Footbinding Unwrapped

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!Why did China practice foot binding, how did it start, and how did it finally end? This curriculum review unwraps the history of Chinese footbinding: the golden lotus, the tiny lotus shoes, the families who saw it as the only way up, and the women who fought back.CONTENT WARNING: this episode discusses footbinding, including pain, injury and disability, and shows historical photographs and X-rays of bound feet. Watch (or just listen) at your own pace.I spent this research cycle buried in X-rays, first-person accounts and Feng Jicai's novel The Three-Inch Golden Lotus. We cover where footbinding came from (it started with grown women dancers, not little girls), how it became a ladder for poor families to marry up, why a grandmother in The Three-Inch Golden Lotus broke my heart, the foot festivals that made the lotus shoes an obsession, the British missionaries of the Heavenly Foot Society, the Chinese reformers who wanted to educate their own women, and Qiu Jin, the feminist revolutionary who unbound her own feet and picked up a sword.