Prazniak's Essay: Ban Zhao Lessons For Women

In her essay, Prazniak considered Ban Zhao as a feminist. Zhao’s writing on Lessons for Women was a way to make a statement about the treatment and status of women during the time of ancient China. Ban Zhao was also “undermining the classic Confucian texts at the same time she pretended to invoke and apply them.” Prazniak argues in her essay that Ban Zhao emphasized how woman’s role as a wife is what defines her virtue and the importance of women’s subservient duty towards her husband. She also included in her essay that “Ban Zhao argued forthrightly for equal treatment of boys and girls in education.” Since females during that time were not allowed to be as scholarly as the males were, Ban Zhao tried to point out the importance of having an education for a woman. Prazniak explained how Ban Zhao’s attitude toward education for women in Lessons for Women became a groundbreaker for women’s involvement in scholarly activity throughout the Chinese society. Ban Zhao wrote Lessons for Women not only to educate her own daughters, but to the general female population during the time of ancient China. My interpretation from my own reading of Zhao’s writing is similar to that of Prazniak’s. As a scholarly woman herself, Zhao must know the importance

Zhao wrote that “If a wife does not serve her husband, then the proper relationship between men and women and the natural order of things are neglected and destroyed.”5 Here the natural role for women is to be subservient to her husband. According to Prazniak, “The worthiness of the husband and wife as individuals was evident…in the husband’s ability…to allow his wife to serve him.”6 Though I don’t fully agree that the husband’s worthiness is determined by the extent to which he allows his wife to serve him, it can be evident that the “worthiness” of the wives are defined by their ability to do their subservient role