The Taiping Rebellion From The Perspective Of Chinese Scholars ——A Case Study Of Ssu-yu Teng

The Taiping Rebellion was an important event in China’s modern history.It was not only a simple peasant movement,but also had the nature of an old bourgeoisdemocratic revolution.It is generally considered that the Taiping Rebellion caused heavy damage to the Qing government and was the pinnacle of the peasant war in Chinese history.At the same time,the Taiping Rebellion caused a certain degree of blow to the Western powers and delayed the process of China’s transformation into a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society.At the same time,the Taiping Rebellion as a historical event has always attracted the attention of domestic and foreign researchers.Ssu-yu Teng,a scholar of Chinese descent,is a famous American historian and Sinologist who has been devoted to the study of the Taiping Rebellion for a long time.It should be said that the study of the Taiping Rebellion occupies an important position in Ssu-yu Teng’s academic history.Understanding the research on the history of Chinese revolution by overseas scholars is helpful for absorbing different research theories and methods,promoting the diversification of research perspectives,and enriching the research on the history of Chinese revolution.In view of this,this paper takes Ssu-yu Teng’s research on the Taiping Rebellion as a case study to show the Taiping Rebellion from the perspective of "others" by analyzing its research origin,research content and academic evaluation of its research.First,Ssu-yu Teng began to pay attention to the study of the Taiping Rebellion due to factors such as personal opportunity,academic trends,and the influence of his teachers.Secondly,Deng’s research on the Taiping Rebellion includes: the understanding of the rise of the Taiping Rebellion,the driving force of the Taiping Rebellion’s development,the Taiping Rebellion’s foreign policy,and the characteristics of Taiping Rebellion’s nationalism.It is worth noting that the academic research on Ssu-yu Teng’s Taiping Rebellion can clearly see the academic evaluation of Ssu-yu Teng’s books;in addition,it summarizes the characteristics of Ssu-yu Teng’s view of the Taiping Rebellion.This article attempts to make a comparative analysis between Ssu-yu Teng’s view of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement and the views of Chinese scholars from the perspective of historical materialism.Finally,it summarizes the enlightenment of Ssu-yu Teng’s view of Taiping Rebellion.Throughout Ssu-yu Teng’s view of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement,as one of the proponents of the "Shock-Response" theory,he is not limited to the theoretical stereotypes.It should be pointed out that,as a scholar of Chinese descent,Ssu-yu Teng did not receive systematic marxist historiography training,so there are inevitably many views in his works that are different from those of Chinese scholars.When summarizing and reflecting on overseas scholars’ research on the history of Chinese revolution,they should proceed from historical facts and respect the objective laws and basic methods of historical research.At the same time,paying attention to overseas scholars’ research on the history of The Chinese revolution is helpful to explore the internal motivation of the Chinese revolution,summarize the historical experience of the Chinese revolution,and further promote and enrich the research on the history of the Chinese revolution in the new era.