Gender, Culture, and Christianity: American Protestant Mission Schools in China 1880-1930

Between 1880 and 1930, Christian schools established in China by American Protestant missionaries were at the peak of their popularity and autonomy. During these years, a burgeoning professional ethos and the desire to compete with native schools led to the steady secularization of the mission schools. Americans also used these schools in a campaign to alter the gender beliefs and customs of the Chinese. The emergence of Chinese nationalism and rapid social change in the 1920s, however, caused American teaching missionaries to question their role in China.