Jiaohua : Chinese Ideas and Practices of Moral Transformation

This book explores the single Chinese concept and practice of “shaping the mind through education”—jiaohua—from multi-disciplinary perspectives, with a view to furthering the understanding of jiaohua, and of China more broadly. It proceeds from the assumption that the concept has played a critical role over at least two millennia in what Benjamin Schwartz described as China’s “common socio-political patterns and common cultural orientations” and holds a key to understanding Chinese culture and societies as a whole. Though a large body of scholarship in Chinese and English has shed light on various aspects of the concept, its shifting sociological significance, as it is oriented toward social questions and functions, remains under-examined. The book develops a better understanding of jiaohua on the basis of greater conceptual clarity and a broader perspective than can be found in the extant literature. In considering a range of social domains and various schools of thought on the one hand, and on the other, major shifts in the meaning, functions, and significance of jiaohua from the past to the present, this book is indispensable to students and scholars researching the various facets of Chinese society, philosophy, and culture.