Wolfgang Franke (Sinologist)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wolfgang Franke (born July 24, 1912 in Hamburg ; † September 6, 2007 in Berlin ) was a German sinologist .

Life

Wolfgang Franke was the son of the sinologist Otto Franke . From 1930 he studied Sinology in Berlin, later in Hamburg with Fritz Jäger . In 1935 he was with a thesis on the reform attempts of K'ang Yu-wei in 1898 his doctorate . From 1937 to 1945 he worked as a research assistant at the Germany Institute in Beijing.

After the war he became a professor at Sichuan University and the private West China Union University (WCUU) in Chengdu (Sichuan Province) and then at Beijing University .

After 13 years in China, he returned on July 24, 1950 to Germany and was appointed to the Chair of Chinese Studies at the University of Hamburg appointed and was also director of the Department of Language and Culture of China. He was the fourth holder of the chair for sinology and thus the successor to his father Otto Franke, who had established the chair in 1910. In 1977 Wolfgang Franke retired and moved to Kuala Lumpur , Malaysia, where he taught as an emeritus at the university. He later lived with his daughter in Berlin.

He was married to Hu Chün-yin since 1945. The marriage produced a daughter and a son.

Act

He was known internationally as a China expert and, thanks to his personal contacts in China, became a focal point of international China research. He was involved in various national and international committees on China and Asian studies and was a member of the University Club of Hamburg University.

Franke's authoritative works in German were writings such as “The Century of the Chinese Revolution. 1851–1949 ”from 1958,“ China and the West ”from 1962 and the“ China Handbook ”from 1974 as well as his two-volume autobiography“ Im Banne Chinas (Part I: 1912–1950) ”and“ Im Bans of China (Part II: 1950–1998) ”. In addition, from the mid-1960s onwards he dealt intensively with the Chinese Abroad in Southeast Asia and collected epigraphic material on them. The results of his research were published in several volumes in English for Malaysia 1983–1987, Indonesia 1997 and Thailand 1998 (see publications).

Fonts

  • China's cultural revolution. The Movement of May 4, 1919. Oldenbourg, Munich 1957.
  • The Century of the Chinese Revolution, 1851–1949. Oldenbourg, Munich 1958; 2nd edition Munich 1980.
  • China and the West. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1962.
  • An Introduction to the Sources of Ming History. Kuala Lumpur, Singapore 1968.
  • (Ed.): China-Handbuch. Bertelsmann University Press , Düsseldorf 1974, ISBN 3-571-09000-4 .
  • Chinese Epigraphic Materials in Malaysia. 3 volumes. Kuala Lumpur 1983-1987.
  • Travels in East and Southeast Asia 1937–1990. Zeller, Osnabrück 1998, ISBN 3-535-02492-7 .
  • Chinese Epigraphic Materials in Indonesia. 3 volumes. Singapore Vol.1 1988, Vol. 2 + 3 1997 ISBN 9971-936-10-0 + ISBN 9971-936-11-9 .
  • Chinese Epigraphic Materials in Thailand. Taipei 1998. ISBN 957-17-1761-4

Autobiography

  • Under the spell of China. Autobiography of a sinologist 1912–1950. Projektverlag, Bochum 1995, ISBN 3-928861-44-1 . (Edition Cathay, Volume 11.)
  • Under the spell of China. Autobiography of a sinologist 1950–1998. Projektverlag, Bochum 1999, ISBN 3-89733-039-3 . (Edition Cathay, Volume 48.)

literature

  • Bernd Eberstein, Brunhild Staiger (ed.): China. Paths in the world. Festschrift for Wolfgang Franke on his 80th birthday. Institute for Asian Studies, Hamburg 1992.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Hans Stumpfeldt: On the history of China from 1980 to 2006. A documentation of the Hamburg Sinological Society (HSG)
  2. ↑ Ernst Joachim Vierheller: Wolfgang Franke: Under the spell of China. Autobiography of a sinologist 1912–1950. ( Memento from June 11, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) In: News of the Society for Nature and Ethnology of East Asia. No. 157-158, 1995, ISSN 0016-9080 , pp. 231-233  
personal data
SURNAME Franke, Wolfgang
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sinologist
DATE OF BIRTH July 24, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Hamburg
DATE OF DEATH September 6, 2007
Place of death Berlin