A Study On British-Educated Late-Qing Students,Cross-Cultural Perspectives

China in late-Qing Dynasty was faced with huge national crisis, and overseas education was regarded as a necessary way for the rise of China. This thesis probes into late-Qing British-educated students. It examines the main groups studying in the United Kingdom and their contributions to China from historical point of view. Moreover, it analyzes the cultural factors behind the experiences and contributions ofthe British-educated graduates from cross-cultural perspectives.This thesis firstly studies the overseas education in late Qing by means of historical archives. Chinese history in late Qing period is a history of seeking a path to modernization and development, and its overseas education underwent changes in various aspects as well. It changed from individual behavior to national policy to organize studying abroad. Studying abroad as something new was firstly rejected but later highly admired by common populace. The target countries of overseas education spread from western European countries and the United States to the eastern country of Japan.This thesis focuses on a cross-cultural study of late-Qing British education. Although the number of less late-Qing students studying in the UK was smaller than that in the US and Japan, studying in the UK started earlier and the quality of students was much better. The two main groups studying in the UK were students from Tongwen Guan and the naval students. The Qing Imperial dispatched four groups of Tongwen Guan students to study in the UK. After they returned, these students mainly served in the educational and diplomatic departments and promoted the development in translation, diplomacy and education. As for the naval students, three groups were sent to the UK before the Sino-Japanese war, studying ship-driving and manufacturing that were urgently needed in the Chinese navy. After the Sino-Japanese war, the naval students in the UK studied a wider range of disciplines. The British-educated naval graduates came back with new thought and technology, greatly influencing the ruling class at that time and their stubborn ideology. Besides, this thesis does individual case study into Yen Fu, the most outstanding character of the naval students. Yen Fu received traditional Chinese education in his early childhood. During his stay in the UK, although he was a naval student, he read a lot of works on Western philosophy and culture. After he came back, he was frustrated by the repeated failures in the traditional officialdom. Therefore he turned to the translation and introduction of Western Culture. He realized that the gap between China and the UK lay not in technology, but in system and culture. It was because of Yen Fu’s introduction of Western learning into China that Chinese realized that Chinese national crisis came from the rotten political system instead of the backwardness in science and military. Thus it was deeply rooted in the Chinese people’s mind that China should independently strive in order to be strong and get rid of the national crisis. In addition, this thesis views late-Qing overseas education from comparative perspectives. It makes an all-round comparison between Chinese students in the UK, Japan and the United States during the late Qing dynasty, to highlight the distinctive features of those who studied in the UK. It also makes a comparison of overseas education between Modern Japan and China and explores the different results of overseas education in the two countries.Since there have been systematic studies on late-Qing overseas education in the UK in the discipline of historical studies, this thesis will employ cross-cultural perspectives to analyze the cultural factors in the movement of late Qing overseas studies.From cross-cultural perspectives, this thesis points out that neither the Cultural Relativism nor the Cultural Absolutism can be the possible path for China to realize National Rejuvenation. The Cultural Communicationism recognizes the necessity and possibility of cultural communication. In a broader sense, cross-culture communication is also the process of crossing the boundaries of different countries, regions and peoples. It shows both their cultural convergence and divergence and helps overcome the obstacles for effective communications. Studying abroad provides a chance for people to have cross-cultural interactions and communications that can help the development of their own countries.Late-Qing overseas education in the UK promoted the development in China in a certain degree, but it failed to fulfil the goal of modernizing China. It was true to the overseas education in all the target countries. Besides, China started to dispatch students to study abroad almost at the same time as Japan, but it didn’t bring the same change to the nation as that in Japan. This is a reflection of the favorable and unfavorable conditions of the cross-cultural communications. Late-Qing overseas education was initiated by the difficult social situations when China was facing national crisis. The students were undertaking the responsibility of saving the nation when they studied abroad. The advanced technology and ideas that they brought back were greatly needed. However, the strong conservative forces hindered the culture communications. Moreover, the culture development is in fact the human development, but the evolution of institution on the level of culture is difficult and long. Compared with other countries, the cultural changes in China can be even more difficult and longer. Even those people like Yen Fu and Ku Hweng-Ming who had received Western education were still under the constraint of traditional Chinese culture, let alone common populace.When China keeps on opening to the world in this globalized era, the number of Chinese people studying abroad is increasing unprecedentedly. Under this circumstance, a study on the British-educated late-Qing students from cross-cultural perspectives can help people understand the divergence in Chinese and Western cultures, enhance the significance of overseas education in cultural communications. More importantly, it will help contemporary Western-educated Chinese students to better undertake their responsibilities in the National Rejuvenation.