China's History not in the West's History...?

dang, spaces between paragraphs don't display like they did in the editor... pooey

hi guys, I had an world history course when i was a high school student. American history and England history are the main part. We also learn some general history knowledge about other countries. Since Calkins mentioned the Nanjing Massacre, i wondered that how many of you know about it? Do you know "comfort woman"? I was shocked when i found there was such a painful history. Here are an article from People's Daily, China. 60-Year Sadness of Chinese Comfort Women Editor's Notes: The "September18" National Humiliation Day is approaching again. The aggression and disaster of those years have moved farther and farther away and the blood color is fading gradually. However, only when a nation bears those years firmly in mind, only when it refuses to tamper with and forget history and only when it dares to face up to the suffering and filth it had experienced, can it stand up on the new stage, and avoid history to repeat itself. It is precisely because of this that old people bring up past humiliation again. Recent news reports say that the new editions of Japanese textbooks either make no mention of or only lightly touch the Nanjing massacre and comfort women. If the bloody history is forgotten even by our posterity, then, it is not impossible that the tragedy would be re-staged. The Comfort Women system carried out by the Japanese army during the Second World War was the ugliest, filthiest, darkest sexual slave system in human history of the 20th century. Enslaved by this system, about 200,000 Chinese women suffered devastation, but only about 200 of them can be checked against historical records. Many of those old people, for various reasons, are still trembling in the twilight of history. At the time when the wheel of the times has "rumbled" into the 21st century, some Japanese Right-wingers are still trying to cover up their atrocities, such as the "Comfort Women" system and the Nanjing Massacre, committed during Japan's invasion of China, and to revive their old dream of "Great Japan Empire", striking an inharmonious note in the times of peace. This December, a group of Chinese women ravaged by the Japanese troops will file a suit to the court of Tokyo to claim compensation. Eighty-three-year-old Meizhi was once a comfort woman. She was taken away from home on Chongming Islet of Shanghai by Japanese army one day in April 1938 when she was 21. Meizhi was taken to a "Comfort Station" to serve as a sex slave, henceforth starting her life of a hell on earth. Early this year, Meizhi raged again when she saw on TV Japanese Right-wingers assembled in Osaka, openly denying the Nanjing Massacre atrocities. Recommended by another old man living in the same village, Meizhi attended the "International Academic Seminar on China Comfort Women" held late last March and denounced the atrocities of Japanese army with her experience of blood and tears. In order to participate in the Tokyo Women's International Court of War Criminal, the stepson of Meizhi, Wang Anzhang, with the help of staff of the legislation service office of the township and Professor Su Zhiliang of the China "Comfort Women" Research Center, has finished the plaint and is still gathering materials at present. The 83-year-old Meizhi said: "Why don't they admit what they have done indeed?" "I must win this lawsuit. As long as justice can't be upheld, I won't cease the lawsuit," said she with tears covering faces already. Zhou Mei, living in the same town with Meizhi, was also a comfort woman once and suffered from mental and physical pain too in those days. The 91 years old women, thought living a forlorn life now, still keeps a clear memory of the shocking and horrible experience happening more than 60 years ago. Zhou Xie, son of Zhou Mei, witnessed all those when he was only five years old. The seed of hatred has long been rooted in his heart. Later on he took part in the war to resist US aggression and aid Korea, becoming an excellent pilot. He also has written the plaint and prepared for the opening of the Tokyo court this December.

My recollection of history (in the U.S.) pretty much consists of a quick run-through of Greek-Roman-European history followed by an exclusive focus on U.S. and California history. Probably the greatest focus on Chinese per se involved the immigrant experience during the gold rush (California history) and the related Chinese versus Irish transcontinental railroad competition (U.S. history). There was a vague awareness of the existence of Indian and Chinese cultures, but no more. Modern history was skewed towards Cold War indoctrination (Vietnam had just ended) with little coverage of actual events.

What should be taught about China in school? Who made the Great Wall, or to more confrontational aspects? What is being taught about China in schools today? Anyone recently graduate from high school (or still attending) or have children in high school and care to share?

As a teacher myself, I can say that the Chinese are often discussed when talking about Westward expansion and the building of the railroads in relation to US history. Also, the proliferation of prostitutes and the agent system for importing sex workers over during the same period is also discussed to address the large gender imbalance. There is also a brief examination of the dynasties in world civilation class. In terms of modern history, the revolution, communism, and Mao have became rather passe, but there is obviously more interest aimed at present day China due to the upcoming Olympics. Good reading material to give a broad overview of 20th/21st century history: "Mandate of Heaven" by Orville Schell "The China Fantasy" James Mann "The High Road to China", Kate Teltscherer.

Hi There! I've been listening for a long time. I found this particular podcast most interesting! Please *please* have more shows like this one! It's wonderful to be getting a language refresher AND a history lesson at the same time! Thanks again! irene

In school, I learned that China was where Marco Polo went, and returned with technology for gun powder and noodles. Also, that China was a place I was forbidden to go. (The latter changed after I became an adult.) That was about it. When I was at the University there were classes about Chinese history, culture, language, etc, but I didn't take any, nor did most students. Now when I hear about China in the news it is usually something about American jobs going there, the balance of trade, political opposition to US initiatives on the UN Security Council, or human rights and the Olympics. My general impression is that we Americans are on average dangerously ignorant of the rest of the world. That said, lessons on Chinese history in Chinese are probably not the most effective way to elighten the most Americans, but tell me more, please, I'm interested.

In my schooldays we had one little piece of chinese history and that was about the emperialism and how england tryed to keep up the Opium import to china ( leading into a war...). This lesson was going about 2 schoolhours maximum. The most,well probably all I know about chinese history comes from TV documentarys.

I agree, very very little Chinese history taught in U.S. schools. I'm sure the lack of it had a lot to do with politics. I recently read The Rape of Nanking, by Iris Chang, and I couldn't believe I'd never heard of it. Very sad. Why teach about The Holocaust, but not about this? I highly recommend this book. It's not for the faint-hearted, it is very graphic, and many of the atrocities are truly unbelievable...but this is a powerful book.

calkins... I'm in shock. I'd never heard of it, either. So very, very saddening!

I assume a lot of what people learn(ed) is going to be based on age. I went through high school in the late 80s, and the Soviet Union/ Cold War loomed large--we studied both the Russian and the Chinese Revolutions/ Civil War in detail. China pre-1911 may as well not have existed, alas, even though I was in Vancouver--a city with a massive 華人 population. And I graduated high school in June 1989, and, well... let's just say the Cold War Red China paradigm wasn't exactly broken in that month. As a child of British immigrants who grew up with the Hornblower series of novels, I was more than a little horrified when I finally figured out (during university, reading on my own) what the Opium Wars entailed. It'd always sounded somewhat romantic and rascally to me. Oops. I'm also somewhat troubled by how little I ever learned about the Chinese immigrant experience in "Gold Mountain"--much of the railroad was built by exploited Chinese labour. Novels have admirably filled this gap; I don't know if history classes have caught up. I'd hope that now high school courses do a lot more with China. In the late 80s/ early 90s, to be honest, China just didn't seem that important in an international context, just as today India (2nd most populous) isn't discussed as much as China, and Indonesia (4th) isn't on the radar at all. James Fallows of the Atlantic Monthly is currently based in China, and has recently written a number of interesting articles--pandas, the really odd currency deal between USA and China, traders in ShenZhen... good reading. I'm curious when Sinophobia will come back on the political radar in the States--it's faded into the background post-911, although you still see it when the military attempts to justify their budget. The Olympics could be quite geopolitically interesting... boy, that sentence shows how much of a nerd I am! I couldn't care less about the sports, but I'm very curious about how Americans would react to coming second to China in the medal count. As a quick guess: history tends to focus on when one's own people look good--witness British obsession with the Tudors and World War II, Russian concerns with the Great Patriotic War, American love of the Founding Fathers and Lincoln... And pretty much no countries look good in their historical dealings with China.

Ouch! Sorry if that sounds in any way like criticism of the USA, it's not meant to be, we just happen to be the countries embroiled in it at the time. It was part of the thinking of the times we lived in half a century ago, and I am saddened to know that more USA people have suffered a great deal more than we have. Of course China, due to its extreme unknownness, was painted as the boogey man for a while, then it virtually disappeared off our maps again.

Well, the few lessons I had rather accidentily in 1989 were at least fair. My father told me his teacher in the late 40s still had a quite different "socialization". Those days China was depicted not unlike Auntie Sue put it above - a place with a dangerously amount of people all craving for a world-take-over. And in physics they had to estimate how big the earthquake would be if every Chinese citizen jumped up and down at the same time. Another interesting question is how China is depicted in the media in the west *today*. Accoring to major news outlets they all want to rob our industries, the exchange students are hidden spies, and of course they sent us poisoned and inferior products. If milk prices rise it is because Chinese gobble up all world milk ressources. And if coal prices drop (which hurts our over-subsidized mining industry) it is because China digs up too much coal.

AuntieSue, your comment on SE Asia is spot-on. Of course, in 2005 it emerged that the followup attack of the Gulf of Tonkin incident was misrepresented, not only to get Americans behind the war, but our allies as well. There's nothing anti-American about it. About Chinese history in the West, I sometimes wonder about the flip side of that question; what are the Chinese taught about the West? Previously, I understand that 国民党/國民黨/GúoMínDǎng schools taught that America came to China's aid during WWII; and that the mainland viewed as imperialists. I wonder what they teach in Taiwan now? Or in China?

I'm in my 20s now, and grew up in the mid-western United States. I think I slept through most of history class (needless to say, it wasn't my best subject...), but from what I do remember, we focused mainly on American and European history (this was in the mid-to-late 90s). I do remember specifically studying Greek/Roman history. China, though, was largely unmentioned. I think it was still viewed by my mid-western teachers as a looming giant, semi-uncivilized, and unworthy of class time (or maybe they themselves just didn't know enough to teach about it). Come to think of it, the same goes for the whole continent of Africa. It makes one wonder how we are supposed to understand the unfamiliar if no one will teach us?

Up through 8th grade, history in the US tends to be focused on (Western) European and US history. My high school's history requirements was 2 years of US history and one year of "World Cultures". The World Cultures class spent at least a month or two on China. Two years vs 1-2 months... yes, a very western-centered view. Actually, not even Western; Central and South America did not receive equal treatment to Western Europe. But I suppose a year of world history is more than some have experienced, so I count myself among the lucky ones. I take a modified view of what LostInAsia said... history focuses on one's own people, with a more than slight lean toward one's own good deeds. I'm curious whether history taught in other countries is also just as country-centric. Incidentally, if you're able to find it in the library (otherwise, it's quite expensive), I really enjoyed listening to The Teaching Company's "A Brief History of the World" as an overview of world history... there's one lecture in there that compares and contrasts Han China and the Roman Empire which some may find interesting.

tvan raises a good point. What are the Chinese taught about America? Anyone willing to share?

> I was so angry when I first went to China, >realizing I had no accurate information or understanding >of such a great place. Angry also with myself for letting >that happen. Same here. I made it a priority to check things for myself once I realized that the education I got in my country ([West--Germany, late 80s, cold war) was heavily influenced by politics.

I investigated. :) My wife told me she had a semester of "World history" in school (1 school hour per week). Contents encompassed classic European history (Greek/Roman), the discovery of America, colonialization (of course), industrial revolution, and the two World Wars.

When I was a little kid, we were all told that this mysterious foreign place contained unimaginable millions of evil people, whose primary aim in life was to come to Australia and change our type of government without us being forced to go and vote any more. Their method was to play hopscotch across all the island nations until they reached here. I can still see all the maps and diagrams that were repeatedly on TV, in newspapers, and anywhere you might see a poster. One of these small countries en route was busy having a war with itself at the time, and that was holding up the evil invasion plan. If we could charge over there with guns and make the right side win, that country couldn't be used as a stepping stone and we would not be invaded. Also, the USA wanted us to do it. They insisted. If we didn't send our teenagers to that war, we would lose the USA's protection and worse, could become enemies of the USA, which sounded at least as dangerous as the aforementioned forced change of government. So we did it. Lots of our kids died there not understanding who they were fighting and why, soon the lie was exposed, and as we know the whole schamozzle went belly up. And nobody ever mentioned China again after those initial propaganda diagrams had completed their task.