Lu Xun, Returning Home, and May Fourth Modernity

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirk A. Denton
Keyword(s):  
Subject Formation ◽  
Chinese Modernity ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
Modern Subject ◽  
Returning Home ◽  
May Fourth ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
Chinese Intellectuals ◽  
Complex Relationships ◽  
The Individual

Leaving home was the quintessential modern act for Chinese intellectuals in the early twentieth century, as home had come to represent cultural backwardness and oppression by the early Republican period. At the same time as they wrote of leaving it, however, modern Chinese writers also often wrote of returning home. This chapter analyzes the complex relationships between the individual and his home in Lu Xun’s first-person reminiscences. As representations of the return of a repressed past, literary representations of returning home complicate facile narratives of modern subject formation and suggest that the experience of modernity in this period of transition was an ambivalent and uneasy one. A closer look at such narratives of returning home suggests that the relationship with tradition in Chinese modernity is far more difficult and conflicted than the paradigm of “May Fourth iconoclasm” and its discourse of modernity’s radical rupture with tradition allows.

The Concept of Rendaozhuyi in Late Qing and Early Republican China

Cultura ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 105-117
Author(s):  
Ke ZHANG
Keyword(s):  
Human Dignity ◽  
Great War ◽  
Republican China ◽  
Chinese Tradition ◽  
Late Qing ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
May Fourth ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
Chinese Intellectuals ◽  
The Great War

This paper examines the concept of Rendaozhuyi in Late Qing and Early Republican China. Appearing as early as 1903, Rendaozhuyi is the Chinese rendering of both humanism and humanitarianism. For the Chinese intellectuals during the Late Qing and Early Republican period, “rendao” itself represented a modern value of humanity and human dignity. In the wake of the Great War, Rendaozhuyi gained tremendous popularity among the May-Fourth scholars. Some of them held it up as a universal ideal and tool to critique Chinese tradition, while others respectfully disagreed, worrying it would undermine the collective morale of “strengthening the nation”. Finally, the late 1920s saw the rapid ebb of the discussions of Rendaozhuyi.

Rethinking the 1898 Reform Period: Political and Cultural Change in Late Qing China. Edited by Rebecca E. Karl and Peter Zarrow. [Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Asia Center, distributed by Harvard University Press, 2002. x+273 pp. £29.95; $45.00. ISBN 0-674-00854-5.]

2003 ◽  
Vol 176 ◽  
pp. 1112-1114
Author(s):  
Roger R. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Harvard University ◽  
Asian Studies ◽  
Chinese Modernity ◽  
Late Qing ◽  
Reform Period ◽  
May Fourth ◽  
Chinese Intellectuals ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Historical Moment

In their introduction to this excellent collection of nine essays, most of which were presented at the 1998 Annual Meeting of the Association for Asian Studies, historians Rebecca Karl and Peter Zarrow write convincingly that the “1898 period” in particular and the late Qing in general mark the moment when “Chinese experiences of modernity” (p. 10) began. Recognizing that many of the elements we associate with the May Fourth paradigm first appeared in the under-studied late-Qing period, the editors decry how the late Qing “continues to be treated in an isolated fashion and is seldom drawn into the main currents of ‘Chinese modernity,’ which are seen as more properly placed in the later May Fourth period” (p. 7). The reason to study 1898 now is that we can see and compare China's confrontations with two global capitalisms (late 19th and late 20th centuries). We don't need a “functionalist exhumation of 1898;” we need an approach that helps us understand the “local effects of globalizing trajectories” (p. 7). In sum: “[We need to] rethink 1898 not as an event per se but, more important, as a vital conjunctural historical moment, as an extended moment during and through which Chinese intellectuals and society consciously confronted and began to reformulate the Chinese historical problematic” (p. 7).

scholarly journals Swiss Enchantment

Asian Studies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 145-164
Author(s):  
Federico Brusadelli
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Late Qing ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
Liang Qichao ◽  
Political Concept ◽  
Kang Youwei ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
Chinese Intellectuals ◽  
Institutional Model ◽  
The Ideal

A vast and hyper-centralized Asian empire built on the premise of an alleged cultural homogeneity. A small, federalist Alpine state sustained by the ideal of coexistence of different languages and religions. The differences between China and Switzerland could not be wider, and it is therefore understandable that the Swiss confederacy has been fascinating Chinese intellectuals in both the modern and contemporary era. In the late Qing and early Republican period, Switzerland was mentioned by prominent figures like Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao, who praised its democracy, and in the 1920s the Swiss political system became a source of inspiration for “provincial patriots” in Hunan or for Chinese federalists such as Chen Jiongming. The present paper intends to survey these political encounters and perceptions, focusing on the transformation of the Swiss institutional model and historical experience into a “political concept”, and on the reasons for its final rejection as an unrealistic utopia unsuited for China.

The Power of Position: Beijing University, Intellectuals and Chinese Political Culture 1898–1929. By Timothy B. Weston. [Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 2004. xiv+325 pp. $60.00; £39.95. ISBN 0-520-23767-6.]

2004 ◽  
Vol 179 ◽  
pp. 841-843
Author(s):  
Benjamin A. Elman
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Intellectual Life ◽  
May Fourth Movement ◽  
New Culture Movement ◽  
Fourth Movement ◽  
May Fourth ◽  
Chinese Intellectuals ◽  
The University ◽  
Chinese Political Culture ◽  
The May Fourth Movement

Timothy Weston's study of Beijing University (hereafter, “Beida”) spotlights how modern Chinese intellectuals positioned themselves politically and socially in the early 20th century. Weston relies on the Beida archives, dailies, journals, and many other sources, to make four contributions. First, Beida's early history shows how literati humanists repositioned themselves during a period of great uncertainty. New style intellectuals had influence because they mastered Western and classical learning. Secondly, Beida's complex history did not break sharply with the past. Earlier accounts of the May Fourth movement obscure the efforts of intellectuals since 1898 to redefine their role. Weston suggests that May Fourth amplified a continuing progression of new and old ways of doing things. Thirdly, political tensions emerged when the university increasingly radicalized after 1911. No more than 20 per cent of Beida students were involved in the New Culture movement. A strong conservative undertow continually challenged radical agendas. Often we hear only the voices of the latter. Finally, Weston assesses Beida's history in light of how the May Fourth movement played out in different locations. In the 1920s, Shanghai replaced Beijing as the leading venue for urban China's cultural and intellectual leaders. Beijing increasingly lost status under warlordism, and the Nationalist shift of the capital to Nanjing refocused Chinese intellectual life on the Chang (Yangtze) delta.

Republican conception of liberty in early republican Turkey and its contemporary implications

2015 ◽  
Vol 42 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 429-439
Author(s):  
Boğaç Erozan
Keyword(s):  
Problem Solving ◽  
Ample Evidence ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
Initial Failure ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Problem ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Early Republican

Established in 1923, Turkey has been a republic without a dominant republican conception of liberty. A chance to install such a conception was missed in the early republican period and never recaptured. The republic was unable to get rid of vestiges of the authoritarian tradition of the past. Centuries-old authoritarian tradition persisted well into the recent and the contemporary periods. Presenting ample evidence, the article underlines the weight of history and the legacy of authoritarian mentality that promoted the use of authority, not liberty, in political problem-solving. The initial failure to abandon an authoritarian problem-solving approach proved fateful for the chances of the deepening of democracy in Turkey.

EVREN KÜÇÜK, Türkiye-İsveç İlişkileri (1914-1938) / Turkey-Sweden Relations (1914- 1938), Publications of Turkish Historical Society, Ankara 2017. [Book Review]

Belleten ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 82 (294) ◽  
pp. 759-762
Author(s):  
Ayşe Bedi̇r
Keyword(s):  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
National Archives ◽  
Simple Language ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
State Archives ◽  
Foreign Ministry ◽  
Comprehensive Study

The purpose of this book review is to fulfi ll the absence of comprehensive study on the Turkey-Sweden relations both Sweden and Turkey yet. Turkey-Sweden Relations (1914- 1938) is an original work, which is suitable for scientifi c criteria and prepared as a doctoral thesis, receives the details of the relations of both countries for the fi rst time in detail, and sheds light on the last years of the Ottoman Empire and the early Republican period of Turkey. Very rich sources are used in this work with a simple language and style. As it is seen that in preparation of the book the sources of the foreign archives and local archives such as Sveria Riksarkivet (Sweden State Archives), Sveria Krigsarkivet (Sweden Military Archives), Kungliga Bibliotek (Sweden Royal Library), Uppsala University, Carolina Rediviva Library, The National Archives (London), League of Nations Photo Archive, Prime Ministry Republican Archives, Prime Ministry Ottoman Archives, Red Crescent Archives, Presidency Archive, Foreign Ministry Archives, Istanbul Sea Museum Archive, Turkish Revolution History Institute Archives have been used. Additionally, the book uses domestic and foreign literature, newspapers and magazines.

scholarly journals Different Approaches to Modern Art and Society: Li Zehou versus Xu Fuguan

Asian Studies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Téa Sernelj
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Aesthetic Experience ◽  
Modern Art ◽  
Chinese Modernity ◽  
Material Development ◽  
Modern Chinese ◽  
Chinese Aesthetics ◽  
Basic Approaches ◽  
Art And Society ◽  
The Individual

Proceeding from the inseparable relation between ethics and aesthetics in traditional (and often also modern) Chinese thought, this article aims to illuminate two important approaches to the aesthetic foundations of Chinese modernity. The relation between the individual and society, which is a core question of modern ethics, is reflected in most of the ethical theories of 20th century China. In this context, the article first presents Li Zehou’s theory of aesthetics and his definition of aesthetic experience. In this way, it aims to illuminate Li’s interpretation of modern art and society, and to posit it into a contrastive position to Xu Fuguan’s ethico-aesthetic theories, especially the ones regarding modernity and Western culture. The basic approaches applied by these two important modern Chinese scholars reveal great differences in attitude towards the spiritual and material development of humanity in the 20th century, which is especially interesting since they are both rooted in the abovementioned belief that ethics cannot be separated from aesthetics. Besides, Li Zehou sincerely admired Xu Fuguan’s work on traditional Chinese aesthetics and referred to his comprehension of general concepts of traditional Chinese aesthetics in many of his own works dealing with aesthetics.

Envisioning an Ideal Christian Family in Republican China

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 194-215
Author(s):  
Yun Zhou
Keyword(s):  
Active Role ◽  
Republican China ◽  
Christian Community ◽  
Republican Period ◽  
Chinese Christians ◽  
The Social ◽  
Christian Family ◽  
Early Republican ◽  
Domestic Roles ◽  
Theological Thinking

Abstract Amid debates and discussions on the institution of the family in Republican China, foreign missionaries and Chinese Christians played an active role in promoting an ideal Christian family. This article investigates the three waves of prominent theological thinking that underpinned changing ideals of the Christian family throughout the Republican period: Chinese society’s encounter with the gendered ethics of the Christian community in the early Republican period, discussions of domesticity by Chinese Christians amid the social gospel movements of the 1920s, and discussions of domesticity during the National Christianizing the Home Movement. An exploration of Christian publications on domesticity points to a gendered perspective on women’s domestic roles as well as a male-dominated theological construct that attempted to reconfigure the notion of the Chinese Christian family. The discourse on the ideal Chinese Christian family had both secular and spiritual dimensions, shaped by the dynamic transnational flow of ideas and the development of local theological thinking.

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