Seow, Victor Kian Giap (Author)
This article examines how the notion of a tradition of invention, which took shape in China in the nineteenth century, became entrenched there by the 1920s. It begins by looking at how invention received heightened attention from Chinese elites in the May Fourth era, when many of them upheld the primacy of science for national salvation while science’s very rectitude was being contested. It then explores how these elites took up and contributed to narratives of a past inventiveness as a way of imagining possibilities of a better future, the most notable expression of which was the idea of the “four great inventions.” Finally, it delves into a particular paradox that underlay this glorification of prior scientific and technological achievements. While staking claim to a tradition of invention may have been ultimately for the purpose of charting a course toward a technoscientific tomorrow, the fixation on those past accomplishments led many Chinese across China’s long twentieth century to either ignore or downplay domestic developments in science and technology that were actually taking place. Ironically, then, the nagging sense of inferiority that underlay the lauding of ancient inventions came to be reinforced rather than alleviated by that very act.
...MoreArticle Victor Seow; Sean Hsiang-lin Lei (2022) Who Is Mr. Science and Why Does He Matter?. East Asian Science, Technology and Society: An International Journal (pp. 269-278).
Article
Wen-hsin Yeh;
(2022)
Situating Science in the Century since the May Fourth Movement
(/isis/citation/CBB391993124/)
Article
Jia-Chen Fu;
(2022)
Would Mr. Science Eat the Chinese Diet?
(/isis/citation/CBB810341281/)
Article
Zuoyue Wang;
(2022)
Practicing Mr. Science: Chinese Scientists and the May Fourth Movement from Zhu Kezhen to Fang Lizhi
(/isis/citation/CBB822830037/)
Article
Fa-ti Fan;
(2022)
“Mr. Science”, May Fourth, and the Global History of Science
(/isis/citation/CBB027652084/)
Book
Jie Zhang;
(2018)
Cultural Politics of Railways
(/isis/citation/CBB444711433/)
Book
Elizabeth LaCouture;
(2021)
Dwelling in the World: Family, House, and Home in Tianjin, China, 1860–1960
(/isis/citation/CBB338457805/)
Book
Christopher A. Reed;
Cynthia Brokaw;
(2010)
From Woodblocks to the Internet: Chinese Publishing and Print Culture in Transition, Circa 1800 to 2008
(/isis/citation/CBB667455096/)
Book
Ying Jia Tan;
(2021)
Recharging China in war and revolution, 1882-1955
(/isis/citation/CBB504232820/)
Article
Zhu, Qin;
(2010)
Engineering Ethics Studies in China: Dialogue between Traditionalism and Modernism
(/isis/citation/CBB001033621/)
Book
Xiaoyuan Jiang;
(2021)
A New Phase of Systematic Development of Scientific Theories in China: History of Science and Technology in China Volume 4
(/isis/citation/CBB281376897/)
Book
Vinayak Laxman Patil;
(2021)
Chronological Developments of Wireless Radio Systems before World War II
(/isis/citation/CBB310029927/)
Book
John, Richard R.;
(2010)
Network Nation: Inventing American Telecommunications
(/isis/citation/CBB001230799/)
Book
Kat Jungnickel;
(2018)
Bikes and Bloomers: Victorian Women Inventors and their Extraordinary Cycle Wear
(/isis/citation/CBB207693974/)
Article
Hubert Weitensfelder;
(2018)
Hundert Jahre Zunkunft? neue Technologien in Österreich seit 1918 - Aspekte und Diskurse (One hundred years of the future? new technologies in Austria since 1918 - aspects and discourses)
(/isis/citation/CBB768237600/)
Book
Daniel Jordan Smith;
(2022)
Every Household Its Own Government: Improvised Infrastructure, Entrepreneurial Citizens, and the State in Nigeria
(/isis/citation/CBB663829322/)
Book
Ian Wills;
(2019)
Thomas Edison: Success and Innovation through Failure
(/isis/citation/CBB235875861/)
Article
Lamm, M.;
(Spring 2007)
The Fiberglass Story
(/isis/citation/CBB714502101/)
Essay Review
Mullen, Megan;
(2012)
Demystifying Some Momentous Changes
(/isis/citation/CBB001566996/)
Article
Victor Seow;
Sean Hsiang-lin Lei;
(2022)
Who Is Mr. Science and Why Does He Matter?
(/isis/citation/CBB356374547/)
Article
Lü, Daoen;
(2013)
A New Study on the Invention of Photo-Zincography and Photo-Lithography and Their First Introduction to China
(/isis/citation/CBB001200175/)
Be the first to comment!