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Boxer Rebellion

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Submitted By beavis
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While foreigners were building railroads and other forms of industrialization, they would sneak up and kill them. They were also responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Chinese Christians. The Boxer Rebellion was an uprising of the Righteous Harmony Society against the West in northern China between 1898 and 1901. The Boxers began as an anti-foreign, anti-imperialist peasant based movement. It is also said to be a religious revolution against national corruption in the form of foreign missionaries, soldiers, and diplomats, as well as native Christians. Reforms were implemented after the crisis in 1900, which laid the foundation for the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Chinese Republic. In this article, we see that the author demonstrates that this event can be split into that of true history and myth. History in three keys is a work written about the point of view of its author, but not always portrayed in a factual sense. Cohen’s view in the article follows the categories of event, experience, and myth.
Historical retelling is in constant tension with two other more influential ways of knowing the past - experience and myth. History retells itself through the accounts of historians with those of participants and witnesses; and sets these perspectives against the range of popular myths that were fashioned about the Boxers. One part tells the Boxer rebellion as recreated by historians. The next explores the feelings and behavior of the direct participants in the Boxer experience who understood what was actually happening to them at the time unlike historians. Lastly, Cohen studies the myths surrounding the uprising in China and moreover the West. By going about his research this way he is able to form his own conclusion about the event and act as an educated human that actually lived the time rather than a parrot gossiping about it.

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