The Gentry And The Local Education Of Shandong Province In The Qing Dynasty

As the hometown of Confucius and Mencius, Shandong was developed in the areas of culture and education from ancient time. Shandong has a long history and an excellent tradition of cultural education. In the Qing Dynasty, many talented person came out in succession from the Jinan, Dongchang and Yanzhou county of Shandong Province, where the cultural education was prosperous particularly. It was connected with the local Gentry taking part in the education activities. So this article is based on local chronicles, making Jinan, Dongchang and Yanzhou county as the centers, specifically analyzing the forms and significance between the Gentry and the local education. There are four parts in this article.The first part inspects the Gentry’s constitutions, the special authorities and the social positions of the Shandong Province in the Qing Dynasty.The second part explores the Gentry’s attending forms in the local education. The forms mainly include the Gentry donating to build the facilities of Official schools, taking part in the Academical education, taking part in the Charitable education, subsidizing to attend school and Imperial Examination for students, and so on.The third part introduces the cases of the Gentry’s attending forms in the local education. Taking the Gentry in the Fu family of Liaocheng and the Wu Xun set up the Charitable school for example in order to discuss the Gentry play an important role in building the local school.The fourth part concludes the significance between the Gentry and the society. It completes the local education system; it fosters many talented person; it benefits the inherit of the good custom and it also improves the reputation of the Gentry and so on.