Collection on Republican Era Women's Press(1912-1949)

East Asian Resources acquired, in the summer of 2001, a collection of late Qing and Republican Era Women's Press titles on microform. The collection contains 70 titles published from the first decade of the twentieth century into the forties.

"This acquisition is an important addition to our Chinese language materials at UNC and the early women's press is an important historical source for the study of modern China or women in East Asia."

"The press was borne of patriotism and reform in the late Qing. While individual publications often had short runs and faced tremendous challenges in finance, distribution and censorship, they were all dedicated to addressing issues including the education of girls, the abolition of footbinding, and equality for men and women. In the early twentieth-century, the women's press, along with media in general, flourished. Republican Era titles, including the long-running Fu n¨u za zhi (Ladies Journal) (1915-1931), actively linked women's issues with concerns of national salvation as well as more concrete social and political topics of the day. Like the women's press in Japan and the West around the same time, these print journals were not solely edited or consumed by women; they had a mixed-gender readership and editorship."

--Dr. Eugenia Y. Lean