Lessons for a Woman: selected translation

A historical argument about education and conduct for women in Han China. Read its demands for learning alongside its acceptance of hierarchy.

Nancy Lee Swann translation, 1932, reprinted in The Human Record, second edition, 1994 · Translated by Nancy Lee Swann

View the work and reading plans

How to study this source

• Can a text widen education while reinforcing a hierarchy?

  coreIntroduction or preface and opening chapter. Record the edition and translator before reading.

  Historical writing and a contested text on women’s education and conduct in Han China. Read educational possibilities alongside the hierarchy the text assumes.

Ideas and questions

Read background definitions when a term blocks the argument. Then return to the source and reconstruct its claim in your own words.

Read alongside, read against