From Cultural Rehabilitation to Cultural Renaissance: Through the Education of Indigenous Social Science

Abstract

In the previous chapter, I discussed the cultural origin of crisis in higher education in Taiwan and mainland China, namely, academic self-colonization which might be traced to the ideology of scientism formed during the May-fourth Movement period. In this article, I argue that the development of indigenous social science may result in a new model of Taiwanese higher education that could prevent its collapse by attracting students from mainland China to supplement the shortage of university freshmen caused by the rapid decreasing fertility rate of Taiwan in the coming years. On the other hand, the transmission of indigenous social science from Taiwan to mainland China may resolve the ontological anxiety and epistemological confusion prevailing in the Chinese academic community.