Abstract

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Title:: Inheritance and Innovation: An Investigation into the Compilation of Middle School Chinese Textbooks in theEarly Years of the Republic of China

Keywords:: middle school Chinese textbooks; practical ancient Chinese prose; highly artistically stylized texts; traditional culture

Abstract:: In the context of education reform during the early years of the Republic of China, a reform began to take place in the compilation of Chinese textbooks for middle school students. Firstly, on the basis of continuing the ancient Chinese prose education, some textbooks accepted modern practical genres as a part of their selected texts according to the needs of social development. Secondly, under the influence of the evolution of literary ideas and the thoughts of aesthetic education, the texts characterized by highly refined styles(such as parallel prose and poetry), which had not been taken seriously in the Chinese education in the late Qing Dynasty, were gradually favored by the textbook compilers. At the same time, due to the need to carry forward the traditional Chinese culture, Chinese textbooks for middle school students began to select and absorb the traditional scholastic learning. In other words, the compilation of Chinese textbooks for middle school students showed some alienation of traditional ancient Chinese prose education, and presented a new structure with the mixed contents from ancient Chinese prose, modern practical genres of texts, highly artistically stylized texts and traditional scholastic learning, which laid a solid foundation for the reform of Chinese language and literature education in the period of New Culture Movement.