"Zhejiang Fever" And Their Science And Communication Studies

This paper makes an investigation on the publications, communication strategy and contents, based on the journal Zhejiang Tide(1-10periodicals) which was initiated by the Chinese students studying in Japan in late Qing Dynasty according to history of students journals; Chinese journalism; science communication and the publication environment of the journal. Its primary study is about the spread of the local and foreign news, the educational thoughts and the natural science and technology. Zhejiang Tide is a comprehensive monthly magazine which was established by the abroad students of Zhejiang Association in1903. As its mission of "with an eye to the interests of all the people" and "introducing civilization", it harshly criticized the feudalization and also actively communicates other discipline knowledge through the editorial sections and document forms. For instance, the essay "On Nationalism" trenchantly pointed out the phenomena that existed in China and the danger that faced China. And the news items that were published in the column of "Summary of Events in Each Country" were classified into three categories: local, foreign and overseas students by its contents. The local news items were divided into two parts:the political and social news that happened in China and the news about the foreign countries or foreigners who were in China. Its foreign press reports involved in America, England, Japan, Russia, and Canada,etc. The distribution of geographical location ranges from Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania to Africa, and its contents are about military, economy, political and social events of some countries. More than10articles covered the students’ activities of attending Zhejiang Association; participating in the Industrial Exposition in Osaka, Japan and the campaigns of resisting Russia and French in Japan in1903, Which revealed the general pictures of higher education in late Qing Dynasty. There were more than70articles about science and technology from the invention of the equipment, the animal properties to the construction of facilities in the journal, which demonstrated the cutting-technology in time. It highlights the contents of science communication, reporting the Madame Marie’s discovering of radium. Although a few months later than "The Magazine of Yaquan", it still demonstrated its high sensibility for important scientific events from different angles and depths. The first geology paper carried in it---Lu Xun’s On Chinese Geology is not a pure demonstrative essay, but a comprehensive evaluation on geology, and it reflects that the Chinese began to pay attention to the relationship between the geological survey and mapping and scientific research. Meanwhile, it stands out the aggressive research of some foreign countries in order to awaken the Chinese confidence about the country’s concept. The Continued Theory Of No Ghost written by Chen Huang tried to prove in the world there was no ghost based on natural science and criticized the thoughts of feudal superstition profoundly."The underdeveloped scientific thoughts" and "the difficulty in finding one technician"(ie. the scarcity of engineers) are the fundamental causes that resulted in the backwardness of China, which makes science communication show depth of thought and also makes zhejiang Tide control the commanding height that the other journals couldn’t reach at the same time. Zhejiang Tide is a successful case of spreading the scientific thoughts through journals by the students studying abroad in Chinese modern history, which pointed out some social phenomena with the expressions of "ignorant","the country becomes weaker because of believing in superstition","the underdeveloped in geology and science" and gave the suggestions to save the country like "industry breeding and business initiating policy" and "to cultivate technicians of new China" in the meantime. And it leaves marks on the history of modern journalism in China.