Fei Xiaotong

Fei Xiaotong ( Chinese:费孝通; Pinyin: Fei Xiaotong, Wade- Giles: Fei Hsiao -t'ung; born November 2, 1910 in Wujiang, † April 24, 2005 in Beijing) was a Chinese researcher and professor of sociology, Anthropology and Ethnology. His studies on national minorities in China laid the foundation for Social Anthropology in the People's Republic of China. He held the Chair of Sociology at Peking University.

Life

Fei Xiaotong studied from 1930 to 1935 at the Yenching and then at Tsinghua University in Beijing sociology. He then studied under Bronisław Malinowski at the University of London, where he earned a PhD in 1938 title. He returned to China. Large parts of the country were occupied by Japan, and he was in Kunming ( Yunnan Province ) - a city that was not under Japanese occupation and a haven for many people - a professor of social anthropology.

His first field research led him to the mountainous regions of today's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. His first major release, " Peasant Life in China," which was published in 1938 in English, was the result of these studies.

After the founding of the People 's Republic of China by the end of the 1970s he was unable to conduct many studies. Then he was engaged again " discipline " produce in the social sciences, which had been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.

In the 1980s, he suggested, to encourage farmers to rural enterprises ( TVEs ) to set up. Today, these rural businesses are an important engine for economic development in the country.

He had several - mainly representative functions - in the political system of China, among others, he was Deputy Chairman of the VI. Political Consultative Conference of the Chinese People and honorary chairman of the Central Committee of the Democratic League of China.

Works

• From the Soil. University of California Press, 1992, ISBN 0-520-07796-2. (New edition )