of Hong Kong's colonial history.
329
CHARLES WALKER
D. E. Mungello. Curious Land: Jesuit Accommodation and the Origins of Sinology. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989. 405+2pp. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.
The title of the book leads the reader to expect a discourse on the development of Sinology out of the accommodative approach which the Jesuits took to missionary work in China. However, this is not the theme which the author pursues. Rather he writes about the historical development of Jesuit accommodation in the 17th century within the context of European intellectual traditions and concerns, paying particular attention to the impact of their published works and in some cases correspondence with contemporary European scholars, whom he characterizes as 'proto-sinologists'.
The author's concept of accommodation is not adequately defined in the introductory remarks where he says only that it applies to the setting in China where Jesuit missionaries accommodated Western learning to the Chinese cultural scene and attempted to achieve the acceptance of the Chinese literati through the 'Confucian-Christian synthesis' (p. 15). Much later the author spells out other very important aspects of his perception of Jesuit accommodation, namely 'the supplying of Europe with information about China' (p. 207) as part of their on-going public relations effort which was conducted within the context of Ricci's accommodation whose Confucian-Christian synthesis represented 'a formula for the intellectual assimilation of China by Europeans' (p. 507). Although he notes that this appears not to have been a part of the original formulation of Jesuit accommodation in China, but appears rather to have developed 'out of practical needs' (p. 207), the author gives it nearly equal weight with the Chinese directed aspect of accommodation in his selection and presentation of data throughout this work. Therefore, the reader would have been better served by an early introduction of this idea.
The author coins the term 'proto-sinology' for the early study of China in Europe which he claims, and goes on to show, was intimately connected with the Jesuits' China mission (p. 13). Noting that the term 'applies to Europe where the assimilation of knowledge
of Hong Kong's colonial history.
329
CHARLES WALKER
D. E. Mungello. Curious Land: Jesuit Accommodation and the Origins of Sinology. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989. 405+2pp. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.
The title of the book leads the reader to expect a discourse on the development of Sinology out of the accommodative approach which the Jesuits took to missionary work in China. However, this is not the theme which the author pursues. Rather he writes about the historical development of Jesuit accommodation in the 17th century within the context of European intellectual traditions and concerns, paying particular attention to the impact of their published works and in some cases correspondence with contemporary European scholars, whom he characterizes as 'proto-sinologists'.
The author's concept of accommodation is not adequately defined in the introductory remarks where he says only that it applies to the setting in China where Jesuit missionaries accommodated Western learning to the Chinese cultural scene and attempted to achieve the acceptance of the Chinese literati through the Confucian-Christian synthesis' (p. 15). Much later the author spells out other very important aspects of his perception of Jesuit accommodation, namely the supplying of Europe with information about China' (p. 207) as part of their on-going public relations effort which was conducted within the context of Ricci's accommodation whose Confucian-Christian synthesis represented a formula for the intellectual assimilation of China by Europeans' (p. 507). Although he notes that this appears not to have been a part of the original formulation of Jesuit accommodation in China, but appears rather to have developed out of practical needs' (p. 207), the author gives it nearly equal weight with the Chinese directed aspect of accommodation in his selection and presentation of data throughout this work. Therefore, the reader would have been better served by an early introduction of this idea.
The author coins the term 'proto-sinology' for the early study of China in Europe which he claims, and goes on to show, was intimately connected with the Jesuits' China mission (p. 13). Noting that the term 'applies to Europe where the assimilation of knowledge
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