Evolution Of Wedding And Childcare Clothing In The Modern Wu Area:the Impact Of Marriage And Childbirth Beliefs

With the evolution of society and the childbearing policy,the fertility value and social value of women are increasingly prominent in social development.As an important participant in marriage and childbirth culture,their views on marriage and childbirth,aesthetic consciousness and care for women cannot be ignored.As the social lifestyle drastically changes,wedding and childbirth customs,as well as cultures,change in culture transmission and interpretation.As a result,the Chinese are increasingly oblivious to their own customs and culture.Therefore,a study of traditional customs and culture is necessary to rebuild the cultural confidence of Chinese.As an integral part of Chinese culture,especially Han culture,a case study of Wu dialect Area(hereinafter referred to as Wu area)can be regarded as a regional and endemic cultural study.A regional study of this sort is supplementary to the study of the panorama of Chinese history given the convergence of cultural understanding and underdeveloped related regional studies.At present,discussion on how the modern women view marriage and childbirth as well as wedding and childcare garments tend to focus on one single subject.Furthermore,in the context of textile science and engineering,there are few studies concentrating on combining female view on marriage and childbirth,and,garments of wedding and childcare.In the background of textile science and engineering,this study is written from the view of marriage and childbirth conception by modern women.Using Wu area as the regional background,this article conducted an interdisciplinary study across textile science,sociology,anthropology,historiography,women's studies,art and design science.In the empirical and applied research,the study centres around the evolution of female view on marriage and childbirth and garments of wedding and childcare.Subsequently,this article constructed the unique Wu area wedding and childcare clothing system and interpreted the evolution of wedding and childcare clothes through a female view on marriage and childbirth.Besides,the features of local costume change,local anesthetics,and social consciousness,as well as the relationship between people's conception and the clothes they wear were discussed.It provided references and supplement to the regional traditional culture development and revitalisation.The main contents include:1.Study of view on marriage and childbirth by modern women in the Wu area.Using research methods from anthropology,women's studies,historiography,and sociology,the study combines statistical survey and historical data and compares ethnographies and local chronicles.Based on the change of view,the history of women's view on marriage and childbirth in the Wu area was divided into two phases: the tradition phase and the transition phase.From the social gender perspective,the study of view on marriage and childbirth by women is part of the modern historical study.By analysing its typical regional characteristics,the following conclusions could be drawn: In the tradition phase,the female view on marriage and childbirth is mainly manifested by compromising the free will of marriage and pursuit of marital autonomy,late marriage,and late childbirth,literacy admiration,safeguarding,and resistance towards the chastity concept,emphasis on social institution and identity,and they achieve social identity mostly through self-devotion;in the transitional phase,the view is mainly manifested by neutral attitude towards marital autonomy,marriage and childbearing of the right age and sound childbirth,overturn of chastity concept and conservative attitude in practice,and attaching importance to selfhood and consciousness.The view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in the Wu area is characterised by diversified development-the transition from monotony to diversity,institutional features to consciousness,and the coexistence of guidance and contradictoriness.2.Study of modern wedding and childcare clothing system in Wu area.Research methods of design science,art,and textile science were used along with a comparison of physical material and historical data.In light of the essential elements and the principle of formal beauty in clothing,this article thoroughly analysed the modern wedding and childcare clothes in Wu area with regard to style,accessories,feature,texture,decoration,pattern and cultural connotation from three angles: style,texture,and decoration.It has built a relatively complete Wu area wedding and childcare clothing system and pointed out that: in Wu area,wedding event and childcare clothes come in a variety of forms,styles,types,themes,combinations,and implications,and extinguish itself from the others with its local aesthetic and artistic features: exquisite,delicate,elegant and simple.Throughout its development,the traditional handcrafted fabric coexists with the modern machine-made fabric and transit to machine-made fabric gradually.At the same time,its evolution shows the changess of going westernised and inclines to be more fashion and commercial.The changes in clothing over time not only reflects feminist consciousness,praying for blessing and son,and social-cultural implications of worshipping culture and education,but also shows a weakening and reconstructing clothing hierarchy and system,which corresponds with the new perspectives and new concepts to pursue science.In light of the overall features of wedding outfits and childcare garments,Manchu and Han costume cultures,as well as Chinese and Western costume culture are integrated.There is a changes for increasing convergence and fusion between nationalities,between native culture and foreign culture,and modification and westernisation of clothing.3.Study of the evolution of modern wedding and childcare clothes in the Wu area.Research methods of textile science and design science were used in combination with a content analysis framework in sociological qualitative analysis and grounded theory coding.This article further clarified the difference and state of development of the evolution of marital and childcare clothes in the modern Wu area based on the garment elements and affiliation.With empirical study and literature reference,qualitative software Nvivo was used to conduct a qualitative analysis of visual materials like wedding and childcare photos in modern journals.Then,in the time span of the collected data with major historical events as time nodes,this article further discussed the law of evolution in this area through the analysis in five aspects: style,accessories,form,decoration and audience and determined the nature of the evolution in details.It was summarised that from 1859 to 1949,wedding and childcare clothes in the Wu area changed from simplified Chinese-style—diverse and a mixture of Chinese and Western styles—simplified western-style.From 1859 to 1910,monotony;from 1911 to 1926,mixture;from 1927 to 1936,diversity;from 1937 to 1949,simplified western-style.The overall revolution shows a changes of growing westernisation.Female wedding clothes are mostly of the modified style and childcare clothing mostly in western-style.Different forms are presented in the evolution of wedding and childcare: drastic change,gradual change,slight change,and no change.4.The mapping relationship between the view on marriage and childbirth and wedding and childcare clothes of modern women in the Wu area.Research methods of historiography and women's studies were used to study the forms of the evolution of and the relationship between the view on marriage and childbirth and wedding and childcare clothes of modern women in the area from the perspective of regional history and social history.In the process of dynamic evolution,the mapping relationship between the two was discussed.Conclusions were drawn that there is mapping relationship between guidance of view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in Wu area and fashionableness of wedding and childcare clothes,between diversity of view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in the area and mix of wedding and childcare clothes,and between consciousness of view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in the area and freedom of wedding and childcare clothes.At the same time,diversified Sino-Western concepts and features of view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in Wu area were verified again by its absorption of foreign culture,adherence to native culture and the wave of westernised clothing.It also pointed out the plural fusion and mapping relationship between the view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in Wu area and wedding and childcare clothes,concept and clothing.In summary,this article conducted a study centring on the mapping relationship between the view on marriage and childbirth of modern women in Wu area and wedding and childcare clothes from the above-mentioned aspects and analysed typical characteristics and forms of the evolution of the view.Besides,it constructed the wedding and childcare clothing system and evolution forms under its influence.Eventually,it drew the whole picture of the dynamic evolution of view on marriage and childbirth and wedding and childcare clothes of modern women in the Wu area and discussed their mapping relationship.