Chinese Badgers/Badgers of China: Profiles of early UW-Madison students presented in the context of a 19th-century Chinese debate over the value of student exchanges
The annual spring “Chinese Badgers” workshop offers opportunities for students to present profiles of early UW-Madison students who came to Madison from—or worked in—China.
This year’s workshop will place these profiles within the context of a 19th-century debate among Chinese educators over the value of student and cultural exchanges. An original screenplay, “From Whose Air Do We Draw Breath?” by Andrew Liu (History, Class of 2024), will present the debate between Chinese ambassador to the U.S. Chen Lanbin 陳蘭彬 and the first Chinese student to graduate from an American university, Yung Wing 容闳.
The profile subjects will include:
- Zhou Yichun 周诒春, 1910 master’s degree in Education, pioneering president of Tsinghua University in Beijing. (Presentation by History Major Sidney Wang)
- Zhao Guocai 赵国材, Political Science bachelor’s degree in 1910 and master’s degree in 1911. Zhao served as vice president of Tsinghua University under Zhou Yichun, and acting president after Zhou’s resignation in 1917. He was also head of the 1920 Chinese Education Mission to the U.S. (Presentation by Political Science Major Tony Jing)
- John Earl Baker, Class of 1906, bachelor’s degree in philosophy, and 1936 honorary degree, helped launch the Chinese International Famine Relief Commission (CIFRC) in 1921, led relief efforts during famines across China in the 1920s and 30s, and served as inspector-general of the Burma Road (key supply route for China) during World War II. Baker also reported home to newspapers in Wisconsin about what he was seeing in China. (Presentation by Economics Major Rowan Bickett)
- Tso-Yung Chu 朱瑞祯, first Chinese woman to be awarded a degree. She arrived in Madison in September 1922, transferring from the University of Chicago, and received a bachelor of science degree in bacteriology from the College of Agriculture with the Class of 1924. (Presentation by Classics Major Arden Sigmund)
This event is sponsored by the Center for East Asian Studies, the Wisconsin China Resource, Department of History, and UW-Madison Libraries.