Tao Xingzhi
Tao Xingzhi | |
---|---|
陶行知 | |
Born | October 18, 1891 |
Died | July 25, 1946 | (aged 54)
Nationality | Chinese |
Alma mater | University of Illinois Columbia University |
Tao Xingzhi (Chinese: 陶行知; pinyin: Táo Xíngzhī; Wade–Giles: T'ao Hsing-chih; October 18, 1891 – July 25, 1946), was a renowned Chinese educator and reformer in the Republic of China mainland era. He studied at Teachers College, Columbia University, and returned to China to champion progressive education. His career in China as a liberal educator was not derivative of John Dewey, as some have alleged, but creative and adaptive. He returned to China at a time when the American influence was zesty and self-confident, and his very name at that time (zhixing) meant "knowledge-action," reflecting the catch-phrase of the Neo-Confucian philosopher Wang Yangming which implied that once knowledge (zhi) had been obtained, then action (xing) would be easy.[1]
Biography
Returning from study in the United States at
In December 1921, Cai Yuanpei, Tao, and other educationists founded the National Association for the Advancement of Education (Zhong-Hua jiaoyu gaijin hui) and he was elected as secretary-general. Through the society the educationists promoted the forming of modern education system in China.
In August 1923, Tao and
In 1946, after the Yucai School was harassed by the political police, he moved back to Shanghai. Fearing that he would meet the same fate as other intellectuals assassinated by right wing Nationalists, he worked frantically, leading to exhaustion and death. Zhou Enlai rushed to his home and called him a "non-Party Bolshevik." Tao's reputation was high for the next few years, but in the early 1950s he came under attack as a "bourgeois liberal." In the 1980s, the "Tao Xingzhi Study Society" was founded by Song Enrong, who edited a multivolume edition of Tao's writings.
Nanjing Xiaozhuang Normal College
The Xiaozhuang Normal College, which Tao founded in 1927 and was closed due to political reasons in 1930, was reopened in 1951, after the founding of the
See also
- Memorial of Tao Xingzhi
Notes
- ^ T'ao Hsing-chih was a professor at Faculty of Education of Nanjing Higher Normal School which later became Normal School of Nanjing University and then after 1952 became Nanjing Normal University.
References
- ^ "T'ao Hsing-chih," in Howard Boorman, ed. Biographical Dictionary of Republican China Vol IV, pp. 243–248[ISBN missing]
- ^ (Chinese) "学校简介" Official Website of Xiaozhuang University Retrieved August 27, 2011
- ^ Hubert Brown, "American Progressivism in China: The Case of Tao Xingzhi," in Hayhoe and Bastid, editors, China's Education and the Industrialized World, pp. 120–138, quotes at pp. 126.[ISBN missing]
- ^ a b c (Chinese) "历史沿革" Official Website of Xiaozhuang University Retrieved August 27, 2011
- ^ Wei Dongming, "Weidadi Renmin jiaoyujia dazong shijen" (A great people's educator, poet of the masses), in Tao Xingzhi jinian wenji (Chengdu: Sichuan Peoples Publishing House, 1982), pp. 101–103[ISBN missing]
- ^ 敢于创新的人民教育家 Archived 2011-08-29 at the Wayback Machine, China Education News, July 19, 2003, Section 3.
Further reading
- "T'ao Hsing-chih," in Howard Boorman, ed., Biographical Dictionary of Republican China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970) III.243–248.[ISBN missing]
- Stacey Bieler, "Patriots" or "Traitors"? A History of American-Educated Chinese Students (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2004).[ISBN missing]
- Yusheng Yao, "Rediscovering Tao Xingzhi as an Educational and Social Revolutionary," Twentieth Century China 27.2 (April 2002): 79–120.
- Yusheng Yao, "The Making of a National Hero: Tao Xingzhi's Legacies in the People's Republic of China," Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies 24.2 (July–September 2002): 251–281.