The Scholarship for Taiwan Studies

The Center for Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (CAPEC) was founded in 1996 by the Board of Visitors of George Mason University in order to address the growing economic importance of East Asia by increasing the attention given to this region at the university. In accordance with this mission, the Center made it a primary goal to encourage interdisciplinary academic projects with a focus in the Asia-Pacific region. This it has done in part by granting the "Taiwan Studies Research Travel scholarship" each year to several students of George Mason University, enabling them to spend a few weeks in Taiwan researching a topic of their choice. This March, I was thrilled to learn that I was among those selected to receive the scholarship this summer. I leave this Sunday for the Far East.

The topic of my research will be the teaching of Confucianism in Taiwanese secondary and tertiary education, i.e., the quantity and quality of education in Confucian texts and principles that is received by Taiwanese students in middle school, high school, and college. In order to gain a good understanding of the issue, I will need, for example, to investigate different perspectives on the theme of Confucius in the curriculum, including those of administrators, who determine the curriculum, teachers, who put it into effect, and students, who learn from it (theoretically). I will share more about my research, and, of course, my findings, on this blog after the trip begins.

My acquaintance with Confucianism began in earnest this past semester, in a course taught by George Mason professor Dr. John Paden, a highly esteemed scholar and expert in international affairs. In our unit on China, I read the Analects (the collected sayings and discourses of Confucius) and wrote on Confucian ideals in education. Although in my work I barely scratched the surface of what is an ancient and very complex system of ethics and philosophy, my interest in Confucianism grew during this study. In the end, I proposed to CAPEC a research topic very similar to the one above, so that, if I received the grant, I might continue to study Confucianism and its continuing effect on Asian societies. Since I received the grant, this is what I will be doing very soon.