Cultures of Knowledge: Technology in Chinese History. Edited by Schäfer. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012. vii + 394 pp., €133.00; $182.00. ISBN 978-90-04-21844-4 (original) (raw)
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Modern Theory and Traditional Chinese Historiography
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With the dynamic changes in the composition of all disciplines and recent developments in multicultural studies world wide, interdisciplinary tendency in the humanities needs a cross-cultural dimension (cf. LI You-zheng, 1997(3), 47-48). Not only will this expand domains of research, but it will bring about more original theoretical progress as well. The recent hermeneutico-semiotic turn in comparative studies in the humanities suggests that current theoretical reflections on traditional non-Western scholarship can also expand the theoretical horizon of the humanities in the West, including historiography. This interdisciplinary/crosscultural development will more relevantly and energetically stimulate a further elaboration of present-day Western theoretical practices. The point is not merely in enriching cultural experiences in studies, but rather in the i nt e l l e c t u a l e n c o u n t e r between modern/post-modern Western theoretical approaches and cultural materials in non-Western historical traditions. Needless to say, Chinese is one of the most important cultural strangers for the Western humanities. Western historiography can greatly benefit from examining Chinese-Western comparative historical theories which have three main aspects. One is an effective expansion of the historical experience, namely, a greater knowledge of the characteristic non-Western historiographic tradition. Another is increasing the relevance and precision of theoretical practices in Western historical science. The third is the development of a universal framework to deal with theoretical problems in human history.
IN AND OUT OF THE WEST: ON THE PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE OF CHINESE HISTORICAL THEORY
In ancient China, dissatisfaction with the official compilation of histories gave rise, in time, to reflections on what makes a good historian, as well as on such issues as the factuality and objectivity of history-writing, the relationship between rhetoric and reality, and the value of historians' subjectivity. From these reflections arose a unique set of historiographical concepts. With the coming of modern times, the urgent task of building a nationstate forced Chinese historians to borrow heavily from Western historical theories in their effort to construct a new history compatible with modernity. A tension thus arose between Western theory and Chinese history. The newly founded People's Republic embraced the materialist conception of history as the authoritative guideline for historical studies, which increased the tension. The decline of the materialist conception of history in the period since China's reform and opening up in the late 1970s and, with this development, the increasing plurality of theories, have not exactly lessened Chinese historians' keenly felt anxiety when they confront Western theories. For Chinese historians, the current state of affairs with respect to theory is not exactly an extension of Western theories, nor is it a regression to the particularity of Chinese history completely outside the Western compass. Rather, a certain hybridity with respect to theory provides to Chinese historians a way to move both in and out of the West, as well as an opportunity for them to make their own contributions to Western history on the basis of borrowed Western theories.
Asian Studies 9/2 (May 2021), 2021
The notion of modernity is a concept which doubtless helped to form contemporary societies, and in this regard, China is no exception. If we want to historically evaluate the Chinese attempts at establishing a “typical Chinese” philosophical basis for modernization, we need to consider the context of the questions linked to Hobsbawm's and Ranger’s (1995) concept of “invented traditions”. In other words, we must consider to what extent are the “past” intellectual “traditions” based on historic assumptions, and to what extent are they merely a product of the (ideological and political) demands of the current period. An important consequence of the current trans-nationalization of capital is that, perhaps for the first time in modern history, the global mode of production appears as an authentically universal abstraction that is no longer limited to its specific historical origins in Europe. Hence, the narrative of modernization is no longer an exclusively European one, and for the first time non-European societies are also making their own claims on the history of modernizationSpecial issue on China's Modernization
Introduction Chinas intellectual transformations at the threshold of 20 century
Asian Studies , 2021
The notion of modernity is a concept which doubtless helped to form contemporary societies, and in this regard, China is no exception. If we want to historically evaluate the Chinese attempts at establishing a “typical Chinese” philosophical basis for modernization, we need to consider the context of the questions linked to Hobsbawm’s and Ranger’s (1995) concept of “invented traditions”. In other words, we must consider to what extent are the “past” intellectual “traditions” based on historic assumptions, and to what extent are they merely a product of the (ideological and political) demands of the current period. An important consequence of the current trans-nationalization of capital is that, perhaps for the first time in modern history, the global mode of production appears as an authentically universal abstraction that is no longer limited to its specific historical origins in Europe. Hence, the narrative of modernization is no longer an exclusively European one, and for the first time non-European societies are also making their own claims on the history of modernization.
Because so much of China's nineteenth century history is castigated as 'failure', there has not been enough attention paid to the kinds of advancements in science, technology, and modern warfare that China did in fact pursue, especially in the period 1865-95. However, recent revisionist scholarship has demonstrated there is certain evidence of China's achievements in these fields, and in particular, in shipbuilding, in the adaptation of Western weaponry, in the establishment of modern well-equipped arsenals, and in the creation of 'manufacturing' machines. Moreover, the translation of scientific, military, and technological texts from European languages that helped actualize China's 'modernization' along these lines, also set the basis for Japan's own translation of these same kinds of references. This paper has two goals: to demonstrate in broad brush terms how contemporary globalizing discourses on scientific and military knowledge did in fact penetrate the mind-set of nineteenth century Chinese intellectuals and scholar-officials; and secondly, to indicate how these discourses were obfuscated and expurgated. Ultimately, distortions of China's mid-nineteenth experiences with changing regimes of knowledge helped create the conventional bifurcated assessment of two kinds of learning, 'Western' and 'Chinese' claimed by late Qing dynasty reformers. In this way, the actual transcultural circulation of regimes of knowledge has been obscured, and our understanding of China's first practices with modern science, technology, and weaponry clouded by modern narratives which repeat the reformers' formulae, and which situate the origins of China's modernization only after the downfall of the Qing government in the early twentieth century.