the named and the nameless: gender and person in Chinese society

Abstract

Personal naming provides an insight into the construction of gender and person in Chinese society. The process of naming marks important social transitions for Chinese men; the more names a man has the more socialized and also, in a sense, the more individuated he becomes. By contrast, married women in rural China are essentially nameless. If personhood is a process of social growth, judged against the standard of men, the evidence presented here suggests that Chinese women do not, indeed cannot, attain full personhood.