privacy, thank to the gendered house.
        The second part of Bray’s book suggests that the traditional division of labor – he in grain and she in cloth – not only maintained gender norms, but also served normative functions. That is why even noblewomen worked in the production of textiles. While the commercialization and specialization of textile production drove women away and lowered women’s social status, politicians and scholars tried hard to restore women’s function in textile production. Such attempt was aimed at not only promoting economics but also upholding the social order.
The third part of the book discusses conception, abortion, childbirth, and child-rearing. It highlights a divergence between elite and popular ideals of femininity. While women in the lower classes are likely to be judged by their natural fertility, those in the higher classes are entitled to appropriate any children fathered by their husband and are appreciated for educating the children.
Bray largely treats “gender” as a definitive than developmental category. She devotes most discussion to adult females and little to girls before marriage. Further attention paid to the latter would enable Bray to analyze not only “gender” as a state, but also “gendering” as a process. Another shortcoming is that Bray recovers the dignity and autonomy of women in the higher classes at the expense of those in the lower classes. Poor families cannot afford spacious house and women living inside did not really enjoy privacy. While women in poor households are more likely to be judged by their fertility, did they no enjoy the opportunity to develop any non-biological virtue? Bray makes no attempt to answer. Perhaps these shortcoming stems from Bray’s methodological emphasis on the text, which selectively records information based on class.