Database Introduction

The Research Database “Changing Terminology on Religion in Modern China (1800–Present)” / 現代中文宗教專業詞彙（1800—當代） is a part of the DFG-funded project “Changing Concepts of Religion from Traditional to Modern Chinese, 1890–1949.” The project investigates changes that took place in the Chinese terminology of religion from the end of Imperial China up to the present, placing its focus on the period between 1852 and 1949. The database shall serve as a tool for researchers and is designed as an online dictionary that can be used by anyone interested in or conducting research in the field of religions in China / Chinese religion(s).

The overall task of the database is to document usages that give significant insights into the linguistic changes of speaking about religion(s) that reflect the important transformations of social, political, intellectual and religious fields. The database makes accessible important religion related vocabulary obtained through a close reading of primary sources that include Western missionaries’, Japanese and Chinese dictionaries, translations, introductions to “religion” (zongjiao 宗教), and other relevant monographs and periodical articles published between 1852 and 1949. For pragmatic reasons the database will start from dictionaries and important introductory works, but is planned to be expanded step by step. All sources used will be listed in a separate bibliography (list of sources).

Key terms have been selected primarily from the intellectual and academic discourses on religion in Late Imperial and Republican China. The entries of single Chinese terms also make transparent semantic relations and networks through links to hypernyms, antonyms, synonyms, or hyponyms.

Terms have often been translated not just once, but twice or several times in multiple variants in different temporal, local or specific discourse contexts or depending on continental European, Anglo-American or Japanese influences. For example, “animism” has been translated in at least eight or more ways, for example as hunpo chongbai shuo 魂魄崇拜說, annimisimu 安尼密斯姆, guilingjiao 鬼靈教 or jingling chongbai 精靈崇拜, a term such as “magic” has been translated as moshu 魔術, but also fashu 法術 among others. Accordingly, the database will allow to search and compare different translations as well as check the earliest usages verified in the selected sources.