FEMALE OPPRESSION IN SHIRLEY LIMS AH MAH

In this essay I am going to focus on the theme of female oppression in Chinese culture in
terms of its cultural practice of foot binding. The character Ah Mah is seen as having a
hard life in her society where the practice of foot binding is condoned. Ah Mahs misery
is suggested by the phrases every bone in her feet/ had been broken, bound tighter/ than
any neighbors sweet daughters. I believe the writer, Shirley Lim, is trying to show the
terrible life that the character grandma of Ah Mah had gone through. It is mentioned in
the phrase she tottered in black silk in stanza 3 and Ten toes and instep curled
inwards in stanza 6. Grandma has to totter when she is walking because her feet become
smaller than normal feet. Her feet bones are broke and become deform.
Foot binding is a culture in Chinese where a young Chinese girl foot is wrapped
tightly by her mother. It is started during Song Dynasty (Ebrey, P.B, 341-343). The foot
will be small because the bones are broke and curling the toes under the ball of the foot.
Lily Feet were considered attractive and a sign of status (Lieberthal, K., 14). It is a
common practice only in the wealthiest parts of China (Chinese foot binding).
The phrase curled inwards, yellow petals/ of chrysanthemum, wrapped
suggested in Chinese culture, gold is associated with rich people from upper and middle
class. Grandma perhaps is from a rich town of trading silk (Suzhou). It is mentioned in
phrase she tottered in black silk. Her feet are bound together by a silk cloth which only
can be done if she is from a rich family.
The speaker of the poem probably is a young child who is observing her grandma
and describing about her physical appearance. She describes her grandma as smaller

than me at eight. Had she/ been child forever. It is suggested that perhaps, her grandma
is smaller than her, and she is wondering about it. She also describes that her grandma
has a small face. This is suggested in phrase as a knuckle, fan face.
The poem is set in a Chinese culture. It takes place in China. Foot binding is
originally for palace dancers. Later, in the Song Dynasty, the practice spread beyond the
palace. It is considered as beautiful and admired (Levathes, L., 38. The phrase
grandfather brought her/ Soochow flower song girl suggested that grandma is from
Soochow. Soochow is located seventy miles west of Shanghai (Kruger, R., 343). It is a
fascinating city. The famous Great Pagoda becomes an attraction for this city. It is also
known as Kingdom of Wu (Chiang Kai,76-77).
Soochow or Suzhou is famous with silk. Silk looms or silk machine for weaving
cloth, counted by the tens of thousands were reported in Suzhou and Nanjing (Ray
Huang, 224). In phrase of fat anywhere, she tottered/ in black silk, leaning on
suggested that the bandage which bound grandmas feet is made from silk. Since
grandma is from Soochow, she is using a silk for wrapping her feet.
The speakers tone is sympathy. It suggests that grandma had gone through a hard
life. The phrase of fat everywhere, she tottered/ in black silk, leaning on/ handmaids, on
two tortured suggests that, grandma cannot walk properly like others. She has to rely on
the servants to help her in daily life. Moreover, the phrase Ten toes and instep/ curled
inwards is suggest grandma is suffering because she cannot walk like normal people do.
Instead, all her feets bone break and badly shaped which makes her in pain.
The writer creates the oppressing life which grandma had gone through by using
literary devices. Literary devices such as simile, imagery and comparison are used in Ah

Mah. A simile is use in the phrase as a knuckle, fan face which means the physical
look of grandma by mentioning how small she is with a small face.
The writer is also using an imagery in phrase In his calloused flesh, her/
weightless soles, cool and slack/ clenched in strangers fever. It creates an image of how
grandma feels when grandpa warm hands while embracing the grandmas feet. The word
soles is refers to the feet. The grandmas feet is out of shape and deform badly.
Moreover, a visual image of the oppressing and suffering life which grandma had
gone through is portrayed in this poem. This is suggested in the phrase Helpless,
hopeless which indicates how grandma feels. There is nothing much she can do to make
things going better. The only thing she can do is to except the fate.
In the phrase than any neighbors sweet daughters, the writer probably means
that no one else has a feet bound as tighter as grandma. By using than, the writer is
comparing the character, grandmas feet with the neighbors feet. Even though both of
them have a bound feet, but grandma has tighter bound feet.
Based on my close analysis of a poem Ah Mah by Shirley Geok-lin Lim, I can
conclude that the persona of this poem, which is grandma, is living under an oppressive
culture. A culture where women are treated like an object of exchange, so man can
admire woman is very oppressive. Moreover, foot binding process makes women lives
become suffer. It highlight an oppressive culture that woman has to go through.

REFERENCES

Ah Mah by Shirley Geok-lin Lim

Chinese foot binding http://www.angelfire.com
Ebrey, P.B. Chinese Civilization A Sourcebook, 2nd edition, Revised and Expanded. The
Free Press A Division of Macmillan, Inc., 1993.
Eastman, E. Lloyd. Chiang Kai-sheks Secret Past. Westview Press. 1993.
Kruger, R. All Under Heaven A Complete History of China. John Wiley & Sons Ltd.,
2004.

Lieberthal, K. Governing China : From Revolution Through Reform. New York : W.W
Norton & Company, Inc., 1995.

Levathens, L. When China Ruled the Seas. New York : Simon and Schuster, 1994.

Ray Huang. China : A Macro History. New York : M.E Sharpe, Inc., 1997.

Suzhow http://www.wikipedia.com

Shirley Geok-Lin Lim (b. 1944). Born in Malacca,

Malaysia, Lim first attended the University of Malaysia and
later came to study in the United States in the 1960s; she
earned a Ph.D. from Brandeis University in 1971. Of her four
published books of poetry, Crossing the Peninsula won the
Commonwealth Poetry Prize in 1980, a first both for an
Asian and for a woman.
Of Chinese origins in a non-Chinese cultural landscape, Lim writes best about the
culturally colonized and marginalized individual. Her poetry is dominated by sharp
delineations of fragmented identities, and sustained by a strong, penetrating style and an
ironic, unsentimental delivery. She has furthered this theme significantly by addressing
the question of her female identity within the context of her received patriarchal culture.
Lim's work has appeared in various anthologies, including A Private Landscape, ed.
David Ormerod (Kuala Lumpur, 1967 ); The Second Tonque, ed. Edwin Thumboo (Kuala
Lumpur, 1976 ); and Under Another Sky, ed. Alistair Niven (London, 1987 ).
Her published works include two short-story collections and several editions of critical
studies and anthologies focusing on gender and Asian American issues, including The
Forbidden Stitch: An Asian American Women's Anthology (1989), which won an
American Book Award. She is a professor of English at the University of California at
Santa Barbara.

(Source: Shirley Geok-lin Lim Poetry. Bedford-St Martins LitLink. 2001.

Http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/LITLINKS/poetry/lim.htm)
Read more: Shirley Geok-lin Lim Biography - ( 1944 ), Crossing the Peninsula and
Other Poems, Another Country and Other Stories
http://www.jrank.org/literature/pages/9597/Shirley-Geok-lin-Lim.html#ixzz1EMeFAgos

Female Oppression

Shirley Lims poem Ah Mah unfolds a story about Chinese women of yesteryears who
had to be subservient to ancient culture and tradition which victimized women. Ah Mah
or grandma has to endure the agony of having her feet bound which stunted the growth of
the feet bones causing deformed feet. It is also by tradition that Ah Mah has to marry the
man who bought her (as his concubine), thus freeing her as a Suchow flower song girl.
Now she has to serve grandfather who is her new master. Read this poem below and
answer the question given.

Ah Mah

Grandmother was smaller

than me at eight. Had she
been child forever?

Helpless, hopeless, chin sharp

as a knuckle, fan face
hardly half-opened, not a scrap

of fat anywhere, she tottered

in black silk, leaning on
handmaids, on two tortured

fins. At sixty, his sons all

married, grandfather bought her,
Soochow flower song girl.

Every bone in her feet

had been broken, bound tighter
than any neighbors sweet

daughters. Ten toes and instep

curled inwards, yellow petals
of chrysanthemum, wrapped

in gold cloth. He bought the young

face, small knobby breasts
he swore hed not dress in sarong

of maternity. Each night

he held her feet in his palms,
like lotus in the tight
hollows of celestial lakes.
In his calloused flesh, her
weightless soles, cool and slack,

clenched in his strangers fever.

Shirley Geok-lin Lims Ah Ma:

1. The poet provides a physical description of her grandmother as well as clues to
her personality and emotional life. How are all these elements similar?
2. What is the grandmothers relationship to the world she lives in and to her
husband in particular?
3. Discuss the tradition of foot-binding in the Chinese tradition. How is this
tradition seen as oppressive for women?
4. Does this poem have a feminist overture? If so/not, why and how?