Title: The Inter-generational Destiny of the Educated Youth Who Marched North
Lecturer: WANG Qisheng (Professor, Department of History, Peking University)
Chairperson: QU Jun (Professor, Department of History, East China Normal University)
Date: 9 am, June 15th, 2018 (Friday)
Venue: Room 5303, Building of School of Humanities, Minhang Campus, ECNU
Sponsor: Si-mian Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities, ECNU
Abstract of the Lecture:
From 1924 to 1928, a large group of youngsters educated with new knowledge had become the social basis of both Kuomintang (KMT) and the communist party (CCP). Left the rural communities at early ages, they strived for living and education in cities with the ideal of self-liberation as well as social emancipation. However, they could hardly find a way out in reality. Sharing the feeling of depression and fierce resistance, many of them thus headed south to Kwangtung and joined the Northern Expeditionary Army. These youngsters later are considered as the major force that leads to the success of the National Revolution. While after the revolution, most of them became the victims of further political disputes between the two parties. Began as revolutionaries, yet ended up as counter-revolutionaries, their inter-generational destinies profoundly reflect the long-range gene and complex features of the Chinese revolution in the 20th century.