Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c15.s2.t5.2

v2.c15.s2.t5.2

Lifetime Tao Xingzhi was a descendant of Tao Yuanming, the great poet of the Jin Dynasty. His father was a Christian, and his mother once was a maidservant at Chongyi School under the church. So, poor as his family was that he could study at this church school free of charge. During this time, he cultivated a spirit of sacrifice and service as advocated by Christianity and an aspiration to liberty, equality and fraternity and also acquired a solid knowledge of English. He became a Christian in 1913, and graduated from University of Nanking in 1914, with a proficiency in English. Since University of Nanking was the only ‘Class A’ university founded in China by American Christian Church, its graduates were entitled to direct admission into a graduate school in the United States of America. So, Tao Xingzhi went to the United States to study municipal administration. In 1915, he received a Master’s degree in Politics from University of Illinois, and in the autumn of the same year, he went to University of Columbia to study educational administration, and obtained a certificate of Urban Education Director from Normal School in 1917. He returned to China in August 1917, and served as an Education Professor at Nanking Teachers’ College and the Dean of Department of Education of Southeast University. In 1922, he worked with Huang Yanpei and others to establish China Mass Education Promotion Society. In 1927, he founded Xiaozhuang Normal College in Nanjing, which was opened to the public. He followed and developed ideas of the American educator John Dewey and proposed life education theory such as ‘life is education’, ‘society is a school’, and ‘teach, learn and act unite’ and explored new alternatives for Chinese education in that time. From 1931, he turned to mass education movements. From 1936 to 1938, he visited 28 countries in Europe, Asia and Africa to investigate their education and culture, to publicise Anti-Japanese efforts and to call for the overseas Chinese and students to support Anti-Japanese War. He dedicated his life to the people and mass education. He died of cerebral hemorrhage in Shanghai at the age of 56. The 10-volume *Complete Works of Tao Xingzhi* was published in 1992.