The Smallest Step: Footbinding's Role in Shaping the Chinese Female Identity

Footbinding – a notorious cultural practice – represents how image, pain, and power intersected to leave an indelible mark on both Chinese culture and the human body. For centuries, this brutal tradition reshaped the lives of millions of women, distorting their bodies in the name of beauty and status. But what was the true cost of this centuries-old ideal? Behind the delicate ‘lotus feet’ and the allure of small, graceful steps lay a world of suffering, societal control, and relentless pressure. It’s a story that goes beyond aesthetics; it’s a tale of power, tradition, and the lengths people would go to shape not just a woman’s appearance… but her very place in society.

The customary beauty ideal originated in the fifty years between the Tang Dynasty and the Song Dynasty (907-959 AD). In the royal court of Emperor Li Yu of the Southern Tang, we discover the earliest documented instances of the symbolic significance of footbinding in Chinese culture. Yao-Niang, a dancer at the emperor's court, bound her feet with strips of white silk to create an aesthetic of small, arched feet (“like the crescent moon”, according to Susan Greenhalgh). To Emperor Li Yu, she was considered extraordinarily beautiful and delicate. To women, bound feet were the new feminine ideal.

An aesthetic fascination with small feet grew into a broader societal practice, gradually spreading from the imperial courts to other social classes. The urban upper class first supported footbinding as a way of demonstrating their lavish lifestyles. Mirroring the royal court reinforced their high position in Chinese society, and with an expanding market economy, supporting women as they were crippled to the extent that they could no longer work became the new norm. For the elite, bound feet were a visible indicator of wealth and privilege, as they required time and resources to maintain. But soon, the lower classes followed. Since women were expected to partake in daily labour out of economic necessity, only daughters hoping to marry into richer families bound their feet. The distortion of women’s feet became central to how they were perceived; unbound feet were suddenly viewed as a sign of lower social status, particularly among peasants and labourers.

Footbinding was also intertwined with prevailing Confucian ideals. Confucius' view on the inferior status of women, encapsulated in his assertion that women are "indeed human beings, but of a lower state than men," directly aligns with the cultural practice of footbinding in imperial China. Women were expected to embody traits such as obedience and subservience. Patriarchal ideologies, emphasising male superiority, utilised footbinding as a tangible expression of these qualities, as they rendered women physically limited and dependent. The philosophical outlook on women and the practice of footbinding reflect a deep-seated cultural ideology that positioned women as inferior and in need of control, shaping the social and physical limitations imposed on them for centuries.

However, the reality of footbinding was far from romanticised. While small feet were considered beautiful, they also brought lifelong suffering for women. The process of binding could cause infections, difficulty walking, and even permanent disability. Women with bound feet often faced difficulty in performing everyday tasks, as their mobility was severely limited. Despite the pain, it became an accepted part of life – something that girls were told would make them more valuable in the marriage market.

The cultural longevity of this tradition shows that it was not simply an isolated cultural practice; it was deeply ingrained in Chinese culture for centuries. The custom survived multiple dynasties, despite opposition from intellectuals, reformers, and even religious missionaries. Even after the Qing Dynasty (1644–1912) officially outlawed footbinding in the early twentieth century, it continued in some rural areas for several decades. Dr Haslep, who worked with the China Medicine Missionary Journal, characterised the “perfect work” as simply the deformity of a foot to foreign populations. Practising footbinding was viewed as an absurdity by those uninvolved in the deeply ingrained cultural notion, seeing it merely as societal control of women.

By the mid-twentieth century, modernisation efforts and the rise of women's rights movements led to footbinding falling out of favour. The practice came to be viewed as a relic of a backward society, increasingly incompatible with evolving cultural norms. As traditional values began to shift, these changes aimed to promote greater gender equality, challenging practices that reinforced women's subordination.

In a tragic twist, the scars of footbinding remain even today, as the images of women with bound feet remain etched in historical memory. Photographic evidence comparing the mutilation of female feet to the natural state serves as poignant documentation of the profound physical toll inflicted by footbinding, offering a visual testament to the painful sacrifice of mobility and health for the sake of an idealised beauty. The juxtaposition underscores the physical reality of this cultural practice but also highlights the broader social and gendered forces that dictated the value of a woman’s worth in terms of beauty and submission.

While footbinding officially ended over a century ago, its legacy lingers in the collective memory of China. The practice's painful history reminds us of the resilience of women throughout history, with the relentless pressure of societal standards restricting their freedom and autonomy. Footbinding is a symbol not just of suffering but of the strength it took to challenge the norms of an entire culture.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

‘The Chinese Foot Binding Practice’, Scientific Journal, 71.10 (1894), p. 152.

Underwood & Underwood, Bound feet of a Chinese Lady Compared with the Unbound Feet of a Working Chinese Woman, photograph by Underwood & Underwood, [between 1900 and 1999?]. 1 photograph: photoprint, albumen, stereograph, images each 8 x 7.8 cm, Wellcome Collection.

Secondary Sources

Blake, C. Fred, ‘Foot Binding in Neo-Confucian China and the Appropriation of Female Labour’, Signs, 19.3 (1994), pp. 676-712.

Gao, Xiongya, ‘Women Existing for Men: Confucianism and Social Injustice against Women in China’, Race, Gender & Class, 10.3 (2003), pp. 114-125.

Greenhalgh, Susan, ‘Bound Feet, Hobbled Lives’, Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies, 2.1 (1977), pp. 7-21.