Examining the Past with an Eye to the Future: The Implications of Current Chinese Middle School History Textbooks

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2009
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Bi-College (Haverford and Bryn Mawr Colleges). Department of East Asian Studies
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Thesis
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Award
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eng
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Bi-College users only
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Abstract
Modern day Chinese textbooks are dominated by two major themes: National Unity and National Humiliation. These ideas have had an important place in Chinese schools for over one hundred years, and almost all historical events are framed within the context of these two motifs. Textbooks, in turn, have profound influence on the thinking of Chinese people. Acute concerns over humiliation at the hands of foreigners, and over threats to one united nation, strongly color the political views of Chinese people today. In contrast, the events that are so importantly symbolic of humiliation and unity in Chinese textbooks receive little attention in U.S. education. Americans receive little information about Humiliations like the Nanjing Massacre, and view the problem of Tibet in terms of human rights instead of National Unity. Due to this gap in understanding between the two sides, I warn that debates touching on these hot button issues--like modern Tibetan human rights protests--are especially likely to lead to misunderstandings that erupt into grave political crises.
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