Unearthing the Nation: Modern Geology and Nationalism in Republican China, 1911--1949

Download or read book Unearthing the Nation: Modern Geology and Nationalism in Republican China, 1911--1949 written by Grace Yen Shen and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Though the chapters of this dissertation follow a roughly chronological order, each one is organized around a problem of geological development tied to the land but conceived and addressed through the imperative of saving the-nation. Chapter 2 opens by asking why Chinese became interested in modern geology at all, and how they began to reconceptualize their homeland as an object of study. Chapter 3 explores the role of fieldwork in grounding the Chinese geological enterprise and reinventing the modern Chinese intellectual. Chapter 4 analyzes Chinese efforts to forge community and participate in international science by establishing the Geological Society of China as a meeting place for competing foreign powers. Chapter 5 looks at how Chinese geologists tried to balance their own ideas of geology to save the nation with the growing demands of the Guomindang state in the "Nanjing Decade" (1927-1937). Chapter 6 examines how the Japanese occupation of China's coastal regions during the War of Resistance narrowed the focus of Chinese geology and set the stage for geologists' post-war disillusionment with the Guomindang.