Canada's first professor of Chinese Studies in 1930

While he is credited for introducing socialism to China as the founder of the Socialist Party of China 中國社會黨 in his early life, the multivalent assemblage of thoughts and ideologies he has engaged with in his life is often ignored in Chinese scholarly discourses, mainly due to his cooperation with the Wang Jingwei regime, which earned him the reputation of a traitor in Republican and Communist China and brought him to jail. He eventually past away due to illnesses while imprisoned in Shanghai. 

The time he spent overseas, however, is less noticed in comparison to his political activism and government positions. His passion for socialism and anarchism was developed in his own pursue of education in Japan and Europe, and he acquired a teaching position in the University of California, Berkeley between 1914 and 1920 as well as the role of Chinese consultant in the library of congress in 1928. In 1930, Jiang was appointed the first chairman of the nascent Chinese Studies department at McGill University. His appointment lasted 3-4 years until the discontinuation of the department in 1934. 

Although his time at McGill was brief, it has left us with the  Kiang Kang-hu Fonds archive which collects the documents related to Jiang during his time at McGill, his teaching materials, correspondences, general administrative notes, and more. The values of its archival legacy is three-fold. First, the correspondence fills the gap in the biographical research of Jiang Kanghu in Canada. During his time at McGill (and by extension, the preceding two years when he undertook the role of the Chinese consultant for the Library of Congress), Jiang’s interests have shifted between political activism, which received most of the attention in existing Chinese scholarship on Jiang, and  teaching. Introducing Chinese culture to the western world and the hardships of overseas Chinese emerged to be a central theme in his writings and lectures.

The archive also provides insights into the early interests of Chinese studies in North America, intertwined with the history of Universities through correspondences, financial records, and curriculums. He collaborated with Nancy Lee Swann, the Columbian-trained sinologist, who later left McGill due to the cancellation of the department and the move of the Gest Library, one of the largest libraries for Chinese studies at the time, to Princeton University. The movements of scholars and resources sketch an exciting outline of how academia and university administration perceived the field and the position of China in the modern world.

Lastly, this archival found could be a starting point for further studies on Chinese students studying abroad in the early twentieth century. Only limited studies in English on Chinese students abroad exist, and their scopes are limited to either the Chinese Education Mission sent by the Qing government in the 1870s or the surge of international students after the reform and opening up in the 1980s PRC. Meanwhile, although Western education (and, by extension, education in Japan) is one of the most formative aspects of intellectual history in Modern China, such perspective limits the Chinese discourses surrounding the topic by focusing on the few elites and their contribution to the modernization of China after their returns. The identity of overseas students as a collective group within the history of immigration, the students’ lived experiences, and the policies and regulations of different destinations at the time are understudied.

According to the author, Kiang Kanghu led a life of complexity and transformation. During China's "unprecedented upheaval in three millennia" in the modern era, the country was plagued by constant national conflicts, class divisions, social crises, cultural clashes, and ideological confrontations. Jiang's shifting political positions and evolving ideological theories mirrored the turbulent waves of China's modern history.

• Born into a feudal "second-generation official" family, Jiang transitioned into "one of the pioneers of the reform movement in Beijing after the Boxer Rebellion of 1900."

• From a reformist with a strong sense of innovation advocating for social change and national salvation, he evolved into an anarchist pursuing the philosophy of "nihilism."

• Around the age of 30, Jiang shifted from being an anarchist to embracing the ideals of the Second International's democratic socialism as a "socialist."

• After turning 40, he transitioned from an active promoter of socialism to a politician seeking collaboration with the Beiyang warlords and their government to implement his ideological visions.

• Despite supporting the Japanese government, he did not shy away from criticizing it in banned articles for failing to provide sufficient grain supplies to the Chinese people.