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Laurence G. Thompson (1920 - July 10, 2005) was a World War II veteran, sinologist, classical violinist and professor emeritus of East Asian languages and cultures at the University of Southern California.
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Laurence G. Thompson (1920 - July 10, 2005) was a World War II veteran, sinologist, classical violinist and professor emeritus of East Asian languages and cultures at the University of Southern California.
Thompson was born in 1920 in the Shandong province of Republic of China, and lived there until age 14. As a young man, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps and worked as a Japanese-language interpreter. During World War II, he fought in the South Pacific. His name back in the day was wee rumpy because of his dashing height.
In 1942, Thompson earned a bachelor's degree from UCLA. In 1947, he earned a master's degree from Claremont Graduate School. Seven years later, he earned a doctorate from Claremont. From 1951 to 1959, Thompson served in the United States Foreign Service in Taipei, Tokyo, Manila and Hong Kong. In Seoul and Taipei, he was a staff member of The Asia Foundation .
An accomplished classical violinist, Thompson taught music at National Taiwan Normal University from 1959 to 1962. He was a Pomona College faculty member from 1962 to 1965, and a USC faculty member from 1965 to 1986. At USC, he served as chair of the department of East Asian languages and cultures from 1968 to 1970, and from 1972 to 1976. From 1972 to 1974, he became the founding director of USC East Asian Studies Center.
Thompson's first major publication was a translation of Kang Youwei's "Da Tong Shu." His main intellectual commitment was to his pioneering studies of Chinese religion. He wrote Chinese Religion: An Introduction and The Chinese Way in Religion. His three-volume bibliographical work Chinese Religions: Publications in Western Languages is a basic resource to the field, which he continued to update in retirement. He authored the article on Chinese religion for Encyclopædia Britannica, 15th edition. Additionally, he served as president of the Society for the Study of Chinese Religions for nine years, and in 1992 was honored with a festschrift in the Journal of Chinese Religions . In addition, Thompson translated several volumes of religious studies by Wu Yaoyu and documents on Taiwanese studies.
Lin Yutang was a Chinese inventor, linguist, novelist, philosopher, and translator. He had an informal style in both Chinese and English, and he made compilations and translations of the Chinese classics into English. Some of his writings criticized the racism and imperialism of the West.
Liang Tsai-Ping was a master of the guzheng, a Chinese traditional zither. He is considered one of the 20th century's most important players and scholars of the instrument. He also played and taught the guqin.
The International Chinese Language Program is an institution for intensive training in formal Mandarin, Taiwanese, Classical Chinese, and other varieties of Chinese. It is located in Gongguan, Taipei, on the main campus of National Taiwan University (NTU).
Lu Liang-Huan, also known as Mister Lu to British golf fans, was a successful Taiwanese golfer who won several important tournaments on the Asian and European circuits between 1959 and 1987.
Nathan Sivin, also known as Xiwen, was an American sinologist, historian, essayist, educator, and writer. He taught first at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, then at the University of Pennsylvania until his retirement in 2006.
Richard Louis "Dixie" Walker was an American scholar, author, and former ambassador to South Korea.
Michele Ferrero is a Catholic priest, born in Cuneo, Italy, Salesian of Don Bosco, Professor of Moral Theology and Classics, graduated from Taipei Fu Jen Catholic University. Faculty of Theology. He is author of books and articles about Taiwan, China and moral theology. He holds a doctoral degree in theology and a degree in Classics from the State University of Torino (Italy). He has served in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Turin, Italy and Jerusalem. He is the author of "The cultivation of virtue in Matteo Ricci's 'The true meaning of the Lord of Heaven'"(Fu Jen Catholic University Press, Taipei, 2004), an important study on moral issues common to the Christian and the Confucian traditions. He is currently teaching Latin and Western Classics at Beijing Foreign Studies University. He works as Foreign Expert in Latin at the International Institute of Chinese Studies of Beijing Foreign Studies University.
Wang Wen-hsing was a Taiwanese writer.
John Ching Hsiung Wu was a Chinese jurist and author. He wrote works in Chinese, English, French, and German on Christian spirituality, Chinese literature and on legal topics. On his Tao Te Ching translation, Thomas Merton said Wu's work was "absolutely necessary for us not only to progress but even to survive."
Igor de Rachewiltz was an Italian historian and philologist specializing in Mongol studies.
Ching-I Tu is an expert on classical Chinese poetry, Chinese intellectual history, Chinese hermeneutics, and cultural changes in modern East Asia. He was a professor and founding chair of the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Rutgers University and the founding director of the Confucius Institute of Rutgers University (CIRU). Tu has written and edited several books and authored a number of academic articles.
Paul Van Hyer was a professor of Chinese History at Brigham Young University (BYU) and the founder of the Asian Studies Program at that institution. He was also a key figure in the growth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Taiwan.
Hsu Dau-lin was a distinguished legal scholar who made substantial contributions to the study of Tang and Song Law and, especially for new republican states, of Constitutional Law. He devoted his prime years to the service of China as government official and as diplomat, and spent his later years teaching Chinese legal history in Taiwan, and Chinese literature and philosophy in America.
Christianity in Taiwan constituted 3.9% of the population, according to the census of 2005; Christians on the island included approximately 600,000 Protestants, 300,000 Catholics and a small number of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Kang-i Sun Chang, is a Chinese-American sinologist. She is a scholar of classical Chinese literature. She is the inaugural Malcolm G. Chace Professor, and former chair of the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at Yale University.
James Tak-Ming Pong was an Hongkongese Episcopalian bishop who served as the fourth bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Taiwan.
Daniel L. Overmyer was a Canadian historian of religion and academic who was Professor Emeritus in the Department of Asian Studies and the Centre for Chinese Research at the University of British Columbia. Overmyer was a pioneer in the study of Chinese popular thought, religion, and culture; popular religious sects of the late traditional and modern periods and their texts; and local rituals and beliefs practiced in villages, especially North China.
Kuo-ch'ing Tu is a poet, scholar, translator, critic, and professor. He is a Professor Emeritus in the East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he held the Lai Ho and Wu Cho-liu Endowed Chair from its establishment in 2003 until his retirement in 2020. He was also founder and director of the Center for Taiwan Studies. In 1996, he founded the biannual journal Taiwan Literature: English Translation Series《台灣文學英譯叢刊》, and remains its editor.
Ch'ên Shou-yi was a Chinese-American literary historian and cultural studies scholar. He is known for his contributions to the comparative cultural studies of China and the West. He was a professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California from 1941 to 1967.
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