Remember History, Not Hatred: Collective Remembrance of China's War of Resistance to Japan

2011 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 463-490 ◽  
Author(s):  
JAMES REILLY
Keyword(s):  
Chinese History ◽  
Critical Periods ◽  
Education Campaign ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
Patriotic Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
External Events ◽  
War Of Resistance ◽  
Historical Periods ◽  
Party State

AbstractChinese leaders have repeatedly insisted upon the contemporary relevance of the ‘War of Resistance to Japan’ (1937–1945). However, the content of the official history of the war and the lessons drawn from it have changed dramatically from 1949 through 2010. This paper begins by reviewing theories of collective remembrance and then covers four historical periods: China's ‘benevolent amnesia’ on Japan's wartime atrocities before 1982; China's patriotic education campaign from the mid-1980s; the rise of history activism in China in the late 1990s; and the post-2005 reversal in official rhetoric on Japan and the wartime past. It concludes that, while the party-state retains an impressive capacity to shape the narratives of critical periods of modern Chinese history, Chinese leaders are likely to find themselves increasingly constrained by domestic forces and by external events beyond their control.

The Enlightenment Turns to China: The International Flow of Concepts and Their Geographic Dispersion

Cultura ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 31-52
Author(s):  
Chien-shou CHEN
Keyword(s):  
Joint Production ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Conceptual History ◽  
International Flow ◽  
Geographic Dispersion ◽  
Production Of Knowledge ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
Enlightenment Project ◽  
History Of

Abstract This article attempts to strip away the Eurocentrism of the Enlightenment, to reconsider how this concept that originated in Europe was transmitted to China. This is thus an attempt to treat the Enlightenment in terms of its global, worldwide significance. Coming from this perspective, the Enlightenment can be viewed as a history of the exchange and interweaving of concepts, a history of translation and quotation, and thus a history of the joint production of knowledge. We must reconsider the dimensions of both time and space in examining the global Enlightenment project. As a concept, the Enlightenment for the most part has been molded by historical actors acting in local circumstances. It is not a concept shaped and brought into being solely from textual sources originating in Europe. As a concept, the Enlightenment enabled historical actors in specific localities to begin to engage in globalized thinking, and to find a place for their individual circumstances within the global setting. This article follows such a line of thought, to discuss the conceptual history of the Enlightenment in China, giving special emphasis to the processes of formation and translation of this concept within the overall flow of modern Chinese history.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Guo
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Press Freedom ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Late Qing Dynasty ◽  
Late Qing ◽  
The Social ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
Chinese Perceptions ◽  
History Of ◽  
China Today

Ever since the concept of press freedom was first introduced into China during the late-Qing dynasty, Chinese perceptions of the function of a free press have frequently changed. This research has shown that the social and cultural context shaped the unique interpretations of press freedom in China and impacted the extent to which it was realized in modern Chinese history. There were numerous problems that permeated the history of press freedom in China, problems that continue to influence the experience of press freedom in China today. This chapter concludes by exploring the theoretical and contemporary implications of the conceptual history of press freedom in China.

FIRST SEMINAR ‘DYNASTIES AND SUCCESSION TO THE THRONE IN ANCIENT CHINA’. SERIES “COLLOQUIUM STANISLAVI. TERMINOLOGY DESCRIBING POWER AND KINSHIP IN ANCIENT CHINA”

2020 ◽  
pp. 318-325
Author(s):  
Marina E. Kuznetsova-Fetisova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Ming Dynasty ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Ancient History ◽  
Ancient China ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
History Of ◽  
Oriental Studies ◽  
Academy Of Sciences ◽  
Historical Periods ◽  
China Series

In a number of issues and problems in contemporary Sinology opinions of experts still differ sharply; this also extends to the ancient history of China. A series of seminars “‘Colloquium Stanislavi’. Terminology Describing Power and Kinship in Ancient China” held in the Chinese Department of the Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, is envisioned as a platform for discussions on the most pressing issues, exchanging of views, and development of new terminology. The first seminar on the topic “Dynasties and Succession to the Throne in Ancient China” was held on November 18, 2020, with over 35 researchers taking part in the seminar. Traditionally, 24 dynastic histories are distinguished in the history of China; “dynastic history” being the name of the traditional historical sources describing the rule of a particular house; later the very historical periods were called accordingly. But these traditional denominations, for example, the Shang or Ming dynasty, did not coincide with the surname of the clan that ruled at that time. The discussion clearly revealed two main problems: Firstly, the lack of an adequate term to describe the phenomenon of Chinese history, which is now called “24 Dynastic Stories” and, secondly, the need to determine terminology conveying such major Chinese concepts like dai (代) and chao (朝).

scholarly journals FROM TRAITOR TO MARTYR: DRAWING LESSONS FROM THE DEATH AND BURIAL OF WANG JINGWEI, 1944

2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-158
Author(s):  
Jeremy E. Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
National Government ◽  
Modern China ◽  
The Political ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Modern Chinese ◽  
Specific Event ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
History Of

AbstractBased on recently reopened files and publications in Nanjing, as well as published and newsreel accounts from the 1940s, this paper represents the first scholarly analysis of the rituals surrounding the death and burial of Wang Jingwei in Japanese-occupied China. Rather than locating this analysis purely in the literature on the history of the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–45), however, this paper asks what Wang Jingwei's Re-organized National Government might tell us about personality cults in the political culture of modern China. While Wang's burial drew heavily on the precedent of Sun Yat-sen's funerals of the 1920s, it also presaged later spectacles of public mourning and posthumous commemoration, such as Chiang Kai-shek's funeral in 1975 in Taipei. In focusing on this one specific event in the life of a “puppet government,” this paper hopes to reignite scholarly interest in the study of “dead leaders” and their posthumous lives in modern Chinese history more generally.

Chinese Religious Reform

Asian Survey ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 51 (6) ◽  
pp. 1042-1064 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kuo Cheng-tian
Keyword(s):  
Significant Progress ◽  
Liberal State ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Religious Reform ◽  
Education Campaign ◽  
The Past ◽  
State Administration ◽  
Patriotic Education ◽  
Institutional Actors ◽  
Party State

Abstract The Chinese Christian Patriotic Education campaign demonstrates that the party-state has adapted itself to the religious politics among various public and private institutional actors, pivotally coordinated by the relatively liberal State Administration for Religious Affairs. Consequentially, religious freedom in China has made slow but significant progress in the past decade.

A General Review of the Study of the Revolution of 1911 in the People's Republic of China

1980 ◽  
Vol 39 (3) ◽  
pp. 525-531 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhang Kaiyuan
Keyword(s):  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Dominant Position ◽  
Republic Of China ◽  
General Review ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Revolution

Before Liberation, the history of the revolution of 1911 fell within the domain of Kuomintang party history. Although numerous publications appeared, some of which possessed historical value, generally speaking an orthodox point of view occupied the dominant position. Many published works were filled with prejudice and distortion and should not be regarded as genuine historical research.Since the new China was established, research on the revolution of 1911 has gradually become a branch of modern Chinese history, which takes historical materialism as its leading principle.

Sir Robert Hart and the Writing of Modern Chinese History

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 109-126
Author(s):  
Chihyun Chang
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Modern China ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Modern History ◽  
Inspector General ◽  
Republic Of China ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Modern China ◽  
Academic Debate

AbstractThis article examines the conflicts in writing the imperial modern history of China among various stakeholders, particularly Chinese and American historians, and their dealing with a set of personal documents of Sir Robert Hart, Inspector-General of the Chinese Maritime Customs Services (CMCS) during the Qing period. This set of documents is called “Hart Industry” and contains Hart's personal papers and seventy-seven volumes of diaries, among others. Revealing the imperial Inspector-General's view on “westernization” in modern China, the Hart Industry played a key role in the development of the history of modern China throughout the twentieth century. From around 1957 until 1995, the diaries became a source of a highly politicized academic debate between Chinese Communist historians of the People's Republic of China and western historians of the Hart Industry. By providing a “study of studies” on the historiography of the colonial modern history of China, this article argues that the Hart diaries were critical to historians’ understanding of their own academic discourse.

The 1911 Revolution: An end and a beginning

2011 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 213-231 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arif Dirlik ◽  
Roxann Prazniak
Keyword(s):  
Turning Point ◽  
100Th Anniversary ◽  
High Peak ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Current Regime ◽  
Modern Chinese ◽  
Long Duration ◽  
The 1911 Revolution ◽  
Modern Chinese History ◽  
History Of

The 1911 Revolution was a momentous event in bringing down the monarchical institution with a history of 2,000 years. Yet its consequences were ambiguous, it was overshadowed by the more radical revolution that followed in 1949, and it was stigmatized by the defeat of the Kuomintang, which claimed it as its own. Its ‘revolutionariness’ has been in question even as it has been celebrated as a turning point in modern Chinese history. This discussion reaffirms the revolutionary significance of the event, but also suggests that it is best viewed as a ‘high peak’ in a revolution of long duration that is yet to be completed. The current regime in China has revived aspects of monarchical culture and practices that revolutionaries sought to abolish in 1911. Most importantly, the promise of full citizenship for all that animated the 1911 Revolution remains unfulfilled, which may explain the contemporary regime’s nervousness over the celebration of its 100th anniversary.

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