Taiwan, situated at the intersection of ocean and continent, entered recorded history four hundred years ago, and at the same time took a place on the stage of early modern world history. Despite the fact that over the centuries the island has been subject to colonization at the hands of several nations, Taiwan has nonetheless been seen as a prime location for the study of Chinese society and culture, attracting many foreign scholars to do fieldwork. Taiwan has also exported a considerable amount of sinological literature to satisfy the demand of academic institutions around the world. This exhibition examines some of the factors behind these trends. Before the 20th century, the academic tradition on Formosa was quite weak. However, Taiwan may now count itself a bastion of sinological research. What cultural and scholarly trajectories has sinology in Taiwan developed along? How have Taiwan’s humanities and social sciences, and sinology in particular, repositioned themselves among the crosscurrents of globalization and localization after the end of the Cold War and in the wake of economic and political reforms in mainland China?
This exhibition highlights sinological materials in Taiwan, revealing their origins and characteristics in the context of the development of Taiwanese culture and scholarship. It showcases the indigenous traditions of Han people in Taiwan, the sinological materials and tradition of scholarship that accompanied the Nationalist Government in its move to Taiwan six decades ago, and the continual growth and expansion of Taiwanese scholarship. Each of these is shown in a new light. Exhibits have been placed in six groups based on type rather than academic discipline. These include:1. official documents; 2. ancient texts, rubbings and social documents; 3. images and drama; 4. material culture; 5. Chinese language and characters; 6. maps and the Geographic Information System (GIS).
With advances in computer technology and the development of the internet over the past three decades, the Taiwanese academy has undertaken the large-scale digitization of sinological archives. In the spirit of scholarly openness, sharing, and cooperation, we will continue to invite researchers around the world to make use of this precious digitized cultural heritage, and join us in welcoming a new age in humanities research.
Development of Taiwanese Culture and Scholarship
Taiwan, located east of the Eurasian continent and originally inhabited by Austronesian people, was drawn into political and economical change on the global stage in the 17th century. During this period, colonial powers from Western Europe competed with each other in Asia, and the Qing dynasty superseded the Ming in China. Over the course of a century, control of Taiwan passed from one power to the next. These complicated developments brought Taiwan into the age of recorded history.
Under Qing dynasty rule, Han people gradually came to Taiwan. Out of the wilderness, they formed a frontier society, and engaged in agriculture and commerce. Immigrants from Fujian and Guangdong brought their religious beliefs and customs with them. Traditional Chinese culture thus took root in Taiwan, changing and adapting to local conditions. Over the 18th and 19th centuries, this competitive frontier society fostered an elite culture of scholar-officials. These literati studied the traditional Chinese classics and took the imperial examination, thus bringing Taiwan into the Sinosphere.
After the mid-19th century, European imperial powers posed a new threat in East Asia. China and Japan took different paths toward modernization in response to this challenge. Taiwan became a Japanese colony. A generation of young Taiwanese intellectuals studied in Japan, and encountered rational modern thought and culture through the Japanese language. Liberal currents swept across Taiwanese society during the fifty years of Japan’s rule. The arts and letters flourished, and Western-style higher education and a spirit of scientific inquiry took root.
After World War II ended and the communist government took power in China, millions of refugees came to Taiwan. Among them were intellectuals, including both traditional humanists and adherents of Western intellectual liberalism. These intellectuals brought with them the rich cultural legacy of Chinese scholarship as well as the results of early scholarly modernization. At the same time, Taiwan aligned with the West geopolitically, and experienced an influx of American culture. Young elites studied in the United States and brought new currents in Western thought back home with them. Chinese scholars in the West, intellectuals who had fled from the mainland, students returning from educations abroad, and Taiwan-trained scholars together laid the foundations for scholarship in post-War Taiwan.
By the end of the Cold War, Taiwan was becoming a newly industrialized economic power with a society characterized by democracy, freedom and openness. Over several centuries, different cultural traditions converged to form a rich Taiwanese culture, but these were also intermingled with and weighed down by various political, economical and social forces. Positioned among the forces of nationalism and globalization, and saddled with a legacy of colonial modernization, intellectuals in Taiwan continue to scrutinize the complexities and contradictions of their own culture. They strive to transcend the false dichotomies of continental and insular and center and periphery. On the long path of self-exploration, intellectuals query the local in hopes of meaningful engagement with the universal. This indeed is the basis for productive dialogue with other members of the global community, both near and far.
Origins and Characteristics of Sinological Materials in Taiwan
Under Qing dynasty rule, Taiwanese society saw the development of traditional Chinese culture. During the period of colonial rule, the Japanese conducted large-scale surveys in a variety of fields to inform the administration and judicial activities of the regime, and effectively govern a populace ethnically different from their own (as well as to satisfy the curiosity of Japanese scholars and intellectuals). To this day, the results of this research represent an invaluable source of information about Taiwan’s past. Despite the influences of Japanese colonialism and Western modernity, Taiwan’s Han roots remain strong to the present, though they are in a constant state of evolution and renewal. This has attracted the interest of many scholars.
A number of academic institutions, museums, and publishing houses accompanied the Nationalist Government during its retreat to Taiwan in 1949. These brought with them a great deal of texts and artifacts. In many ways, these items represented the highest achievements of the upper echelons of Chinese civilization from ancient times to the birth of modern China, and their arrival gave Taiwan an access to the most rarefied of classical Chinese cultural forms, something that its short history could not provide itself.
Thus, sinology in Taiwan draws on the dual heritage of local Han culture and imported elite culture, meaning that it encompasses rarefied and folk traditions, and provides insight into both the center and periphery of Chinese civilization. Building on this diverse legacy, Taiwanese scholars have actively worked to obtain new research materials and expand the scope of their academic pursuits. For example, the digitalization of Buddhist sutras owes to a uniquely Taiwanese combination of factors. Buddhism’s origins in Taiwan can be traced back to the Ming and Qing dynasties. Then during Japanese rule, there was interaction between Buddhism in Japan and Taiwan. After World War II, Taiwan had freedom of religion, and monks fleeing from Chinese communist oppression came to Taiwan and staged the revival of Buddhism. All of these unique historical conditions as well as the development of new information technology were behind the digitalization of Buddhist sutras in Taiwan.
This exhibition presents the fruits of the three decade-long endeavor to digitize texts and other materials important for sinological research. This process is part of the ever-expanding vision of sinology in Taiwan, and also benefits from the contributions of library science and information science. In all of this, the hope is to find new value in old documents and artifacts by transforming them into new media. Scholars in Taiwan will no doubt continue to uphold this spirit of rationality and academic rigor, welcome input from various sources, and exploring new horizons of digitization and humanities research.
