Modern Education In Qinghai(1912-1945)

As a late modernizing region, Qinghai’s unique political, economic and cultural conditions determined that its educational path would be unconventional. The society cross-fused on a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-religious level, and the theme of educational modernization proceeded in parallel with the interweaving of ethnic and national identities. Consequently, local educational characteristics are pronounced, and the evolutionary process lagged behind. This thesis, on the one hand analyzes the characteristics and processes of traditional education’s transition towards a new, modernized form through educational development in the Nationalist period; on the other hand, it attempts an investigation of how educational change played a leading role in the process of social transformation.The thesis is composed of an introduction and a formal text. The introduction defines the object of study and the scope of the project, explains the thesis’ basic argument, research framework and methodology. The structure of the text is as follows:Chapter One Traditional Education in Qinghai Prior to Reform:the introduction of ruxue (traditional Confucian education) is the primary content of conforming Qinghai education to that of the rest of the country. This educational standardization becomes the channel for local cultural change, and forms the preconditions for modern Qinghai education.Chapter Two The Rise of Ethnic Minority Education and Qinghai Education’s Transition to Modernization (1911-1928):through the changes in Mongolian, Tibetan and Muslim societies in the Nationalist period, we dissect how traditional religious education begins to gradually retreat from a universalist stance to a purely religious basis, and how the actions of local operators played out in local education within a period of national change.Chapter Three The Preliminary Construction of a Modernizing Educational System after the Founding of Qinghai Province:comprehensively analyzes the developmental track of modern Qinghai education, analyzes the content of the changes and the local characteristics of the process from the perspective of modernization, and investigates the shape of the modern Qinghai educational system under the backdrop of a reforming Qinghai society in the Nationalist period.Chapter Four Kunlun Middle School-The Local Result of a Maturing Modern Qinghai Education:selects Kunlun Middle School, which was established by Qinghai Hui (Muslim) Education Foundation, as a case study of an independently run Qinghai school, and investigates how, in the process of modernizing Qinghai education, local society used methods in line with local circumstances to respond to a transformational age, and the characteristics of ethnic minority society and education influenced the modernizing process of local society.Chapter Five:Managing Huangchuan Middle School under the Sino-British Boxer Indemnity Commission-The model of a transformed modern Qinghai education:the process of managing the Huangchuan Boxer Indemnity middle school shows the relationship between local society and the nation with regards the promotion of and restrictions on education, and how, amid the contradictions of change, education played a role in leading local social transformation.