Li Jinxi: Between Modern Chinese Grammer and Chinese Language Education

Abstract

LI Jinxi (1890–1978) has made pioneering contributions in both fields of modern Chinese grammar and language education in China. These two disciplines were closely linked in Li's studies. Li’s academic training was relatively distant from modern linguistics. Still, the national language movement in the early twentieth century prompted Li, as an officer of the Ministry of Education, ROC, to engage in modern Chinese grammar research, thereby finding a precise grammatical theoretical basis for the national language movement and national language education. The Sentence-based theory revealed in New Chinese Grammar is directly related to the actual needs of language education. Although Li’s grammar system has been criticized a lot, it still plays an important role in China’s primary and secondary school language education today.