Beijing-based Renmin University of China enrolled the first 58 students into its new School of Guoxue on October 16, established to reintroduce the comprehensive study of Chinese philosophy, culture and other areas of learning.

Since plans to open it were announced in the first half of the year there has been much debate on how useful it would be to focus on these studies, according to an October 22 Xinhua News Agency report.

The term Guoxue emerged in the early 1900's, though academics disagree on its precise definition. The linguist Cao Bohan (1897-1959) said it served as an opposite to "Western learning," used in the late Qing Dynasty for natural and social sciences from Western countries.

Amid an influx of Western cultural influence in the early 20th century, many in China who had had an almost religious respect for tradition were forced to reconsider what they had been taught in the past.

Unable to find a balance between the traditional and modern, some intellectuals pinned their hopes on all-out Westernization to find a place for China in the modern world and Guoxue was almost lost.

Nowadays, people usually use Guoxue as a general term for traditional Chinese culture and learning. In a broad sense, it includes philosophy, literature, art, medicine, mathematics; more narrowly, it refers to national cultural heritage.

Ji Baocheng, president of Renmin University, said both the May 4th Movement (1919) and "cultural revolution" (1966-76) dealt severe blows to Guoxue.

"Guoxue became another name for ignorance and backwardness; it bore full responsibility for all humiliations and disasters suffered by China in modern times," Ji said.

Tu Wei-ming, director of the Harvard-Yenching Institute in the US, said it was terrible to regard Guoxue as "good-for-nothing" since without a good knowledge of history, a person cannot fully understand his or her own culture and situation.

Ji said the School of Guoxue has been founded to promote cultural heritage and people's confidence in traditional culture.

Sun Jiazhou, the school's vice dean, said that computer data processing and analysis and mathematical modeling will be employed to carry out comparative and interdisciplinary studies in Chinese and Western culture.

(China.org.cn by Shao Da, October 31, 2005)