Variables de control utilizadas en el estudio

The May Fourth period witnessed a growing nationalist sentiment among Chinese Christians, who, like their non-Christian compatriots, were active in the national salvation movement. While Nü duo

expressed its firm patriotic stance based on its interpretation of Christian teachings,469 _{its editor Laura} White was opposed to the participation of Chinese Christians in patriotic movements. Following the May Thirtieth Incident in 1925 in Shanghai, when the British police opened fire on the crowd and killed several protesters who gathered in the International Settlement to seek the release of imprisoned students, White wrote to Liu Meili, a student at the Ginling Women’s College, to discourage her from attending patriotic movements.470

White, however, failed to see that this notorious incident had further endangered the fragile relationship between China and foreign powers.471 _{Realising the implications of the incident for the}

468 _{Translation by author.}

469 _{Cai Sujuan 蔡蘇娟, “Jiuguo de zhuyin zimu” 救國的注音字母 (Phonetic Symbols to Save the Nation), Nü duo}

(September 1919): 20–4; “Wei guo qiu jiu ge” 爲國求救歌 (Song to Save the Nation), Nü duo (October 1920): 20–1.

470 _{Liu Meili, “Kongsu meidiguozhuyi dui wo de duhai bing ziwojiantao” 控訴美帝國主義对我的毒害并自我檢}

討 (Accusing American Imperialism and the Harm It Has Done to Me as well as My Self-criticism), Tian feng天風 Vol. 12 No. 9 (1951): 128.

471 _{Triggered by a dispute between Japanese employers and Chinese workers in the No. 8 Mill of the Naigai Wata}

Kaisha 内外綿會社 in early February that year, the conflict escalated when a worker named Gu Zhenhong 頋正 紅 was shot dead by a Japanese foreman. In response, students in Shanghai demonstrated and supported the

144 Christian community, the National Christian Council of China (NCCC), a national interdenominational organisation for Chinese Christians, immediately held a special meeting the following day. On 8 June, the NCCC drafted an official letter to the Shanghai Municipal Council, urging a thorough investigation and to secure “harmonious relations between the Chinese and foreign communities in this cosmopolitan centre and throughout China.”472 _{In its message to Chinese Christians dated 16 July, the} NCCC stated that “a Christian should be the highest type of patriot and the noblest example of citizen.”473

The political activities of the NCCC stirred up a heated discussion within the missionary community. One missionary expressed his disappointment and regretted “that the N.C.C. has turned aside from the high level of distinctly religious work [to] the lower level of political activities.”474 _{Another thought} the municipal action and the statement of the NCCC was inclined to “damage the British in general and to aid the boycott.”475 _{As the NCCC facilitated the indigenisation movement and advocated for} the abolition of Unequal Treaties, the China Inland Mission withdrew from the Council in March 1926.476 _{The NCCC advanced its strict policies on foreign powers and foreign missions at this time. At} the fourth meeting of the NCCC from 13 to 20 October 1926, two resolutions were adopted:

1. That the Christian Church and Christian Missions should preach the Gospel and perform Christian service in China upon the basis of religious liberty freely accorded by the Republic of China, and that all provisions in the treaties with foreign countries for special privileges for the churches or missions should be removed.

strike and several of them were arrested and scheduled for trial on May 30. See Hung-Ting Ku, “Urban Mass Movement: The May Thirtieth Movement in Shanghai,” Modern Asian Studies Vol. 13 No. 2 (April 1979): 201.

472_{The Bulletin of the National Christian Council (July 1925): 1–4.}

473 _{“Message of the National Christian Council to the Christians in China,” The Bulletin of the National Christian}

Council (July 1925): 2.

474 _{“Correspondence,” The North-China Herald (8 August 1925): 136.} 475 _Ibid.

476 _{J. D. Macrae, “The Significance of the National Christian Council,” The Chinese Recorder (November 1926):}

818; “The National Christian Council and The China Inland Mission,” The Bulletin of the National Christian Council (June 1926): 2.

145 2. That the present treaties between China and foreign Powers should be revised on the basis of

freedom and equality.477

On 6 February 1927, a thousand Christians gathered in Shanghai and made a statement before their missionary co-workers at the Executive Committee of the NCCC. The message was sent throughout the country in envelopes bearing the name of the NCCC.478 _{It urged:}

1. That immediate representations be made by missionaries, either through deputations going back to their home countries or through other means, calling for an immediate readjustment in treaties with China by economic equality and mutual respect for each other’s political and territorial sovereignty.

2. That all branches of Christian work be placed under the administrative charge of Chinese Christian bodies. …479

The missionary community, however, criticised this statement which became known as the Shanghai Christian Manifesto. With 99% of the population untouched by Christianity, it seemed from the perspective of one missionary that the Chinese Christian leaders who endeavoured to abolish the treaties were motivated “more [by] jealous anti-foreign feeling than for any real harm which is being done by them at present.”480 _{In response to a series of political activities of the NCCC, a large group of} prominent missionaries issued a statement on 7 April 1927, criticising the NCCC and asserting that the Council has lost the confidence of a large part of the missionary body due to its political activities. Laura White, together with many other missionaries, signed the statement and urged the NCCC to limit its activities to its proper duties as defined by its constitution.481

477 _{“Christians and International Relationships,” The Chinese Recorder (November 1926): 764.} 478 _{“Shanghai Christians’ Manifesto,” The North-China Daily News (9 March 1927): 5.}

479 _{“To Our Missionary Co-workers,” The Bulletin of the National Christian Council (March 1927): 4–5.} 480 _{“Shanghai Christians’ Manifesto,” The North-China Daily News, 5.}

481 _{“Missionary Group Criticizes National Christian Council for Political Activities,” The China Press (12 April 1927):}

146 White’s non-political stance in this matter demonstrates her failure to understand the concern of local Christians and their desire to safeguard national pride through political means. Under her influence,

Nü duo maintained an outwardly apolitical attitude. In contrast, Nü qingnian, the monthly journal of the Chinese Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA), published a proclamation from Chinese Christians in Shanghai to their fellow Christians in March 1927, which expressed their agreement with the NCCC on the abolition of the Unequal Treaties.482 _{From the perspective of Chinese Christians,} foreign missionaries were, if not associated with, at least beneficiaries of the Unequal Treaties. While Western missionaries such as White were driven by an evangelical zeal, local converts perceived and shaped Christianity based on their concerns deeply embedded in a local context. In a time of crisis, salvation became more than an individual issue but rather a national concern to many Chinese Christians.

Conclusion

This chapter has examined the transformation of ideas about the family set against the background of ideological and cultural flux during a most dynamic period of modern Chinese history. It was a time when past and present clashed and when the old and new underwent a radical fragmentation which had repercussions for both daily life and the cultural and intellectual spheres. Belief in the values and norms of the traditional family system were shaken to their core under attack from reform-minded intellectuals. While women’s rights, freedom, and equality were fully embraced by May Fourth intellectuals, the editors of Nü duo nevertheless pursued a cautious path toward reform.

The May Fourth period, however, did witness some crucial changes to Nü duo. In the wake of patriotism among Chinese Christians, Nü duo reported responses from the Chinese Christian community to the national crisis. Its circulation of information regarding women’s engagement in political mobilisation, however, contradicted its advocacy of non-political Victorian feminine ideals.

482 _{“Shanghai Zhonghua jidutu dui tongzong tongbao xuanyan” 上海中華基督徒对同宗同胞宣言 (Declaration}

147 The tension between a group of conventional missionaries, including Laura White, and a group of nationalist Chinese Christians, eventually led to a split in plans for Christianising China following the May Thirtieth Incident. With a growing tide of nationalism surging through the Chinese Christian community, Nü duo had to find a way to cope with the new situation while maintaining its principles established by White. The tension between ideals of Victorian femininity with women’s social and political agency became especially evident after Japan’s encroachment into China escalated in the 1930s. The next chapter will examine the magazine at a time when Li Guanfang took over the editorship in 1929 and played a crucial role in indigenising the course of Nü duo.

148

Chapter 5 Searching for a Chinese Christian Domesticity: 1929–1935

An indigenising movement in the Chinese Christian community continued actively following the 1920s. Various attempts were made by Chinese Christians at the time to infuse Chinese cultural elements into theological studies and institutional development.483 _{However, the role of Christian women in the} shaping of Christianity has received only limited scholarly attention until recent years.484 _An examination of Nü duo adds to the knowledge of the voices of Chinese Christian women who shared a similar history as their male counterparts in the process of indigenising Christianity.

From 1929 onwards, Chinese Christian women took over the editorship of Nü duo. In studying the encounter of Chinese women with Christianity, Kwok Pui-lan argues that an appropriate investigation must be conducted into the wider social and political context of modern China. She points out that Chinese women were an integral part of local communities of the time.485 _{Thus, this chapter and the} following chapter will examine the discourse surrounding family reform in Nü duo through paying close attention to Chinese Christian women’s activities in their local and historically specific contexts. This chapter focuses on the period from 1929 to 1935 when Nü duo was under the editorship of Li Guanfang (1896–c.1937). Li was its first Chinese female editor and a close friend of Laura White. She had contributed several articles to the magazine earlier.

483 _{For the indigenising movement among Chinese Christians in the Republican period and beyond, see Cole}

Carnesecca, “Revolution and Religious Reform: The Indigenous Church Movement in Republican China,”Ching feng景風 Vol.12 No. 1/2 (2013): 57–74; Dennis Tak Wing Ng, “Chinese Christianity: The Study of Indigenous Theology in Twentieth-Century China,” The Journal of World Christianity Vol. 7 No.2 (2017): 101–22; Daniel H. Bays (ed.), Christianity in China: from the Eighteenth Century to the Present (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1996); Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chinese Christianity: an Interplay between God and Local Perspectives (Leiden: Brill, 2012); Chloë Starr, Chinese Theology: Text and Context (New Haven (Conn.); London: Yale University Press, 2016); Anthony E. Clark (ed.), China’s Christianity: From Missionary to Indigenous Church, 2017; Lian, Redeemed by Fire, 2010.

484 _{Kwok, Chinese Women and Christianity 1860–1927; Xingbie yu lishi: jindai zhongguo funü yu jidujiao, 2006;}

Lutz (ed.), Pioneer Chinese Christian Women: Gender, Christianity, and Social Mobility; Christina Wong Wai-Yin (eds.), Women’s Work for Women: Chinese Christian Women and Western Missionaries in Canton, South China, 1847–1938, (PhD diss., the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, 2015); Wai Ching Angela Wong and Patricia P. K. Chiu (eds.), Christian Women in Chinese Society: The Anglican Story (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2018).

149 The transfer from Western to local editorship, however, was far from seamless. In August 1929, Fuyin zhong福音鍾 (The Gospel Bell), a monthly bulletin of Zhonghua guonei budaohui 中華國内布道會

(The Chinese Home Missionary Society), published an announcement on the editorial shift. Associated with the NCCC, the Chinese Home Missionary Society, to a certain degree, reflected the collective will of a sizable group of Chinese Christians who desired to take their place in evangelical work. According to the announcement, the Chinese editorial board of Nü duo acknowledged White’s instrumental role in introducing western-style domesticity to Chinese readers. However, the board considered it bad practice for foreigners to edit the magazine due to cultural differences between Chinese people and westerners. Referring to the traditional idiom xuanbin duozhu 喧賓奪主, “a presumptuous guest usurped the role of the host,” the announcement emphasised the urgent need to correct this by passing the editorship to local people and concentrating on the production of original literature. This chapter outlines the process of searching for a distinctively Chinese Christian domesticity that fitted with Nü duo. It will demonstrate that the legacy of Victorian gender ethics did not fit well with growing local patriotic sentiment. Nationalist sentiment subsequently came into fundamental conflict with the Victorian rhetoric of womanhood that had previously featured in Nü duo. This rhetoric rapidly ceased to appear relevant in the changing socio-economic circumstances and the growing national calamity enveloping China. Li Guanfang, whose earlier writings had demonstrated a strong social and national concern, brought this conflict to a head. Although Li was influenced by the Christian teachings of mission schools that embraced a Victorian notion of womanhood, she committed herself to socialist ideals in the 1930s when she adopted a reformist approach to the family. The tension between the missionary legacy of Victorian femininity and Chinese women’s desire for social and national engagement became critical with the outbreak of the full-scale Second Sino-Japanese War, resulting in Li’s resignation from the editorship in 1935. The indigenisation process exemplified in Nü duo

suggests a complex interaction between inheritance and resistance among educated Chinese Christian women in the first half of the 1930s.

150 Understanding the Chinese Christian family portrayed by Nü duo requires an investigation of the ideas and activities of its first Chinese editor Li Guanfang. This chapter explores her life before 1929 and then shifts to examining the discussion on the nature of the family, both within and outside of Nü duo

under her editorship until 1935.