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This article examines curtained theater viewing as a spatial practice through which Qing society regulated female spectatorship. Under Confucian gender norms, women’s participation in theatrical culture was neither simply forbidden nor freely permitted. Instead, it was negotiated through women’s pavilions, side balconies, raised boxes, domestic screens, and curtains. Focusing on court theaters and domestic stages, the article argues that curtains functioned as flexible boundaries: they enabled women to watch while keeping their bodies concealed and morally regulated. This arrangement produced a condition of visible invisibility, in which women entered cultural life through concealment. The article also analyzes the late Qing phenomenon of curtain removal, showing that this change was shaped by commercial interests, new ideas of female public visibility, and continued moral surveillance. Curtain removal expanded women’s access to theaters but did not end gendered discipline. Overall, the article shows how theatrical space materialized gender norms and structured women’s spectatorship through concealment, compromise, and limited agency.
Qing China; curtained theater viewing; theatrical space
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Curtained Theater Viewing and the Spatial Regulation of Female Spectators in Qing China
How to cite this paper: Yudie Liu. (2026) Curtained Theater Viewing and the Spatial Regulation of Female Spectators in Qing China. Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Science, 10(6), 700-705.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/jhass.2026.06.013