This week, we looked at the Chinese Republic; since I looked at the World War One labor forces and the Taiwan exploration packs, my week’s readings had a decided focus on the experiences of Chinese people outside of the territory controlled by a Chinese government. However, the textbook also made clear the very complicated situation that followed the collapse of the Qing. Perhaps the most important takeaway from the textbook readings was that post-Qing China was primarily controlled by various warlords. Interestingly, the different warlords had different political persuasions, so the more conservative (seeming) Yuan Shikai simply wanted to use his position to establish his own dynasty, while other warlords actually aided and harbored revolutionary thinkers like Sun Yatsen. I would be interested in learning more about the actual course of fighting between the various factions, and that may be something that I look into for a future show and tell.
For Friday, I looked at the Taiwan exploration pack, and it brought up some interesting points. To me, the newspaper announcement was the most interesting, since it gave a look at what the Japanese occupiers were thinking and trying to implement in their new colony. I had not realized that the Japanese seemed to be trying to assimilate Taiwan culturally; this surprised me because I had always thought that the Japanese were only looking to exploit and rule over their overseas possessions. This sense is based off of what I know from the era of World War Two, but it was important for me to remember that Japanese government and policy was not uniform from 1900-1945. Another interesting point that both the newspaper and the Patient Taiwan document raised was the problem of who exactly the Taiwanese see themselves as being. In particular, the Patient Taiwan document, having been written by a Taiwanese national, gives an interesting insight since it blames the Qing for the sorry state that the Japanese found the island in. The question of who the people of Taiwan see themselves as strikes me as one of the most relevant issues that the text brings up, since It has only become more complicated in the years between when these texts were written and today.
A Chat with the Governor-General About Discontinuing Chinese Columns in Daily Newspapers.” In The Columbia Sourcebook of Literary Taiwan, edited by Sung-sheng Yvonne Chang, Michelle Yeh and Ming-ju Fan. Columbia Univ. Press, 2014.
14.1: “A Patient Named Taiwan.” In The Search for Modern China: A Documentary Collection. Third ed. Edited by Janet Chen et. al. W. W. Norton & Company, 2014.
Mitter, Rana. Modern China: A Very Short Introduction. Very Short Introductions. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
Moïse Edwin E. Modern China: A History Third ed. Harlow, England: Pearson/Longman, 2008.
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