While 'samurai' is a strictly masculine term, the Japanese bushi class (the social class samurai came from) did feature women who received similar training in martial arts and strategy. These women were called “Onna-Bugeisha,” and they were known to participate in combat along with their male counterparts. Their weapon of choice was usually the naginata, a spear with a curved, sword-like blade that was versatile, yet relatively light.
Since historical texts offer relatively few accounts of these female warriors (the traditional role of a Japanese noblewoman was more of a homemaker), we used to assume they were just a tiny minority. However, recent research indicates that Japanese women participated in battles quite a lot more often than history books admit. When remains from the site of the Battle of Senbon Matsubaru in 1580 were DNA-tested, 35 out of 105 bodies were female. Research on other sites has yielded similar results."
@didgebaba part of me finds it really cool but then another part of me remembers that samurai used to just randomly kill passer-bys for perceived slights, regularly got drunk and killed lots of people, raided and extorted villages and were just generally noble pieces of shit and their women counterparts were likely not that different 💀
@hazelnot@didgebaba The right of women to commit as much dumbshit assholery as men can, and get away with it as easily as some men can, is a very important one.
@Benfell@hazelnot@didgebaba@gorfram We are nowhere near equality yet. Maybe if more men tried to be as low-key, community-minded, responsible about reproductive labour, and nonviolent as women, we might achieve it sooner and in less destructive ways.
For example, a member of the dominant class might consider keeping his opinion of how the subordinated class works towards equality to himself.
@CommonMugwort@Benfell@hazelnot@gorfram I didn't write this. I'm not sure women are a "subordinate class" rather I would say they are exploited, abused, ignored, oppressed, objectified and harassed. But at the same time, and this is key to the understanding of female samurai, they are relied upon. Women keep the human species in existence, beyond that the work of women is essential to all human societies.
If we're getting fussy about terminology, you might say 'subaltern,' which reflects a group's oppression. More radically, critical theorists sometimes say that all of us who are not among the political, economic, military, or religious elite are 'colonized.'
@Benfell@CommonMugwort@hazelnot@gorfram I'm more with Franz Fanon when it comes to the processes of colonisation. The result in the colonised is a sort of internalalised fascist, to paraphrase Deleuze and Guattari. Fanon identifies colonialism as a machine of “naked violence,” which “only gives in when confronted with greater violence”. In Fanon’s view, the Western bourgeoisie was “fundamentally racist” and its “bourgeois ideology” of equality and dignity was merely a cover for capitalist-imperialist rapacity. Access to the qualifiers of bourgeois identity (like money) are premised on this racism. In fact identity formation is critical in Fanon's analysis; colonialism is a total project, so the colonized find themselves adrift in abjection. But violence changes all of that. Violence is simultaneously a saying of no to colonialism and a saying of yes to the possibilities of post-colonial life.
Gotta tell you, I have very mixed feelings about the use of the word 'colonization' here (yes, even though I mentioned it). And Franz Fanon is simply an excellent person to listen to here.
On the one hand, I can understand the rationale. This certainly is colonization of a sort. I doubt historically colonization has always been brutally violent. @histodons, can you help? But Fanon I think wants to save the word for a the brutality that certainly characterizes many--and this should not be taken lightly.
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