mui tsai

Mui tsai (Chinese: 妹仔; Cantonese Yale: mūi jái), which means "little sister" in Cantonese, describes young Chinese women who worked as domestic servants in China, mainly in brothels or affluent households in traditional Chinese society. The young women were typically from poor families, and sold at a young age, with the condition that they be freed by marriage when older. These arrangements were generally considered as charitable and a form of adoption, as the young women would be provided for better as mui tsai than they would if they remained with their family. However, the absence of contracts in these arrangements meant that many mui tsai were resold into prostitution. According to some scholars, many of these girls ended as either concubines or prostitutes, while others write that the...