Essay On Feudalism

By Yeo Chia Hui

In an ideal world, nothing is gendered － colours, toys, chores and more aren’t segregated or discriminative; and most importantly, words are gender neutral. Alas, this is not how it is.

“Many of us see language as something neutral. But language is political and often times patriarchal. In English, for instance, the word ‘testimony’ is derived from ‘testis’ (in Latin, related to ‘bear witness’ and ‘male’). You probably get the idea: only male (or men with testicles) can bear witness to an event,” said conceptual artist, Tan Zi Hao.

Therefore, when the opportunity arise to come up with a female-themed artwork, Zi Hao along with Karmen Hui Chia Yin and Tan Sueh Li, typographers and co-founders of TypoKaki, designed the Women's

“To be more historically accurate, the book is a critique against feudalism and patriarchy. In Malaysia and elsewhere, men still get to decide most of the things. Many institutional systems are themselves patriarchal. Malaysian politics too, is very feudalist (what we called ‘neo-feudalism’), and the fact that we see leaders as ‘protector’ is a clear example. In gender terms, men are always perceived as ‘protectors’ of women too – this is a very condescending view,” opined Zi Hao.

Furthermore, he said that “the book is intended to make people think about the form of Chinese character; to make people question the ideas behind the creation of a Chinese character. What moral values were embedded in the production of language and expression? Morality is historical too. Chinese feudalist thinking is historically specific. Hence, this book also allows us to historicise the Chinese characters and language.”

Challenging the status