ABSTRACT
An important aspect of the missionary-journalists’ work which is not so frequently recognized, is their crucial contribution to modernizing Chinese printing technology. Exploring this aspect, moreover, may cast new light on theories of the wider socio-historical impact of media technologies, such as that classically propounded in the work of Harold Innis (1972; 1995). This chapter aims, first, to trace the way in which generations of missionaries endeavoured to advance traditional printing technology in nineteenth-century China; second, to explore the implications and the ‘unintended consequences’ of this activity; and, finally, to reflect briefly on the implications of the Chinese experience for Innis’s theories.
