File:Foot Bound Girls, Liao Chow, Shansi, China (c1930) IE Oberholtzer (Probable) (RESTORED) (4079285574).jpg

Entitled: Foot Bound Girls, Liao Chow, Shansi, China [c1920-1930s] likely by IE Oberholtzer [RESTORED]. I took out spots, repaired obvious image defects, increased the contrast and fixed the edges.

Another picture worthy of social note was found from a private web gallery. I discovered this wonderful photograph amongst a series of pictures posted to Picassa Web Albums (Google's free picture gallery) by someone named Joe. He has a collection of images that (from what information I could gather on his gallery), seems to have been taken by one I.E. Oberholtzer in or around the Liao Chow area of Shansi, (modern day Liaozhou, Shanxi Province), China, during the 1920-1930s. His collection captured a wide range of events. There is a detailed series on road construction, a small series on the effects of war, and finally, a section devoted to missionary work, and the social milieu of the Shanxi area. I do not know if Oberholtzer himself was a missionary or not.

Other pictures from this series and Joe's magnificent galleries can be seen here:

picasaweb.google.com/LlamaLane

Beauty is often held to be in the eye of the beholder. One of the most famous, yet puzzling, but distinctly Chinese ideas thereof resided in the form of Bound Feet 纏足. This was done by the forcible breaking, folding and binding of young girls feet, so that the resultant footprint was only about half or a third of the size that it would naturally be. This painful, crippling, and sometimes fatal deformity process was performed on Chinese girls as early as three years old. It was considered something that made them more desirable by Chinese men when they reached eventual adulthood. Also known as a Lotus Foot, the practice was almost an exclusive habit of the affluent or wealthy (since the Tang) until the mid to late 1800's, whereupon the very poor too, eventually took up this practice. It was then thought to increase a family's prospects for eventual receipt of a better dowry when a daughter married. Many poor women however, could typically only be married into other poor families, thereby harshly limiting the size of any such dowry. Thus most poor women had their feet crippled for nothing. The practice was eventually outlawed in the early 1900's but remained a cultural imperative clandestinely performed until the middle of the century. At that time, communist Chinese authorities ultimately threatened death sentences to anyone who didn't stop. It was arguably one of the best pro human rights action that the Chinese communists ever did in China.

As the above photo shows, by the early 20th century, this slavish "fashion" phenomenon wasn't restricted to the very rich. Three young teenage girls, with poor and threadbare peasant clothing, nonetheless have tiny bound feet.

For those that have an interest in this horrifying yet historic practice, do take a look at Flickr member Okinawa Soba's extensive collection of images. His gallery not only has great pics of this cultural phenomenon, it is also peppered with lively discussion about it:

www.flickr.com/photos/24443965@N08/3462167744/in/set-7215...