Modern East Asia Midterm Review

Vocabulary practice flashcards based on the HIST 1550 Midterm Review Sheet covering core political, social, intellectual, and diplomatic terms across Qing China, Tokugawa/Meiji Japan, and Chosŏn Korea.

Bakufu

"Tent government": the Tokugawa shogunate's government at Edo that handled foreign affairs, finances, inspections, the shogun's household, temples/shrines, bakufu cities, roads, travel, the rice trade, and inter-han currency.

Bakumatsu

The "end of the shogunate" era spanning 1853–1868, from Commodore Perry's Black Ships to the founding of Meiji Japan, during which foreign pressure and opening undermined bakufu legitimacy.

Bannermen

Members of the Eight Banners, hereditary Qing armies composed of Manchu, Mongol, and Han soldiers who formed a privileged class placed above the existing social order.

Green Standard Army

Qing constabulary force made up of surrendered Ming Chinese troops that kept domestic order, organized separately from the expeditionary Eight Banners.

Grand Council

Qing military advisory board established in 1733 that answered directly to the emperor.

Canton trade

System established in 1760 restricting all European trade in Qing China to the single port of Guangzhou (Canton), conducted exclusively through Chinese merchant intermediaries.

Hong

A licensed Chinese merchant company acting as the sole authorized trading agent for European merchants under the Canton trade system.

Centralized bureaucracy

Administrative system implemented in Qing China and Chosŏn Korea characterized by appointed officials, civil examinations, ministries, and central territorial administration rather than hereditary feudal rule.

Centralized feudalism

The Tokugawa bakuhan system in which the shogun exercised national authority while hereditary daimyo ruled semi-autonomous domains (han) with samurai administering domain law and economy.

Chōnin

Urban artisans and merchants of Tokugawa castle towns who occupied the lowest level in the formal four-class status ideal but achieved significant economic wealth and cultural influence.

Chōnindō

"Way of the townsman": the social ethos, values, and cultural identity cultivated by urban merchants and artisans in Tokugawa Japan.

Floating World

The pleasure-seeking lifestyle of urban entertainment quarters on the outskirts of Edo and other castle towns, characterized by arts, social mixing, and conspicuous consumption.

Chungin

"Middle people" in Chosŏn Korea's social hierarchy, consisting of technical specialists such as interpreters, doctors, astronomers, and clerks positioned below the yangban and above commoners.

Yangin

The commoner social stratum in Chosŏn Korea consisting of peasants, artisans, and merchants, situated below the chungin and above the lowborn.

Ch'ŏnmin

The lowborn class at the bottom of Chosŏn Korea's social hierarchy, which included courtesans, butchers, entertainers, and slaves.

Yangban

The "two branches" of civil and military bureaucracy in Chosŏn Korea; a landed, meritorious Confucian elite exempt from corvée and military service.

Civil service examination system (Qing)

Bureaucratic recruitment system in Qing China testing the Neo-Confucian Four Books and practical subjects at county, provincial, and metropolitan levels until its abolition in 1905.

Daimyo

Territorial lords of the Tokugawa han enfeoffed in return for loyalty to the House of Tokugawa and regulated via sankin kōtai, inspections, and strategic land transfers.

Fudai

Hereditary "house daimyo" in Tokugawa Japan who had been long-standing vassals of the Tokugawa family prior to the Battle of Sekigahara.

Tozama

"Outside lords" in Tokugawa Japan who submitted to Tokugawa rule only after the Battle of Sekigahara and were subject to strict surveillance.

Evidential Research (kaozheng)

Qing intellectual movement ("Han Learning" or hanxue) emphasizing rigorous philological and textual evidence for classical scholarship in response to the fall of the Ming.

Extraterritoriality

Legal principle established under unequal treaties allowing foreign citizens to be tried in host nations under their own home country's laws and courts.

Governance as a moral project

Core Confucian concept linking personal and political virtue, viewing the ruler as a paternal Son of Heaven obligated to lead society through moral example and good stewardship.

Mandate of Heaven

Chinese political doctrine granting legitimacy to a virtuous ruler ("Son of Heaven"); moral failure and natural omens signify the potential loss of the mandate.

Heshen

Emperor Qianlong's powerful, notoriously corrupt favorite official whose prominence symbolized administrative decay during the late Qianlong reign.

Imjin Wars

The 1592–1598 military invasions of Chosŏn Korea launched by Japanese unifier Toyotomi Hideyoshi, which tested Korea's tributary alliance with Ming China.

Indemnities

Massive war reparations imposed on Qing China under unequal treaties such as the Treaty of Nanjing, Treaty of Shimonoseki, and the 1901 Boxer Protocol.

In-Law (or Consort) Government

Early-to-mid 19th-century political condition in Chosŏn Korea where powerful royal in-law clans (queens' families) dominated court politics while kings were weak or young.

Kangxi

Qing emperor (r. 1662–1722) who defeated Taiwan loyalists in 1683, established suzerainty over Tibet in 1720, patronized the Kangxi Dictionary, and banned Christian preaching in 1721.

Kirishitan

Japanese Christians who maintained their faith underground through home transmission and ancestral martyr cults after harsh prohibitions and expulsions by Hideyoshi and the Tokugawa.

Kojong

King of Chosŏn (r. 1863–1907) who proclaimed the Korean Empire in 1897, requested Qing aid against the Tonghak Rebellion, and appealed to the Hague Peace Conference.

Kokugaku (National Learning)

Tokugawa intellectual movement that recovered ancient native Japanese literature, language, and Shintō traditions apart from Chinese cultural and philosophical influence.

Kye

Korean voluntary cooperative associations at the village level in Chosŏn providing mutual aid, collective credit, and ritual funds.

Local elites (Qing)

Landholding scholar-gentry families in Qing China who mediated between formal bureaucracy and local populations through tax-farming, disaster relief, rituals, and dispute resolution.

"Thin" government

Qing administrative system characterized by a small formal bureaucracy that ended at the county magistrate, relying heavily on informal gentry networks to govern society.

Macartney mission

The 1792–1794 British diplomatic embassy to Emperor Qianlong requesting expanded trade beyond Canton, which the Qing court rejected on the grounds that China possessed all things.

Meiji Restoration

The 1868 political transformation that dismantled the Tokugawa shogunate, restored imperial authority, and created a centralized modern nation-state to eliminate unequal treaties.

Nationalist Party (GMD)

The Guomindang, a Chinese political party revived by Sun Yatsen in Guangzhou in 1917 and later led by Chiang Kaishek during the 1926–1928 Northern Expedition.

New Culture Movement

Intellectual movement (~1915–1925) centered on Chen Duxiu and Hu Shi advocating vernacular Chinese, individualism, women's liberation, and "Mr. Science and Mr. Democracy."

May Fourth Movement

Student protests outside Tiananmen on May 4, 1919, against the Versailles settlement giving Shandong to Japan, which led to widespread politicization and a turn toward Marxism.

"Opening" of Japan (Black Ships)

The 1853–1854 arrival of Commodore Matthew Perry's steam warships, which forced Tokugawa Japan to sign treaties and ended its two-century policy of national seclusion.

First Opium War

Conflict from 1839 to 1842 between Britain and Qing China sparked by the illicit opium trade and silver drain, ending with the Treaty of Nanjing.

Qianlong

Qing emperor (r. 1736–1796) who expanded borders to Xinjiang, patronized the Siku Quanshu, established the Canton system, and rejected King George III's trade overtures.

Rangaku (Dutch Learning)

Study of Western practical sciences—such as medicine, geography, astronomy, and mechanical engineering—via Dutch texts at Nagasaki during Tokugawa isolation.

Rice stipends

Fixed payments of grain given to Tokugawa samurai by their daimyo, leaving samurai economically dependent on chōnin merchants to convert rice into cash.

Rites Controversy

Dispute among Catholic orders over whether Chinese ancestral veneration and Confucian rites were compatible with Christianity, prompting Emperor Kangxi to ban Western preaching in 1721.

Russo-Japanese War

Conflict from 1904 to 1905 between Russia and Japan over territorial spheres in Korea and Manchuria, concluding with Japan's victory and the Treaty of Portsmouth.

Sakoku

"Closing of Japan": Tokugawa foreign policy codified in the 1630s aimed at strict state control of diplomacy and maritime trade rather than absolute isolation.

Sankin kōtai

System of alternate attendance requiring daimyo to spend alternate years residing in Edo and maintain their families there as permanent political hostages.

Self-Strengthening Movement

Late Qing reform initiative (~1860s–1890s) led by Li Hongzhang and others to adopt Western military technology, arsenals, and industry while keeping Confucian governing structures.

Shogun

Military ruler of Japan appointed by the emperor with the title seii taishōgun ("barbarian-quelling generalissimo"), exercising supreme public authority (kōgi) over the realm.

Silhak (Practical Learning)

Reform-minded intellectual movement in 17th- to mid-19th-century Chosŏn Korea that sought practical, empirical solutions beyond state-sponsored Neo-Confucian dogma.

Pukhak (School of Northern Learning)

18th-century branch of Silhak championed by scholars like Pak Chiwŏn who advocated adopting practical ideas and technology from Qing China despite Chosŏn anti-Manchu sentiments.

Silver imbalance

Economic deficit caused by British purchases of Chinese tea, silk, and porcelain, which the British reversed by illicitly exporting Indian-grown opium to China.

Sino-Japanese War

Conflict from 1894 to 1895 sparked by the Tonghak Rebellion in Korea, resulting in a decisive Japanese victory and the end of Chinese tributary ties with Korea.

Shi-nō-kō-shō

Confucian four-class social hierarchy blueprint ranking society into scholar-officials/samurai (shi), peasants (nō), artisans (kō), and merchants (shō).

Social Darwinism

Application of "survival of the fittest" doctrines to nations and races, popularized in East Asia by Herbert Spencer translations and Yan Fu to justify reform and imperial competition.

Sŏhak (Western Learning)

Intellectual trend in late Chosŏn Korea that introduced European scientific texts and Roman Catholicism, which was suppressed due to clashes with ancestral ritual order.

State Confucianism

Official state ideology of Chosŏn Korea built on Zhu Xi Neo-Confucianism, Ming investiture, and classical Chinese administrative rituals.

Tribute system

Diplomatic and ritual hierarchy centered on China dating from the Han dynasty, defined by reciprocal suzerain-vassal obligations, investiture, calendars, and formal exchanges.

Taewŏn'gun

Prince Regent (1864–1873) and father of Chosŏn King Kojong who implemented domestic royal centralization, persecuted Catholics, and maintained strict anti-Western exclusion.

Taiping Rebellion

Devastating civil conflict (1851–1864) in southern China led by Hong Xiuquan with Christian-influenced ideology that catalyzed the shift of military authority to regional Han commanders.

Taishō Democracy

Era in Japan (c. 1912–1926) defined by cabinet party politics, popular social movements, and universal male suffrage (1925), which coexisted with imperial colonial expansion.

Tonghak Movement

"Eastern Learning": a religious movement founded in 1860 by Ch'oe Cheu combining Confucian ethics, Buddhism, Taoist naturalism, and shamanism around human spiritual equality.

Treaty of Kangwha

The 1876 unequal treaty between Japan and Korea that declared Korea an independent country, opened three Korean ports, and granted extraterritoriality to the Japanese.

Treaty of Nanjing

The 1842 unequal treaty ending the First Opium War that opened five Chinese treaty ports, ceded Hong Kong to Britain, and established extraterritoriality and war indemnities.

Treaty of Shimonoseki

The 1895 peace treaty ending the Sino-Japanese War in which China ceded Taiwan and the Liaodong Peninsula, paid a large indemnity, and acknowledged the end of tributary ties to Korea.