The overwhelming majority of tea practitioners in contemporary Japan are women, but there has been little discussion on their historical role in tea culture (<
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chanoyu<
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). In <
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Cultivating Femininity,<
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Rebecca Corbett writes women back into this history and shows how tea practice for women was understood, articulated, and promoted in the Edo (1603-1868) and Meiji (1868-1912) periods. Viewing <
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chanoyu<
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from the lens of feminist and gender theory, she sheds new light on tea's undeniable influence on the formation of modern understandings of femininity in Japan. <
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Cultivating Femininity <
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offers a new perspective on the prevalence of tea practice among women in modern Japan. It presents a fresh, much-needed approach, one that will be appreciated by students and scholars of Japanese history, gender, and culture, as well as by tea practitioners.