The Introduction And Adaptation:Missouri University Journalism Education Model In China,1921-1952

Education exchange is an integral part of Sino-US relationship. Against the backdrop of global culture convergence, it is receiving more and more academic attention. As education exchange exerts critical impacts on the young and involves the intellectual community in a society, it carries significant implications for the development, consensus building, and cultural identification between two states. Though a slow process, the long-term influence of education exchange is strong and lasting.This study examines exchanges of journalism education between the U.S. and China. Focusing on the Journalism School of Missouri University, this study synthesizes historical background to explore how the "Missouri model of journalism education" was imported to China in early20th century, which started China’s journalism education, influenced China’s press, and propelled the modernization of China. In fact, this project is part of Dr. Xu Yihua’s research series on "The influence of U.S. higher education on China". It is a distinctive and fruitful angle to examine how education exchanges forge notional, cultural and intellectual identifications between two nations and influence social, cultural and political facets of Sino-China relationship.In1908, the Missouri University in the U.S. established the world’s first journalism school, which signified the start of modern journalism education. To China at the time, Missouri University was a foreign school at the other side of the globe. After about a century, however, the Missouri model of journalism education was copied widely all over the world, and its transplant to China was especially successful. Today, the journalism program at the Missouri University has become a Mecca for many Chinese journalism students, and the Missouri model of journalism education has profoundly influenced the development of China’s press and journalism education. The Missouri model influences China’s journalism education more than any other institutes in the world. But why does the "Missouri model of journalism education" have such a strong impact on China? What is the model’s charm and dynamics? What are the forces that drive its transplant to China? Why was it embraced enthusiastically, rather than rejected by intellectuals in China? Why do modern Chinese intellectual elites associate journalism education with China’s development? Who were the personalities that played key roles in the establishment and thrive of China’s journalism education? How did journalism ideals rooted in distinct cultural backgrounds of China and the U.S. converge? And how did China’s journalism industry form its own characteristics by drawing on western ideals? These issues are addressed in different chapters of the study.First, this study analyzes the historical background and current of thoughts in the U.S. in order to summarize the characteristics of the Missouri model as well as the forces that motivated its export to China. Second, the transplant of the Missouri model to China is scrutinized to figure out why the Missouri model was able to take root in China without being systematically resisted. Third, we further discuss the evolution of the model in China by focusing on the personalities who played important roles in the process. Fourth, based on theories of cultural adaptation and social change, this study probes the merge and development of the Missouri model and China’s journalism education. We unfold how Chinese journalism education evolved from wholesale copying to gradually synthesizing the Missouri model with China’s local needs and unique cultural characteristics. The evolution of journalism education with Chinese characteristics is disentangled. Last, we offer a bird eye’s view of the effects of the Missouri model on China’s modernization.Through nuanced analyses, this study finds that the Missouri model grew out of the industrial-economic boom after the U.S. civil war. The professional education advocated by progressive movements at the time became its hotbed. The expansionism of U.S. at the time drove its export to other cultures. The successful transplant of the Missouri model in China is tightly related to China’s national crises in the early1900s. Establishing a modern journalism education was deemed by intellectual elites as necessary for national survival and development. The further thrive of the Missouri model in China would be impossible without the commitment from a group of "missionary-minded" U.S. and Chinese journalism professionals. They realized their own professional ambitions, practiced the Missouri model and promoted the development of China’s journalism professional education. In accordance with the theories of cultural communication, cultural adaptation and cultural change, the Chinese journalism education gradually acquired its own characteristics. The Missouri model accelerated the modernization process of Chinese society.