The Women of “Xiaoxiao” and “When I Was in Xia Village”, Term Paper Example

Introduction

The similarities between the women of “Xiaoxiao” and those of the story, “When I Was in Xia Village” are many, yet they also reveal how powerfully cultures can shape both gender roles and the lives of individual women.  The single, most common identification between the two scenarios is that of the inescapable force of village life.  It defines and dictates everything, and it is consequently embedded within the men and women living within it.  At the same time, there remains the power of individual choice, and the most interesting thing about the two stories is that the women at the center, completely constricted by village attitudes and customs, make choices all their own.  These are not easy choices and, as it turns out, both Zhenzhen of the Xia village and Xiaoxiao pay high prices for their independent actions.  Each defies the sexual conventions of her environment, although in strikingly different ways, as the women themselves are greatly different from one another.  Nonetheless, both serve to illustrate a harsh commonality.  In “Xiaoxiao” and “When I Was in Xia Village”, it is blatantly seen that women of these places and times are completely defined by their adherence to the sexual codes of their communities, which they themselves understand to be inviolable.

Comparison

Before the attitudes and behaviors of the central women of these stories can be examined, it is important to have a sense of the cultural expectations surrounding them.  Here, as noted, there are similarities, and they may be seen in how these villages are both so fiercely insular and fixed in their societal convictions.   The insularity is far more apparent in Xiaoxiao’s story, for the world she inhabits seems completely removed from any other society.  This appears to be a village where tradition has always dictated behavior, and to such an extent that even irrational customs are viewed as laws.  For instance, Xiaoxiao is compelled to marry an infant boy, and this is a form of arranged marrying that defies even primitive logic; her “husband” is still being nursed by his mother, even as she takes her place beside him as his wife.  The marriage is orchestrated so that, in due course, Xiaoxiao can have a child by the boy and carry on the family line, but this exact timing reveals a great deal about the culture.  More exactly, it appears that the custom of arranging the marriage has been so long in place that there is no need to even observe an ostensible accommodating of reality, such as waiting until puberty is reached.  All that matters is that Xiaoxiao is a healthy female who is likely to bear a child when her husband is old enough to father one.  This clearly emphasizes how locked within itself the culture is, in that ordinary human development is completely ignored, along with any objections on the part of the girl.

Zhenzhen, too, is a female victim of cultural demands, if of a more complex character.  She is victimized repeatedly, and in ways plainly denying a female’s choices in her own relations.  To begin with, her love for Xia Dabao is considered utterly unimportant by her people because the boy is from an impoverished family.  Her duty to her family demands she dismiss this love, and this is where the village of Xia greatly resembles that of Xiaoxiao’s; nothing is more critical than the female’s doing her part to ensure that family prestige and economic security are sustained.  In both stories, the inescapable reality is that how the girls may feel is never remotely considered.  These young women are essentially nothing more than implements to be exploited by the village culture, and their sexuality itself is nothing beyond the means by which “appropriate” children may be had.

As noted, however, Xiaoxiao and Zhenzhen are alike in a shared defiance of these customs, although this defiance takes different forms.  In the seemingly more tribal world of Xiaoxiao, it occurs when she sexually gives into Motley Mutt.   It seems that this form of seduction could not have been unknown in this world, since Motley courts Xiaoxiao with a song that details her circumstances as being married to a baby, and which therefore allow her to be a woman with another man.  What matters in the story, however, is that Xiaoxiao is not raped; she makes a choice that defies the village conventions.  The utter disregard of her as a person is exemplified in the scandal that ensues when it is learned she is pregnant.  This transgression on her part renders her worthy of death.  More dramatically, what saves her is not mercy from the village, but merely the way projected solutions play out.  The answer would be to marry her off to another husband but, as no one arrives to fill the role and as Xiaoxiao has a healthy baby boy, the situation simply reverts to what it was before the affair.  Xiaoxiao is spared because, ultimately, the commercial interests of the family and the village are not harmed.

Zhenzhen’s defiance, when her family forbids her to marry Xia Dabao, occurs in her determination to run away and become a nun.  Interestingly, this rebellion is the opposite of that made by Xiaoxiao;  Zhenzhen defies her village by seeking a chaste life, as Xiaoxiao gives into the sexuality offered by a grown man.  It is all the more ironic, then, that Zhenzhen’s disgrace is the greater.  Captured by the Japanese, it is assumed by all that she has engaged in sex with the enemy, and it is further implied that this has been voluntary.  She is diseased literally, but the stigma of her conduct is far stronger, and the reality of her having been victimized by the Japanese is not even considered.  It seems that, for the village of Xia, a woman’s purity, and consequently her value, remains her responsibility no matter the circumstances.  More exactly, it is unimportant how and why she came to be defiled; all that matters is that she is.  Then, the village believes she must have enjoyed the degradation, for this give the village women the opportunity to demean her.  She is a “hussy”, and one also to be punished for her earlier attempt at independence.  The village women, in fact, seem to view her capture by the Japanese as retribution for her having thought herself “above” them.

These village reactions then relate to how each woman responds to her culture’s restrictions and views, and in this they are both different and alike.  It is never felt that Xiaoxiao actually disputes the prevalent codes of her people, even as she occasionally resists them.  When her pregnancy advances, fear compels her to ask Motley to find a way out for the two of them, either through aborting the child or in escaping to the outside world.  Nonetheless, this is not a denial of that world, but only a reaction to its power.   She does not challenge the ideologies in place.  She seeks to find a way to remain accepted within them, and is driven to desperate plans only because she is fearful of her life.  This, then, is a girl completely in accord with her role as a subservient bearer of children, one to be paired off with any man, or even infant, seen as suitable.  Zhenzhen is not so accommodating.  She is, firstly, somewhat educated, and has been beyond the village confines. Then, she is intelligent enough to perceive that, in the world of Xia, she is forever doomed, and only making her way beyond the village can offer her a life.  However, this is also not exactly a refutation of the customs surrounding her; Zhenzhen does not actively fight against the unreasonable codes punishing her, but merely accepts them as facts of living in this place. She achieves serenity, but one of resignation; right or wrong, her people think little of her, so she sadly sees her only option as going out among strangers.  Consequently, and not unlike Xiaoxiao, she is forever a part of the village culture that reduces her to little more than a female to be exploited.

Conclusion

If any specific factor links the culture of Xiaoxiao’s village and that of Xia, it is a traditional holding to women as valuable only in terms of protected sexuality.  In Xiaoxiao’s case, this viewpoint renders the girl’s sexual being as an investment, one to be profited from when her husband grows into manhood.  For Zhenzhen, this is evident in that her sexuality is a prize, or commodity, that cannot be wasted on a poor boy.   As these village cultures so define the women, so too do they define themselves.  There are instances of rebellion, yet even these fall within the greater arena of the village as the world, and the women face severe repercussions when they seek to make choices of their own.  Xiaoxiao finds her place in her village world and seemingly adjusts to it fully, as Zhenzhen is left with no alternative but to escape.  In both cases, the critical element is that, ultimately, they are too weak as women to effectually change their circumstances.

In “Xiaoxiao” and “When I Was in Xia Village”, it is evident that women of these villages and times are completely defined by their adherence to the sexual codes of their communities, and that they are themselves think and behave as products of these codes.