The Agote Map of Hainan Island,China: A Case Study for Cultural Dialogue in Eighteenth-Century Cartography

The idea of cartography as an example of Western imposition or process of cultural transfer is one that has long fascinated scholars interested in the margins of empires. This article analyses the maps in the possession of Manuel Agote, a Spanish factor in Canton at the end of the eighteenth century. The focus is on the use made by Agote of a Chinese map of Hainan, together with the European maps available already in China for commercial interests, and the way this reflects the cultural dialogue that was operating among local and foreign cartographers engaged in similar European mapping activities in the region.     

《报任安书》三题

文章讨论司马迁《报任安书》中的两个“不得已”与“曼辞以自饰”的意义以及与“从上雍”相关的结构分析问题。     

‘Caught’ between foreign cultural and development policies: perspectives of German Studies and German as a foreign language in Africa

The promotion of the German language abroad and of German Studies plays a central role in German Foreign Cultural Policy. With regard to Sub-Saharan Africa, otherwise a peripheral region for foreign policy, German as foreign language is firmly established as second language after English. Learners especially in Francophone West and Central Africa have increased over the past decade. Numerous funding programmes and actions are supported by German nongovernmental organizations at college/university levels. But bilateral cooperation between German and African academic institutions are challenged both by negative perceptions of the ‘Global South’ among Western colleagues and by an infrastructure adverse to research and to career development in most African countries. Additionally, North/South relations are traditionally seen in terms of (under-)development by German institutions, effecting cooperation. The paper develops a differentiated picture of African Studies in Africa, and outlines benefits that can be attained through collaboration ‘at eye-level’.     

Masters of Healing: Cocaine and the Ideal of the Victorian Medical Man

This article offers a new perspective on the relationship between cocaine and medical practitioners in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Britain. Cocaine is often understood as one of a number of potentially addictive substances to which Victorian physicians and surgeons were regularly exposed, and tempted to indulge in. However, while cocaine has frequently been associated with discourses of addiction, this article proposes that it was also widely represented as a technological triumph, and that the drug was frequently used as a symbol for the scientific and moral virtues of the medical man. The argument draws on popular journalism, medical publications, and fiction to establish the cultural context of cocaine at the fin de siècle. In 1884, cocaine was revealed to be the first effective local anaesthetic, and this article traces the processes by which cocaine came to be regarded as the iconic achievement of nineteenth-century therapeutic science. This aura of innovative brilliance in turn communicated itself to the medical professionals who employed cocaine in their work, so that many patients and practitioners alike depicted cocaine as a most fitting emblem for the idealized selfhood of the modern medical man. This idea also informs portrayals of the drug in fiction, and I conclude with a detailed analysis of L. T. Meade’s 1895 short story, ‘The Red Bracelet’ (published in the Strand Magazine as part of Meade’s series, ‘Stories from the Diary of a Doctor’), as an example of the way in which cocaine functions as metaphor for the physician’s unassailable moral primacy and technical excellence.     

The two starting points of World War II: a reexamination from a global perspective

Although the factual chronology of World War II is not in dispute, how to best make sense of these facts and how to objectively evaluate that history have always been limited by political circumstances and personal biases. Viewing WWII seven decades later, we need to move away from Eurocentrism and to stop seeing the war from the prism of a European war or Pacific war. The entire history of WWII, from beginning to end, including its several phases characterized by fermentation, outbreak, climax, and conclusion, is extremely complex. This paper argues that the war has two origins or starting points because it resulted from disparate prewar conditions in Europe and Asia. Viewed from this perspective, the strategic importance of the China Theater in WWII and the enormous sacrifices and contributions the Chinese people made to the victory over Fascism and for world peace ought to be given due credit.     

The cultivation of Communist cadres during the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression

During the Chinese War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) made great progress in its cultivation of cadres. The favorable environment of the National United Front made it possible for the CCP to successfully train a large number of cadres with intellectual backgrounds while continuously using and promoting those who came from worker or peasant backgrounds. By so doing, the CCP raised the quality of its cadres. The CCP’s cultivation of its cadres during the War of Resistance was a systematic undertaking, with interrelated and mutually reinforcing components of education, training, examination, criticism, and self-criticism. Based on cadre self-consciousness and training, a regularized yet not rigid process of cadre cultivation was established. During the same period, the CCP also launched a rectification campaign (Zhengfeng yundong) to further unify and transform the Party. This important movement also left a deep mark on the cultivation of Communist cadres.     

Embodied bicycle commuters in a car world

As an initiative to increase cycling, bike to work (BTW) events emphasize a pragmatic approach in which people learn through sensory experience. Pragmatism contends that the lived experience of the commuter within fluid geographies of social and physical conditions informs commuting knowledge and behavior. I researched how bicyclists participate in the 2012 BTW event in Lake Tahoe (USA) and how these experiences facilitate the process of becoming bicycle commuters. My study included participant observations, interviews, video observations, and route mapping. I analyzed this data with thematic and narrative analyses. I find that the BTW event illuminates bicycling, a normally invisible practice in a car world, and creates temporary bicycle-friendly spaces that provide the embodied experience and knowledge of bicycle commuting within context. Through this lived experience, participants can break free from unconscious car-based patterns and become embodied bicycle commuters who engage in active renegotiations of their commuting practices.     

为了平等而不平等——从学校向工农开门看新中国的教育平等努力(1949—1965)

中国共产党自成立起就把争取工农群众受教育权利和受教育机会作为己任。新中国人民民主专政政权的建立,使广大人民获得了平等的受教育权,但是长期以来工农教育劣势却不是自然而然就能改变的。学校向工农开门就是中国共产党为增加工农受教育机会、实现真正的教育平等而做出的一种努力。在实践中,虽然采取了各种优先照顾工农青年、工农子女入学的措施,但是工农入学机会尤其是高等学校入学机会却一直不能与其他群体相比肩。于是,1958年以后学校向工农开门力度进一步加大,并且随着阶级路线的贯彻,一些"剥削阶级"子女接受高等教育机会受到限制。这就使新中国教育平等的价值追求呈现"为了平等而不平等"的特点。     

略议风景植被

文本提出了风景植被的含义,阐述了风景植被的发生是人类文明进化的结果,分析了风景植被的宏观构景和微观信息特征。同时还以西安临潼骊山旅游区为例,介绍了风景植被的分类系统。     

北洋政府的侨资政策及其评价

民国北洋政府时期是华侨回国投资兴办实业蓬勃发展的阶段。这与海外华侨资本的迅猛增强密切相关 ,同时也与这一时期积极的工商政策与侨资政策有着直接的联系。北洋政府的侨资政策不仅继承了晚清积极引进侨资的政策 ,而且有所发展 ,有所创新 ,并收到了一定的成效