New Directions in the Study of the History of East Asian Education

Title

New Directions in the Study of the History of East Asian Education

Author

Ming-shi Gao

Page

105-134

DOI

Abstract

The study of the Education History in East Asia appeared under the influence of modern Western historiography, but was most influenced by the educational historiography of modern Japan. “East Asian” in this paper includes China, Japan and Korea. Vietnam is not included due to the lack of sources. “Education” here takes on the meaning of school education, together with private school. This paper is based on the study of monographs and books on this topic, from roughly the late Nineteenth Century to the year 2,000. Books on Education History in the late Nineteenth Century were mainly by-products of the in- stitution of newly established teacher-training systems. At the beginning, they usually covered the education history of both China and the West. Occasionally we see some books on the education history of individual countries. Since the early Twentieth Century, scholars more commonly wrote education history of individual country, especially in the 1930’s. The same tendency is also seen in the other areas of historical writings. Generally speaking, the writings of education history were focused on school education. After the WWII, with the development of democracy, the content of books on education history became more lively. In addition to the theme of school education, the focus became more pluralistic and was broadened to include histories of educational culture, grass- root education, life education, family education, education for women and local education etc. This essay mainly deals with the writings of general education history and does not touch other aforementioned specific fields, but does show the increase of these specific fields. In the future, more research is required on the activities beyond books. Furthermore, the content of writings should be enlarged to include the study of education history from the perspective of East Asia, even of Asia as a category. The search and discovery of the universal existence of the “Confucian Temple School” system in East Asia is also ground-breaking research in the post-War education historiography.

Keyword

teacher-training, internal and external, China and the West, Confucian temple school, academies, culture sphere

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