Traditional Chinese Children’s Primers: A Sourcebook (Re-Editions: Literary and Cultural Texts Recovered for the Classroom)

By: Katherine Ngo and Kelly Ngo

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Synopsis: Traditional Chinese Children’s Primers: A Sourcebook is the first anthology of traditional Chinese children’s textbooks in a European language. This selection of eleven primers, spanning over two thousand years of Chinese education history, remains well-known in East Asia and the global diaspora of Confucian-heritage cultures. These texts represent an important genre of children’s literature and education materials that were employed to teach basic vocabulary, develop cultural literacy, and start students on their journey toward greater fortunes in the imperial examinations. The sourcebook covers texts from the second-century BCE to the late twentieth-century, and a range of subject areas, including etiquette instruction, literacy training, character education, and Confucian and Daoist thought. The Classic of Family Reverence (Xiaojing), for example, opens a window onto early Confucian thought in ancient China, while the Extended Wise Sayings (Zengguang xian wen) represents the eclectic worldviews and beliefs of the seventeenth century, and Lord Wenchang’s Essay on Quiet Merits (Wenchang dijun yinzhi wen) introduces readers to the tradition of popular morality books. This first-of-a-kind sourcebook in English addresses a long-standing gap in the translation of primers and provides impetus for research in the development of character and virtues, comparative literature, and cross-cultural education studies.