Arthur Henderson Smith
Arthur Henderson Smith (July 18, 1845 – August 31, 1932) (Chinese name: 明恩溥; pinyin: Ming Enpu) was a missionary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions noted for spending 54 years as a missionary in China and writing books which presented China to foreign readers. These books include Chinese Characteristics, Village Life in China and The Uplift of China. In the 1920s, Chinese Characteristics was still the most widely read book on China among foreign residents there.
Biography
He was born in Vernon, Connecticut, to a middle-class Protestant family described by historian
In 1907 Smith was elected the American co-chair of the China Centenary Missionary Conference in Shanghai, a conference attended by more than 1,000 Protestant missionaries. He retired in 1926, 54 years after his arrival in China. His wife died the same year. He died in California in 1932 at the age of 87.[3]
The Boxer Uprising
In 1898 and 1899 an indigenous anti-foreign movement arose in Shandong province. One of the missionaries there, possibly Smith, named the participants, mostly farmers, the
Smith’s role in the siege was a minor one as a gate guard, but he gathered material for his book, China in Convulsion, which is the most detailed account of the Boxer Rebellion.
Influence and legacy
Smith's acerbic style and pithy judgments excited interest in both Chinese and Westerners. Chinese Characteristics was translated into Japanese, and from that translation into Chinese. One study found that among English readers the book was the most widely read book on China until it was replaced by
Smith drew a range of comment from later Western historians and critics.
Smith is also remembered for speaking out against the Chinese practice of infanticide of girls and drawing attention to this often-ignored practice.[13]
Selected works
- Chinese Characteristics (New York: Revell, 1894). Various reprints: EastBridge, D'Asia Vue, with a Preface by Lydia Liu, 2003.
- Village Life in China; a Study in Sociology. New York, Chicago [etc.]: F. H. Revell Company, 1899. Various reprints.
- China in Convulsion. New York,: F. H. Revell Co., 1901. Volume 1[14] Volume 2[15]
- Proverbs and Common Sayings from the Chinese: Together with Much Related and Unrelated Matter, Interspersed with Observations on Chinese Things-in-general (1902)
- Rex Christus: an outline study of China (1904)
- The Uplift of China (1907)[16]
- China and America To-day: A Study of Conditions and Relations, Volume 1 (1907)
- Proverbs and Common Sayings from the Chinese, Together with Much Related and Unrelated Matter, Interspersed with Observations on Chinese Things in General. New York, 1914. Reprint, Paragon 1965.
See also
Notes
- ^ JSTOR 43898357. Retrieved 23 August 2021.
- ^ "Arthur Henderson Smith". Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Christianity.
- ^ Thompson, 216,219
- ^ Thompson, Larry Clinton. William Scott Ament and the Boxer Rebellion: Heroism, Hubris, and the Ideal Missionary. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2009, 47
- ^ Thompson, 90, 189
- ^ "Boxer Rebellion Indemnity:the overture of Chinese students coming to the United States". Beloit College. Retrieved 2013-02-23.
- ^ Thompson, 219
- ^ Hayford (1985), p. 154.
- ^ Lydia H. Liu, ”Translating National Character: Lu Xun and Arthur Smith,” Ch 2, Translingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity: China 1900-1937 (Stanford University Press, 1995).
- ^ Isaacs (1958), p. 137.
- ^ Isaacs (1958), p. 115 n. 36.
- )
- ISBN 978-0-7425-5531-0.
- ^ Smith, Arthur Henderson (15 August 2017). "China in Convulsion". F. H. Revell Company – via Google Books.
- ^ Smith, Arthur Henderson (15 August 2017). "China in a Convulsion". Fleming H. Revell Company – via Google Books.
- ^ Smith, Arthur Henderson; Education, Baptist Forward Movement for Missionary; Society, American Baptist Foreign Mission (1912). The uplift of China. Published for the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society by the American Baptist Publication Society – via Internet Archive.
References
- Myron Cohen, "Introduction," Village Life in China (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970).
- Hayford, Charles W. (1985). "Chinese and American Characteristics: Arthur H. Smith and His China Book". In Barnett, Suzanne.W.; Fairbank, John King (eds.). Christianity in China: Early Protestant Missionary Writings. Cambridge, MA: Harvard. pp. 153–174.. Internet Archive Online Here
- ISBN 0873321618. Internet Archive online here.
- Lydia Liu,”Translating National Character: Lu Xun and Arthur Smith,” Ch 2, Translingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity: China 1900-1937 (Stanford 1995). Shows how Chinese nationalists made use of Smith's Chinese Characteristics, which had been quickly translated into Japanese, thence into Chinese.
- Lodwick, Kathleen L. (2000). "Smith, Arthur Henderson (1845-1932), Missionary". American National Biography. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198606697.
- Theodore D. Pappas, “Arthur Henderson Smith and the American Mission in China,” Wisconsin Magazine of History 70.3 (Spring 1987): 163-186. JSTOR https://www.jstor.org/stable/4636056
- Larry Clinton Thompson, William Scott Ament and the Boxer Rebellion: Heroism, Hubris, and the Ideal Missionary. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2009
External links
Media related to Arthur Henderson Smith at Wikimedia Commons
- Guide to the Arthur Henderson Smith Papers Beloit College Archives.
- Works by Arthur H. Smith at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about Arthur Henderson Smith at Internet Archive
- WorldCat Arthur H. Smith Authority Page.
- Arthur Henderson Smith Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Christianity