A Study Of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper

At the end of the Qing Dynasty, China witnessed the upsurge of publishing vernacular newspapers and periodicals. There were some profound social reasons for the upsurge of vernacular newspapers and periodicals in China during the period of the late 19th century and the early 20th century. After the Opium War, China was confronted with troubles at home and aggression from abroad. On one hand, the Qing Government was corrupt and incompetent; on the other hand big powers invaded, attempting to dismember China. China faced the drastic change not seen once in thousands of years. The danger of national doom and racial extinction was approaching day by day, and the voices and struggle of saving the nation from subjugation and ensuring its survival ran high. Advanced intellectuals realized it was impossible to strive for survival without innovation. Since they had no right to do that, they resorted to running newspaper, in hope that newspaper could convey their ideas, enlighten the mass and awaken the people.The predecessor of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper is the National Vernacular Daily, started publication on the first day of July of the 34th year of Guangxu emperor of Qing Dynasty (July 28,1908). Most of founders were the members of the revolutionary party coming from Anhui Province, such as Li Duo(Jing Zhong), Li Yanshu (Xin Bai), Fan GuangQi (Hong Xian), Chen Zhongheng, etc. It was suspended publication on September 24,1908, and went on to publish with a new name Anhui Vernacular Newspaper, which was a comprehensive publication, Anhui Vernacular Newspaper was one of the earliest newspapers with colloquialisms to record events. It attached importance to exciting the atmosphere of studying, investigating news concerning custom, politics, and education of this province and other provinces and other groups. Anhui Vernacular Newspaper did its utmost to advocate the spread of education, local autonomy and railways and mines. The Newspaper aimed to "open an atmosphere of making everybody have access to common knowledge, have the thought of rights and obligations for the country, and have the spirit of striving for survival and competition for win". Anhui Vernacular Newspaper, with then-advanced thought, precise and appropriate speeches, keen insight to society, bold political critique all the time, published content with strong anti-imperialist and anti-feudalism color. After the 12th issue of it was published in October of 1909, the Paper was forced to suspend publication under the joint ravage of reactionary forces home and abroad.As a newspaper which introduced the contemporary political situation in modern Anhui and propagated the revolutionary ideas, Anhui Vernacular Newspaper produced immeasurable effects upon the facilitating the development of the ideological trend of the democratic revolution, the social changes in Anhui and the development of the cultural cause. Therefore, it plays a fairly important role in the history of the Chinese Press, especially that of Anhui. With the help of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper, the revolutionists spread the ideological trend of the democratic revolution, the new culture, ideas which led to the great social behaviors in Anhui and exerted wide-spread and far-reaching impacts on the society. Meanwhile, together with other revolutionary and vernacular press, Anhui Vernacular Newspaper became a part of the crucial strength that promoted the coming of the Revolution of 1911 and the New Cultural Movement, and the liberation of thoughts.But nowadays, the academe studied this newspaper which preserves a great amount of history information rather inadequately. Studies mainly are the simple introductions from the dictionaries or the simple summaries of its development in the general context of the history of the Chinese Press. Systematic study only focused on Anhui Vernacular Newspaper is almost none. Making use of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper stored in Anhui Archives as texts, this thesis mainly adopts the textual research in the historical research, combining with methodologies used in the studies of the mass media, to study Anhui Vernacular Newspaper comprehensively. Based on the abundant original materials recorded by Anhui Vernacular Newspaper, the thesis combs through the basic situations of the newspaper and investigates information like the founding backgrounds, the founders, the publication spirits, the publication procedures, the reporting styles, etc. From the angles of the mass media, it reveals and summarizes the revolutionary propaganda methods and strategies of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper in the historical and political conditions at that time, and the experience gained by the publication which attained the wide-spread social impacts. From the angles of the historical development, the thesis unveils the positive facilitation achieved by Anhui Vernacular Newspaper upon the social development and historical progression.This paper holds that three factors contribute to the widespread social influence and remarkable propagandizing effects of Anhui Vernacular Newspaper. One is the common recognition and acceptance of its revolutionary stand among the masses, when the bourgeois revolutionary thought overwhelmed the bourgeois reforming thought in the public voice. The second is that the initiators of the Anhui Vernacular Newspaper becomes more skillful in spreading revolutionary ideas under the shield of news after drawing lessons from the Jiangsu Newspaper incident and adopting some brilliant tactics in propagandizing. And finally, the news collecting, styles and columns of the Anhui Vernacular Newspaper are targeted at the lower people, which sparks great popularity for its closeness to life and better moving effects.Apart from these, the Anhui Vernacular Newspaper always devotes immense space to report three critical economic, political and social issues during that period: the movement of protecting the ownership of railways and mineral resources, provincial autonomy during the late years of Qing dynasty, and education popularization. This greatly propels the nationwide movement for taking back the ownership of railways and mineral resources, exposes the government's hypocrisy of executing regional autonomy, publicizes progressive educational thought and promotes the popularization of advanced science. The Anhui Vernacular Newspaper achieves its due historical position by playing an important part in the social and historical development.