Description
The Theodore Hsi-en Chen papers consist of administrative and faculty papers from Dr. Chen's chairing of the East Asian Studies
Center and its predecessors from 1960 to 1971. The collection also includes material from the 1940s and 1950s, a scrapbook
of newspaper clippings on Dr. Chen's career, photographic slides showing Theodore Chen and Wen Hui Chen's tour of Hong Kong
and Southeast Asia in 1962, research reports and theses, and a photocopied biography of Theodore Chen. Lastly, the collection
contains an oral history interview with Theodore Chen conducted by Ken Klein in 1986. Theodore H.E. Chen (Ph.D. 1939) was
chairman of USC's Department of Asian Studies from 1940 to 1968, and from 1960 to 1971 he directed the East Asian Studies
Center, in support of which he had obtained the first federal grants. Chen also secured outside funding for a project to
help train and advise high school teachers of Chinese and Japanese. A native of Fuzhou, China, Chen was president of Fukien
Christian University in 1946 and 1947 while on leave to participate in postwar rehabilitation. He also helped organize Tunghai
University in Taiwan as a representative of the United Board of Christian Colleges. He was the author of nine books, including
Thought Reform of Chinese Intellectuals and
Maoist Educational Revolution and Chinese Education. Dr. Chen died on May 7, 1991.
Restrictions
All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Department of Special
Collections at specol@usc.edu. Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections as the owner of the physical
items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained.