[ { "id": 212012, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1989", "page_number": 427, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "402\n\ncivilization occurred during the time of Confucius and not, as Schwartz argued in his latest book, The World Of Thought In Ancient China (1985), half a millennium earlier in the Western Zhou. Metzger underlines foundations for individual moral autonomy in traditional Chinese thought, a position contradicting the general evaluation (supported by Schwartz) that 'Confucian norms emphasized the importance of the group at the expense of the individual's freedom, spontaneity, creativity and moral autonomy', (p. 263). The fact that Chang's analysis uncovers no decisive break with tradition, but only a 'counter-tendency' to the cosmological myth which legitimated imperial rule (pp. 30-31), manifests the need to question the usefulness of positing an axial age when applied to pre-Qin cultures. Studies edited by Eisenstadt have recognized this methodological dilemma, noting the difficulty of identifying a period of radical metaphysical construction and social repositioning during Confucius' era. This leaves open the possibility that Schwartz's location of the major shift in the earlier period of the sage kings, in spite of oracular bone evidence to the contrary (pp. 18-19), may yet identify an important option. Metzger's challenge, on the other hand, unveils a leitmotif which weaves the polychronic essays into a single tapestry: the question of the relationship between modernity and China.\n\nThese essays being divided into four general sections entitled 'Thought', 'Literature and Culture', 'Political Theory', and 'Culture and Methodology' — tend to converge on either characterizing the process of modernization in some dimension of Chinese societies or evaluating the methods scholars have employed to illuminate China's status in the modern world. These convergences are imbedded in comparative discussions of intriguing complexity, making this thread less easy to identify at times. Nevertheless, recourse to the touchstone of modernity is a central feature of the volume. In fact, the discussion regarding it is not always complementary.\n\nDon Wyatt, like Metzger, locates a singular continuity in Confucianism: Confucian language is \"this-worldly\", especially in its use of analogical arguments, (pp. 42-57). Surprisingly, perhaps, this does not mean that Confucianists (especially in the Song) did not address metaphysical, even other-worldly, ideas. Emphasizing this kind of 'language consensus' which sinologists have regularly typified as this-worldly, Wyatt goes so far as to claim that, although Confucian society was clearly stratified, no class-bound structures are evident in Confucian language, (p. 61). Whether or not this is still the case, this assertion", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212013, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1989", "page_number": 428, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "403\n\nis starkly countered by David Arkush's study of Hebei village opera in the twenties. Concluding his perceptive study of the underside of China's recent history, Arkush observes that, at least in rural northern China, 'the moral categories and values of the ruling elites did not totally dominate the thinking of the subordinate classes', (p. 105). The illustrations presented to support this claim reveal not only a rupture in thought but also in language. How true was this of the pre-Republican period? Do these folk themes reflect a popular contrapuntal, an unprinted Zhuangziese, which actually questioned the values and concepts inherent in Confucian discourse?\n\nThe ‘optimistic this-worldliness' Metzger discovers as a continuous element of Chinese scholars' historiography and cultural analysis tends to bypass Wyatt's identification of metaphysical themes which, though 'premodern', are still approached without intellectual incredulity by some of these same scholars. Metzger recognizes this fact, but believes that an issue more important than general philosophical discussions of human nature is the actual production of ‘self-propelled adults' in Chinese society, (p. 284). These morally autonomous leaders are in fact the reason why China could maintain its cultural continuity as well as uphold a normative vision of culture for her future generations. Whether in premodern China or in Mao's Republic, this salient feature of the morally autonomous individual can be observed. Metzger draws this to a point by announcing that modern China has 'fully merged with liberalism and humanism', (p. 288).\n\nThis evaluation is explicitly denied by Leo Ou-Fan Lee, who carefully distinguishes between the adoption of 'historical modernism' by Chinese intellectuals in the twentieth century (i.e. progressive history) and their general irresponsiveness to Western 'esthetic modernism', (pp. 109 ff). Examples of the latter are few and far between, as Jeffrey Kinkey's study of a young writer in the eighties affirms. Metzger was more reserved in his judgement earlier in his essay, admitting that China, following Alistair McIntyre's criteria for modernity, had only committed herself to socialism and not to existentialism or some form of ethical scepticism, (pp. 269, 279). Metzger's promotion of an ‘anti-teleological' historical methodology as the proper tool for more critical studies of China by Chinese intellectuals flies in the face of Lee's awareness of the salient historically progressive element in China's modern consciousness. The suggestion may well be beneficial, but it sets up a tension between Chinese and non-Chinese forms of modernity. It seems a poignant truth that", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213266, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1994", "page_number": 88, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "68\n\nback door. In this way prosperous winds are not allowed to blow straight out of the other side. Considerable care was taken, too, in selecting the positions and angles of the two long escalators leading up to the first floor of the Bank. They should not directly 'confront' the entrance.\n\nUnlike most enterprises in urban Hong Kong 'The Bank' still has an open space in front of it and a sea view. The harbour is the bathing place of the dragon. With water signifying money this is important. Water is the most powerful of all the Elements. It is non-resistant. It can wear away rocks. A deluge can sweep all before it.\n\nIn many cases planners go to some lengths, among other measures, to ensure that interior water features assist good joss to circulate throughout a building. The height of the ejection of water of a fountain is often considered important.\n\nThe now liquidated Hong Kong Branch of the Bank of Credit and Commerce was sadly not so wise. '... the BCC displayed a large water feature which cascaded away from the entrance... this means (in fung shui terms) wealth pours out of the bank. I am surprised anyone should put their money into this bank in the first place,' a fung shui master contended.\n\nThere are countless cases where western managements have paid consideration to fung shui in Hong Kong (Saw, 1990:8) In Exchange Square, for example, a special skylight was installed and the 'water curtains' on either side of the two escalators are spectacular. In the Hyatt Regency Hotel doors and furniture were repositioned.\n\nVirgin Atlantic Airways timed their first flight to the Far East to start on a propitious day. Marks and Spencer buried lucky gold coins in strategic positions under floors in its stores, and Arthur Andersen, the accounting firm, also pays regard to the 'caring philosophy'. Asians, of course, like to see Westerners respecting their culture. In turn, it is good for business (Sunday Times, 1995:16).\n\nThe author has no hard data, but his personal recollections are that clearly far more interest is shown in fung shui by western establishments today than 40 or so years ago. Certainly there is far more interest in it now than there was between the two World Wars. Going back still further,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213394, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1994", "page_number": 216, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "204\n\nHunter, Jane, The Gospel of Gentility, American Women Missionaries in Turn-of the Century China, New Haven Yale University Press, 1984\n\nHunter, W C. The 'Fan Kwae' at Canton, London Kegan Paul, 1882 (Taipei Reprint Ch'eng-wen Publishing)\n\nHunter, William, Bits of Old China, London K Paul, French, 1885\n\nHutchison, James Lafayette, China Hand, Boston and New York Lothrop, Lee and Shepard, 1936\n\nHutchison, Paul, ed. A Guide to Important Missionary Stations in Eastern China Lying Along the Main Routes of Travel, Shanghai Mission Book Company, 1920\n\nHyatt, Irwin T, Jr, Our Ordered Lives Confess. Three 19th Century Missionaries in East Shantung, Cambridge (Mass). Harvard University Press, 1976\n\nIchiko, Chuzo, Political and Institutional Reform, Cambridge History of China, vol II, 375-415\n\nInglis, Brian, The Opium War, London Hodder and Stoughton, 1976\n\nInternational Mission Council, Christian Education in China, A Study Made by an Education Commission Representing the Mission Boards and Societies Conducting Work in China, New York, 1922\n\nIsaacs, Harold Robert. Images of Asia, New York and London. Harper and Row, 1972\n\nJesuits, Letters from Missions, The Travels of Several Learned Missioners of the Society of Jesus translated from the French in 1713, London printed for R Gosling, 1714\n\n1\n\nJohnston, Alan James, The Footprints of the Pheasant in the Snow, Portland Me Johnston, 1976, 1978\n\nJohnston, R. F, From Peking to Mandalay, London John Murray, 1903 (Taipei Reprint Ch'eng-wen Publishing)\n\nTwilight in the Forbidden City, London Victor Gollancz, 1934 (Hong Kong Reprint Oxford University Press)\n\nJones, Francis Clifford, Shanghai and Tientsin, With Special Reference to Foreign interests, London Oxford University Press, 1940\n\nKemp, Emily Georgina (b 1860), The Face of China. Travels in Eastern, Northern, Central and Western China, with Some Accounts of New School, Universities, Missions, New York Duffield and Co. 1909\n\nChinese Mettle, London and New York Hodder and Stoughton, 1921", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214828, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1999", "page_number": 243, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "209\n\nto find there is an image of the great Ch'ing emperor Ch'ien Lung (reigned 1735-1798) on the altar!\n\nMy own experiences in Hong Kong have highlighted this feature of Chinese religious life. Examples that come to light include the many images washed-up from the sea and placed in temples or shrines (Shaukiwan and Ngau Chi Wan, East Kowloon), the Kwun Yam image in the Tai Ping Shan temple to that goddess, and the Kwun Yam image that started the Kwun Yam Temple at Tung Shan, east Kowloon. These examples, readily multiplied here and elsewhere, amount to \"cults of numberless description\".\n\n30 There is much relevant background in the long chapter on Chinese religion in\n\nVol. II of Latourette, op.cit., especially at pp. 124-132, 139-140, and 162-167.\n\n31 See Hong Kong Standard [ ] February 1986, with photographs, for a recent example at Shun Fung Village (Fui Sha Wai), Yuen Long, occasioned by the tree in question having to be felled to make way for the construction of the Light Rail System.\n\n32 William John Townsend, Robert Morrison, The Pioneer of Chinese Missions (London, Partridge & Co., n.d. but my copy presented in 1892), pp.266-267. John Crawford also singles out the women for special mention in the journal of his embassy to Siam and Cochin China in 1821-22, where he cites from the Manuscript of Monsieur Chaigneau, \"The religion of Cochin China is, with little difference, the same as that of China. The lower orders, the women, the ignorant, follow the worship of Buddha; while persons of rank, and men of letters, are of the sect of Confucius”. See John Crawford (with an Introduction by David K.Wyatt) Journal of an Embassy to the Courts of Siam and Cochin China (Singapore, Oxford University Press, 1987), p.500, fn.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215168, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2000", "page_number": 264, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "A Brief History of Technical Education in Hong Kong\n\nsystem. After all, most people have been to school and, therefore, many are instant experts.\n\nClaude Burgess, Colonial Secretary from 1958-1963, said that Hong Kong was a problem of people. Indeed one sometimes wonders how other countries' education systems would have fared if their populations had increased at the rate Hong Kong's has. Post-World War Two education started from a low base line, but by 1981, universal, compulsory, free education had been introduced.\n\nThe proof of the rice dumpling has to be in the eating, just as you judge an education system by the students who graduate. Many of those who studied technical education in Hong Kong have gone right to the top of their chosen fields. A few have graduated from the Polytechnic, or its predecessor the Technical College, and have become members of the Legislative or Executive Councils.\n\nTo achieve what we have, certainly in the old days when funds were restricted, there had to be a force of long-serving, dedicated teachers. Members of staff who gave stability and shape to the technical education scene, in spite of its limitations some of which have been noted in this brief paper.\n\nIf you cannot live with change Hong Kong is not the place to be. Certainly over the past half century the pace of change has been staggering. I cast my mind back to when we teachers were invited in 1956, by past building students, to a Chinese dinner in the woodwork workshop, at the old Technical College in Wood Road. They engaged outside caterers and the food was cooked in the corridor. The cost was around $100.00 per round, Chinese table seating 12 persons. Today, every New Year I am graciously invited by my past students, some of whom have already retired, to a Technical College/Polytechnic/Polytechnic University Ball at the Grand Hyatt. How things have changed! As you can see I still keep in touch with some of my old students, both locally and overseas, some of whom I taught over 40 years ago.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215678, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 455, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "407\n\nTHE LIFE AND TIMES OF\n\nCAPTAIN SAMUEL CORNEL PLANT, MASTER MARINER AND SENIOR INSPECTOR, UPPER YANGTZE RIVER,\n\nCHINESE MARITIME CUSTOMS\n\nA.C. BROMFIELD WITH ROSEMARY LEE\n\nHow it started!\n\nGrave Number 8496 28479\n\nSection 12\n\nHong Kong Cemetery\n\nIn memory of Captain Samuel Cornell Plant Upper Yangtze River Inspector of the Chinese Maritime Customs\n\nThe first to command a merchant steamer plying the river (1900). Born Framlingham Suffolk 8th August 1866 Died at sea 26th February 1921\n\nAlso in memory of Alice Sophia Plant, Captain Plant's wife and devoted companion throughout his 20 years of toil on the dangerous section\n\nof the Yangtze River between Ichang and Chunking. Born 29th November 1870. Died at Hong Kong 28th February 1921.\n\n(Restored by members of the Merchant Navy Guild, Hong Kong 1957. Researched by\n\nRosemary J. Pyatt, 23rd December 1997)\n\nArchibald Little and the Three Gorges\n\nIn 1859, a young Scot named Archibald Little, (he was a very large man), started working as a tea-taster for a German company in Kiukiang. He came of a prominent, expatriate, Shanghai family, one of his brothers being a doctor in Shanghai and another the editor of the North China Daily News. He soon became bored with tea-tasting and set up in business for himself, becoming interested in many aspects of trade, brokering and insurance. He was one of the first expatriates to", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215683, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 460, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "412\n\nHe was 55 years old. His wife died on 28th February, 1921 in the Hong Kong Civil Hospital. Both are buried in Section 12 of the Hong Kong Cemetery. (photograph)\n\nOn reading the report of their funeral in the Hong Kong press, another mystery emerges - that of their two adopted daughters.\n\nIn our research we found mention of them only once, in the detailed report of the funeral in the South China Morning Post of 3rd March, 1921. Theirs was a large funeral conducted by the Bishop of North China and attended by representatives from the large shipping companies as well as the Navy. We read.... 'The chief mourners were the two Chinese adopted daughters of the deceased...,' whom, it goes on to say, were to be looked after by Butterfield and Swire 'pending ascertainment of the provision made for them by their deceased guardians.' Nowhere else have we found mention of these children.\n\nWhat happened to them?\n\nIn publishing this short article we hope to hear from readers who may be able to contribute to the completion of the Plant story.\n\nAcknowledgements\n\nOur interest in the Plant family was aroused on reading Simon Winchester's book The River at the Centre of the World. Thanks go to Dr. D. D. Waters, Past President of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Mrs. May Holdsworth, Ms. Charlotte Bleasdale of Swires, Mrs. Merilyn Hywel-Jones from BACSA, the Pyatt family who researched and photographed the Plant grave in Happy Valley Cemetery in Hong Kong, and to Major Arthur Kirby of the Framlingham and District Local History and Preservation Society. Po Leung Kuk in Hong Kong and the Office of Cemeteries and Cremations, Urban Services Department, Hong Kong, also searched their records. All took a sustained interest in this project and gave willingly of their time to help with research.\n\n1 [Hon. Ed. - Does anyone know what became of it?]", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 } ]