Nanxiu Qian, professor at Rice University, discusses her new book
Politics, Poetics, and Gender in Late Qing China: Xue Shaohui and the Era of Reform (Stanford University Press, 2015). Qian argues that the role women played in the late Qing reform movements has heretofore been overlooked by historiography. Leading reformer Xue Shaohui was a critical poet, prose writer, educator, translator, and journalist. Xue married the literary traditions and scientific and technological advances of China and of the West. Her culturalist vision of women also married the writing-women tradition with her forward beliefs in gender equality. No subservient wife, Xue Shaohui played a central role in the reform networks of women and men and in the vibrant culture of debate that planted the seeds for women's education and women's visible role in public life in China.