Dissertation
The East in the light of the West: American missionary women and women’s higher education in China, 1908-1952
University of Iowa
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), University of Iowa
Summer 2020
DOI: 10.17077/etd.005599
Abstract
This dissertation focuses on the experiences and stories of American missionary women and Chinese women at Ginling College and Hwa Nan College in the first half of the twentieth century in China, aiming to reconstruct the international and intercultural interactions between American and Chinese women whose stories have received insufficient attention in educational history and missionary history. Many historians of missionary work have tended to look at missionaries in China as cultural imperialists and to consider missionary women as carriers of not only Christian messages but also the Victorian ideal of womanhood.
A close examination of missionary women’s experiences at Ginling and Hwa Nan, as well as their interactions with Chinese women, provided a slightly different interpretation of the intercultural interaction. Although they highlighted Christian ideals regarding women’s roles, missionary women’s progressive educational philosophy and expansive views on women’s abilities and responsibilities enabled them to transform the ideology of domesticity into a means to enhancing women’s power and influence. In response to the gender and educational ideals of missionary women, Ginling and Hwa Nan students strategically adopted certain values while they discarded others. They inherited and applied American women’s progressive educational philosophy through rigorous academic learning and intellectual pursuits, and active involvement in social service programs and diverse extracurricular activities, while, at the same time, extending the notion of ideal Christian womanhood through actively participating in social and political movements. Both American women and Chinese women appropriated and made use of the dominant narratives of women’s domesticity to push forward a progressive educational agenda which broadened women’s spheres of influence. In addition, Chinese women’s agency revised the notion of American missionary women as cultural imperialists.
Rather than a traditional institutional history, the dissertation frames individual stories of women’s agency and cooperation within Ginling College and Hwa Nan College against the changing social and political contexts in China from 1908 to 1952, revealing the uneasy coexistence of and struggles between Western Christianity and Chinese nationalism, and the complex and the intertwining patriarchal, colonial, and cultural ideologies that had shaped educated women’s experiences.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- The East in the light of the West: American missionary women and women’s higher education in China, 1908-1952
- Creators
- Limin Su
- Contributors
- Christine A Ogren (Advisor)Katrina M Sanders (Committee Member)Shuang Chen (Committee Member)Brian P An (Committee Member)David B Bills (Committee Member)
- Resource Type
- Dissertation
- Degree Awarded
- Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), University of Iowa
- Degree in
- Educational Policy and Leadership Studies
- Date degree season
- Summer 2020
- DOI
- 10.17077/etd.005599
- Publisher
- University of Iowa
- Number of pages
- ix, 193 pages
- Copyright
- Copyright 2020 Limin Su
- Language
- English
- Description illustrations
- illustration
- Description bibliographic
- Includes bibliographical references (page 182-191).
- Public Abstract (ETD)
The dissertation is a historical examination of stories and experiences of American missionary women and Chinese women at Ginling College and Hwa Nan College between 1908 and 1952. During their service at Ginling and Hwa Nan, missionary women demonstrated an expansive belief and vision in Chinese women’s abilities and responsibilities, which manifested in their educational and teaching activities. At the same time, missionary women brought with them Christian values of womanhood. Their progressive educational philosophy enabled them to transform the dominant narratives of women’s domesticity to a progressive educational agenda which broadened women’s spheres of influence. Chinese students and graduates of the two women’s colleges inherited and applied American women’s progressive educational philosophy to a variety of social service and teaching activities, and extended Christian womanhood through participating in cultural and political activities. The stories of and the interactions between American missionary women and Chinese women at Ginling and Hwa Nan not only modified the notion of American missionary women as cultural imperialists but also demonstrated a more sophisticated and constructive intercultural communication between women in higher education.
- Academic Unit
- Educational Policy and Leadership Studies
- Record Identifier
- 9983988297902771
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