User:Kate-Pure/sandbox

Educational Changes in the Meiji Era (Draft)

During the Edo period the common citizens of Japan were given limited means of education. What these low-class citizens did learn was generally geared towards the basic and practical subjects such as reading, writing, and arithmetic. The change came forth during the Meiji period. After sending several learned Japanese representatives to travel abroad, the government was able to learn many aspects of the West, and then from that developed a new process of education for the country. By the late 1860s, the Meiji leaders had established a system that declared equality in education for all as a means by which to help in the process of Japan entering into a more modernized nation. It was required by law that everyone had an obligation to a public education. This was done for the purpose of not only instilling the values of what it meant to be a Japanese citizen, but to also bring about the knowledge necessary for the people to understand how the new nation would work under Western methods. With the change in education there was brought about more opportunities to prosper in the newly evolving and modernizing Japanese nation. Individuals and families moved up in society in ways beyond the freedoms or abilities of their ancestors. As education changed, so too did the range of talents and efforts applied by the Japanese people to enhance their society.

Education in the Empire of Japan

After much further research this week, I have changed course on which topic I would like to cover for our Modern Japan article. I would like to focus on the article, Education in the Empire of Japan. I would specifically like to dive deeper into how the changes of the educational system from the Edo period to throughout the Meiji era affected the lives for the common, everyday Japanese citizen and find a way to nicely incorporate those facts into the article.

This is the article I will be adding to: Education in the Empire of Japan

The books and articles I will be researching as of right now include: 

Helen M. Hopper’s book, Fukuzawa Yukichi: From Samurai to Capitalist

Andrew Gordon’s book, A Modern History of Japan

Frank Alanson Lombard’s book, Pre-Meiji Education in Japan: A Study of Japanese Education Previous to the Restoration of 1868

Jeffery Hays article, Early History of Japan’s Education http://factsanddetails.com/japan/cat23/sub150/entry-2794.html

Network, C. H. (n.d.). Cultural Life During the Meiji Restoration, Japan. Retrieved February 11, 2018, from http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/edu/ViewLoitLo.do?method=preview&lang=EN&id=12991

Potential Topics

For our course research on Modern Japan, I would potentially like to do my article on one of these three topics I have been looking into: Matthew C. Perry, the function of Japan’s National Diet, or the Rule of Women in Japan entering into the twenty-first century.

Matthew C. Perry: What lasting effects did his arrival have on the nation of Japan?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_C._Perry

Japan’s National Diet: How did this change Japan as a nation?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Diet

Rule of Women in Modern Japan: How did they play a part in the modernization and changes of society?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Japan

-I will be looking more into these articles, as well as doing outside research to see which I can find the most interesting and helpful information so to narrow my topic. ~~~

== Survival in 1959-61 China ==

Hunger, suffering, and death. This is essentially the result of one of China’s hardest few years, known to some as the Great Chinese Famine, and to others as Mao’s Great Famine. Beginning in the year 1958, it would end up becoming disastrous for the nation of China as a whole. Mao was the principal Chinese Marxist theorist, along with being a solider, and renowned states. It was he that governed the nation through the Cultural Revolution. Leading up to the famine, Mao, had plunged his country into a whirlwind with the Great Lead Forward. This was his attempt to modernize China’s economy so that in the years to come it would rivaled that of other nations, especially the United States.

Mao’s experiment, however, would result in a devastation unlike anything the nation of China had ever experienced before. For years, this period was kept secret in the archives of the China’s Communist Party. Much of the results of China’s famine has been unknown to the public, due in large to Chinese authorities carefully keeping track of all their archives. It has been over fifty years since the famine, however, and in recent years is has become a little easier to acquire records and files. Thanks to this, we are finally able to learn what really happened during the devastating days of starvation in China, where there was very little relief for its nations people.  

Hidden Effects of the Famine

(Extra information gathered during the semester. Not necessary used in final article revision).

Why does most the world know about the Jewish Holocaust during the 1940s World War II period, and yet very few have ever heard of the extremely devastating famine in China? To help answer this question, professor and author, Zhou Xun worked for several years to dig up the secretes and mysteries hidden from most of the world about this period. Much of the results of China’s famine has been unknown to the public due in large to Chinese authorities carefully keeping track of all their archives. It has been over fifty years since the famine, however, and in recent years is has become a little easier to acquire records and files. Through her findings, Xun would go on to write the book, The Great Famine in China, 1958-1962: A Documentary History in which one can finally begin to discover on a whole new level the dire extremes brought about by this famine. In her book, Zhou Xun makes it clear just how important it is for people to understand this time, “It is my responsibility to let the whole world know what happened to China at the time.”

So many deaths according in China from the end of the 1950s through the beginning of 1960s. The highest estimation has been up to 45 million individuals. A large portion of this was due to starvation. One individual who lived through this famine declared that in 1960 the thing that impacted him the most was hunger. He stated that, “There was no grain. I was right down to 80 pounds…But I wasn’t doing too badly. At least I was alive.” 

Food was so scarce that people had to result to eating leaves, or even tree bark. Weather also had its hand in this outrageous accumulation of deaths, however. In the winter, it would get so cold, that the only way people could keep warm was to work. As a result of this men and women alike would work twice as hard, just to keep from freezing to death. By the December of 1959, the old had become unbearable. Xun writes in her book, “Very few places were spared from devastation. Whole families perished; villages were wiped out; large swaths of country sides fell silent.” (Xun, page 43) 

I would potentially like to do my article on communal dining, how Chinese families, and individuals struggled to eat and survive, and how this all was put into place during the devastating Chinese Famine of 1958–1961:

These are a few of the articles I have found on the topic of interest.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famine

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao%27s_Great_Famine

http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/452319?journalCode=edcc

I would like to be able to find more information to add on what the effects of this devastating famine was for the people of China. How they survived, how they were able to eat, etc.