The third point is Americanization. A large section of missionaries so
value their own culture that they believe they can do no better than try
and denationalize the Chinese, or Indians, or whatever other nations
they may be working amongst, and transform them into Americans. In the
case of China this seems to me a most disastrous policy, and founded on
serious error. The Chinese and British characteristic of reserve which we
consider a quality they consider a defect, and believe that familiarity
breeds not contempt but friendship. The breaking down of the reserve
in the Chinese character is only too frequently a breaking down also of
moral barriers—a disintegration of character, and opposed to the genius
of the race. The Chinese student returning from the United States is
often completely spoiled by having cast off the charming old-time manners
of his own country in favour of the hail-fellow-well-met manners of young
America. He cannot be accepted into a European or Chinese household on
his return without taking what seems to them unwarrantable liberties,
while he himself is sublimely unconscious of the effect produced. In the
same way in mission schools the students are encouraged to familiarity
with their teachers—as for instance in the case of mixed bathing in
summer resorts. The teacher and the taught are all put on the same level,
and the respect which we have been taught to consider due to age and
learning, ceases to exist. “Manners maketh man,” and the difference in
manners is one of the greatest bars to united work, which Christians of
all denominations are trying so hard to build up in China at the present
day.
To return to our brief stay at Shen Chow. It seemed an interesting
place with fine large shops, and we should like to have made closer
acquaintance with them. However, our boatman, who always wanted to
loiter where there was nothing to be seen, showed a sudden determination
that we should leave the town before sundown and reach a certain safe
spot to spend the night. As we were always urging him to hurry, we felt
obliged to give in, and reluctantly went on board. The Standard Oil
Co. is very energetic there, and has a large advertisement, happily in
Chinese characters, which are not aggressively ugly (like our Western
advertisements) all along the river-front, the last thing we saw as we
floated down stream.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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