East Asia History Essay

Q1a Meaning of sumo and baseball in Japan In Japan, Sumo and baseball are the central sports and depict the cultural belief of achievement, individual effort and character. Sumo is very significant â€Å"to the roots of Japan and is a form of national pride. Therefore sumo is a reflection of the historical Japan, and is today the most important sport acting as a national symbol. Somo was always encouraged young men and boys. However with the growing number of the youth, who have not seen the importance of the traditions of their forefathers have discarded this sport and replaced it with the contemporary sport of baseball. This means that baseball is taking centre stage as the most popular sort especially for the urban youth. Sumo in a way is a representative of the old generation being replaced by a modern sport of baseball. Q3. The position of women in neo-Confucian cultures â€Å"It has been justly remarked that a nation’s civilization may be estimated by the rank which females hold in society. If the civilization of China be judged of by this test, she is surely far from occupying that first place which she so strongly claims† (Chinese repository, 313). This is the remark about women in China, and is correct by all means. In many cultures across the world women and men posses’ distinct functions and responsibilities and in the Neo-Confucian cultures women held a very important position but a lesser one from that of men. Confucians viewed the family â€Å"as a microcosm of the state† which was ruled by a male emperor, therefore it meant that the man was the natural head of the home. The position of women was at home where she was to assume the responsibilities or ‘Dao’ (woman’s way) of a wife and mother. Her other roles included the upbringing of children which included their education. The woman was called to be obedient to her father first, secondly to her husband and to her grown son. Such views portrayed a woman as a tool for men, which would lead eventually to such cultural practices of â€Å"foot-binding† (meant to limit the mobility of females and serve as erotic pleasure for the men. ) Other practices included the â€Å"cult of chastity† where windows were elevated to the role of â€Å"cultural heroes† also such practices led to such harsh traditions of selling unwanted daughters. http://chnm. gmu. edu/wwh/modules/lesson10/lesson10. php? s=0 Confucianism eventually was labeled as the â€Å"chief causes for Chinas failure to modernize† by the â€Å"May fourth â€Å"generation that comprised of communists and intellectuals. Buddhism in china and Japan changed the influence that Confucianism had on the belief of women’s position in the society. By late 19th century, the liberation for the women became a major driving force within the reform and revolution movements. Male crusaders advocated for greater role for the women in the transformation of their nation. Educated women from Japan and China rallied behind them and started speaking and writing publicly for the first time. This attracted opposition and protests from the conservatives and traditionalists who wanted the status quo of gender roles to remain. They viewed the female activists as â€Å"unseemly, unfeminine and too western†. (http://chnm. gmu. edu/wwh/modules/lesson10/lesson10. php? s=0) The journey to liberation for the women is not over yet; but bolder steps have been made towards this end. And in the contemporary East Asia, women have been honored alongside men for their militant participation against in the Taiping Rebellion, where Hakka women fought against Mancho government as soldiers. Q4.  The state of Chinese economy at the time of the Chairman Mao’s death in 1976 to date In May 16th 1966 Chairman Mao Zedong lunched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution that resulted to widespread power struggles that almost brought China to the brink of Civil War. Because of this strain China’s Economy stagnated which also affected the social and political aspect of the republic. ( http://en. wikipedia. org) After the fall of ‘the Gang of Four’ Hua Guofeng and later in 1977 Deng Xiaoping led China in affirming the modernization Programme that had been started by Zhou Enlai in 1975. Deng Xiaoping further initiated new Policies towards achieving the Four Modernizations. The Policies played a very important role in revitalizing the economy of China. The policies played a very important role of strengthening the authority that managers and economic decision makers had as opposed to political or party officials. ( http://en. wikipedia. org) Through these policies workers were offered material incentives, research and education systems were highly strengthened and strategize for an increase in foreign trade. In the period between 1976 and 1978 the economy started peaking from the Cultural Revolution. China’s economy was wholly dependent on agriculture, which had been adversely affected by three years of poor weather in 1977 that saw the drop of agricultural output. However the harvest hit a record high of 14% in 1977 and 13% in 1978. ( http://en. wikipedia. org) Today China’s economy is rated among the highest in the world becoming the world’s second largest and rated as the fastest growing economy in modern history with ac consistent GDP of over 10 %. ( http://en. wikipedia. org)