Women In Society
 
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Japan

In Japan, women were completely under their husband's authority.  In fact, women were supposed to sacrifice their own happiness for the overall benefit of their family.  These sacrifices placed them in high regard by their sons.
In America, images of ideal women are on television, in the movies, and in magazines.  During the 1800's, Japan also had an idea how the perfect woman should look:
  • Women wore up to 12 kimono at one time.  A kimono is a traditional Japanese robe made of very fine fabrics, like silk.
  • Women would put white makeup on their face, giving them a complexion similar to that of a porcelain doll.
  • They would style their hair so it was long, straight, and often styled so that the back of the neck was exposed.
  • Their eyebrows would be plucked completely, and painted high on their forehead.


Ukiyo-e
Ukiyo-e is an art closely connected with the pleasures of the theatre, restaurants, tea houses, Geisha and courtesans.  It originated in the metropolitan culture of Edo (Tokyo) and included idol portraits of popular actors and beautiful tea house girls.  Click here for examples.
 

Geisha
In Japan, there was a class of women called Geisha.  The word Geisha means "walking art" or "walking artist."  Families that had daughters and needed money, or didn't have enough to support the entire family, would sell them into the Geisha profession.  The daughter would then be brought to a place known as an okiya; which was a boarding house for Geisha and apprentice Geisha.  The owner of the okiya would pay for the Geisha to go to school to learn the arts of being a Geisha. 

School For Geisha

At the school the girls learned etiquette, calligraphy, singing, dancing, walking in a particular manner as was only unique to a Geisha, and learned to play all sorts of musical instruments:
shamisen (which resembles a guitar)
tsutsumi (drum)
fue. (Japanese flute)

A Geisha's  talents included charm, conversation, pouring tea, and knowledge of various dances and dance forms.  A Geisha learned the social rules through an already distinguished Geisha.  A tea ceremony was conducted in order to bind the two women together as sisters.  All the money a Geisha earned went to the owner of the okiya to cover the price of acquiring her and what it took to train her.  Their glamorous lifestyle was admired by artists and ordinary townspeople.  They worked out of tea houses, which were run by retired Geishas, not by men.

Population

Before World War II, there were about 80,000 Geishas in Japan.  That number has dropped to about 10,000 today mostly due to Western influence.



"An exquisitely beautiful woman wearing a kimono" of "a water blue, with swirling lines in ivory to mimic the current in a stream.  Glistening silver trout tumbled in the current, and the surface of the water was ringed with gold wherever the soft green leaves of a tree touched it....  The gown was woven of pure silk, and so was the obi, embroidered in pale greens and yellows.  And her clothing wasn't the only extraordinary thing about her; her face was painted a kind of rich white, like the wall of a cloud when lit by the sun.  Her hair, fashioned in lobes, gleamed as darkly as lacquer, and was decorated with ornaments carved out of amber, and with a bar from which tiny silver strips dangled, shimmering as she moved."  Her feet were adorned with "lacquered zori" (or Japanese sandles).  
---Arthur Golden


To see photographs of women in traditional Japanese clothes and makeup, here.  If you would like to read more about the traditional roles of women in Japan, click here.