Typewriters and typists in Republican China, 1910s–1940s: everyday technology and race, class and gender

Abstract

ABSTRACT The typewriter came into general use in China in the early twentieth century, a symbol of modernization and globalization, accessible to all walks of life. But how did it affect people’s livelihood and their social relationships? How was this small machine appropriated locally within the domestic dynamics of relations and cultural ecology? How did machine and people transform and shape each other’s path of change? This study of the typewriter and typists in the Republican era explores the mechanism of the machine’s widespread use, and both positive and negative aspects of such experiences, in particular social relationships of class and gender. The profession of typing may be a “mixed gender space,” as suggested by Thomas S. Mullaney; however, based on the typists’ individual narratives that appeared in newspapers such as Shen Bao, magazines from the 1920s–1940s, and personal memoirs, I argue that male students who took typing classes might move on to more lucrative careers while female counterparts stayed in their jobs as typists and were paid less than men. In addition, female typists like other female professionals had to confront the negative image shaped by mass media of women as a “flower vase,” and face threats of sexual assaults by their male superiors. Under such circumstances, they embraced self-discipline and self-learning to keep their jobs so that they would find their own feet in society. Such strategies could be considered a moderate route to demand changes without overthrowing the orthodox patriarchy.