Observing And Being Observed: On Jonathan Spence's China Study

The differences between cultures stimulate mutual recognition and interaction. This usually brings opportunities for reflection of both the "self and the "other" cultures. It is through this mutual observation and contrast that we find the perspectives beyond ourselves. Jonathan D. Spence, as an influential and representative scholar in US Sinological field, has been working on the foreign cultural study for more than half a century. We hope to obtain a dual perspective of both "self and "other" cultures through the research on Spence's China image construction. At the same time, we hope to offer our own views and consideration to some critical problems in contemporary history context.Spence's China study covers wide topics which include the analysis of tradition China (mainly the Ming and Qing Periods), the search for modern China, the observation of encounter between Chinese and western culture, and the review of contemporary China. This dissertation tries to capture and interpret Spence's China image mainly on the four aspects with the help of comparative culture study theories and under the cultural recognition perspective.The dissertation consists of six chapters.Chapter one offers a general account of the motives of our research, the methods and paradigms we are going to use. This chapter mainly focuses on why and how we are going to do the research on Spence.Chapter Two mainly analyzes the traditional China image constructed by Spence. Although Spence focuses on the Ming and Qing dynasties, we can still find a panoramic picture which includes the noble emperors, intellectual elites and nameless commoners. According to Spence's research, we will interpret his traditional China image through three aspects of scholar intellectuals, imperial power control and rural China society.Chapter Three focuses on Spence's description of formation and changes of modern China. Spence mainly concerns about the process of China's revolutionary transformation. And our analysis will be inevitably about some complicated concepts like "modern" and "modernity". Spence's modern China image is represented from the following aspects: intellectuals, revolution under the cover of religion, leaders of the revolution and overall construction of modern China.Chapter Four focuses on Spence's study of the encounter and dialogue between different cultures. And this topic is one of Spence's favorite and most accomplished subjects. He loves to explore the cultural stimuli and responses, tries hard to examine the typical personal experiences between different cultures. We think this part is the most excellent in Spence's China study. It offers us a referential perspective to review the western construction of China image. Furthermore, Spence's study provides more possibilities for us to explore this construction process.Chapter Five mainly deals with Spence's periodical essays. Generally speaking, there is a main theme in his essays which can be concluded as: to understand today's China, you have to know the past. This chapter does some quantitative analysis of Spence's periodical essays first, and then in order to capture the comprehensive China image of Spence, it focuses on Spence's reflection and review of classical Chinese culture and contemporary China.Chapter six is mainly the summation of Spence's China study. It outlines Spence's research, analyzes his historiographical characteristics and assesses his research values.As an important scholar of today's China study, Jonathan D. Spence is influential in both the academic and general public fields. His construction of China image is the continuous cultural recognition efforts in the perspective of classical western culture system and context. Spence has the passion and curiosity about China. He likes to explore China through historical details but he never neglects the macroscopic background at the same time. We hope to offer a detailed observation to Spence's efforts and criticism of his achievements. Meanwhile, we also find the ignorance and misunderstandings in mutual culture recognition. In the process of constructing China image, the West has been given too much power and justification. All these make us believe that we must learn how to interpret and express ourselves while try to understand others in today's multicultural context. From being watchful and pessimistic to becoming more and more optimistic, Spence lets us realizing the existing problems but also making us feel confident about the communication of different cultures. In today's cultural context, to be open to each other, and benefit each other through the cross-cultural communication are important strategies of cultural practice.