Transforming Maggie May to Miss Pu:

Neoculturalism Through Missionary Nursing in North China, 1924-1943

Jennifer M.L. Stephens, BSN, MA, RN, OCN

PhD student (Nursing), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, CANADA

Introduction

Early History of Nursing in China

Worlds Collide:

Neoculturalism

The Isabella Fisher Hospital, School of Nursing

Tientsin, North China (1881-1943)

Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the American Methodist Episcopal Church (WFMS)

Margaret “Maggie” May Prentice

1892

Born in eastern Colorado, USA

1901

Tells family she is meant to be a nurse missionary in China

Early 1900’s

Training at Colorado Teacher’s College

Rural school teacher in Colorado

1917-1921

Bachelors of Religious Services (BRS):

Chicago Training School for City, Home, and Foreign Missions

1921-1923

NURSE DIPLOMA:

Wesley Memorial Hospital School of Nursing (Chicago, IL)

1924

Sent by the Women’s Foreign Missionary Society of the

Methodist Church to work at the Isabella Fisher Hospital

(Tientsin, China)

1926-1934

Superintendent, School of Nursing, I.F.H.

Nursing leader in professionalization of nursing in China.

1934-1937

Superintendent of the I.F. Hospital

1937-1938

Banished from China due to the start of the 2nd Sino-Japanese

War.

Traveled internationally with nurse friend

Chu-ke Wen-P’ing taking courses and lecturing at nursing

schools (UK, Russia, US).

1938

Return to occupied Tientsin/I.F.H. to resume SON. Declared

Japanese prisoner.

1941

Nursing examiner at Peking Presbyterian Hospital

1942-1943

Imprisioned at Japanese concentration camp.

Forced to leave China.

1943-1944

Lived in Colorado.

Diploma in Journalism from Denver University.

Return to Tientsin in late 1944

1944-1948

Resumed duties as Superintendent of the I.F. Hospital

1949

Final banishment from China with establishment of Communist

People’s Republic of China

1949-1952

Lived in U.S.

1952-1987

Nurse missionary at the Ganta Mission (Liberia).

Published Unwelcome at the Northeast Gate (1966)

1988

Death in Northglenn, Colorado

At the I.F.H., cross-blending of multinational

cultural, social, economic, religious, political,

and practical factors caused the creation of a

new and unique type of nursing and nursing

culture. At first the nurses resisted modification

of Nightingale canons. Nursing epistemology

had distinct grounding in Western, allopathic,

and Christian traditions but was forced to shift

for a Chinese audience. Culture transplanted

from graft (missionaries) to host (China)

suggests instead a project in neoculture.

Neoculturalism in this context refers to the

alteration of the traditional (modernism), with

emphasis on structure and defined limits, into

something new and undefined (post-

modernism).2 Neoculturalism can also be

associated with thick (underlying) versus thin

(peripheral) culture. 3

A neocultural influence is most apparent when

comparing Maggie May’s host of letters and

documents from the 1920’s with those from the

1940’s and beyond, such as her

autobiographical novel Unwelcome at the

Eastern Gate. While she influenced the

development of nursing in China, her

relationship with the Chinese changed her from

a Nightingale/Western nurse into a transcultural

nurse-hybrid, one who embraced many

cultures. Perhaps this flexibility reflects an

essence of nursing.

Founded to bring Western medicine to non-

Western countries, hospitals such as the

Isabella Fisher Hospital in Tientsin, North

China perpetuated allopathic principals of

health care. In nursing these were often

referred to as ‘Florence Nightingale Canons.’

The F.N. model became the focus of

missionary nurse work far and wide.

Missionaries like Maggie May viewed the

Nightingale concepts of nursing as separate

from medicine (physician) and of nursing

being a calling.

1881: I.F.H. for Women and Children founded by Canadian Dr. Leonora King, supported by the WFMS.

1888: First Chinese nursing education program based on the Florence Nightingale/Western model was established by

American nurse Ella Johnson in Fuchou. 4,5

1912: The Nurses’ Association of China (NAC) was formalized and headed by missionary nurses.

1915: I.F.H. rebuilt, reopened, and soon became one of the largest nursing schools in China. 6

1920: First baccalaureate program at the Peking Union Medical College.

1930: The Chinese government opened the first public nursing school.

1930’s: As Superintendent, Maggie May forged a strong alliance between the I.F.H. and other nursing schools including the

Peking Union Medical School, considered the center of nursing education in China for several decades.

Rural Teacher

Farming Background

MAGGIE MAY PRENTICE

玛格利特 梅 普伦蒂斯 “Margaret May Prentice” in Chinese.

“Miss Pu” was given to her by Chinese nurse colleagues right

before her banishment in 1937. “Pu” is a North Chinese

surname indicating that she was honourably adopted.1

Buddhism

Family

Friends in US/China

References

1. M.M. Prentice, Unwelcome at the Northeast Gate (n.p.: Inter-collegiate Press, Inc.,

1966).

2. A. Papakostas, Civilizing the Public Sphere: Distrust, Trust and Corruption

(London: Palgrave McMillan, 2012).

3. W. Mishler and D. Pollack, “On culture, thick and thin: Toward a neo-cultural

synthesis,” in D. Pollack and J. Jacobs (eds.) Political culture in Post-Community

Europe (London: Ashgate, 2003).

4. K. Chen, "Missionaries and the early development of nursing in China," Nursing

History Review: Official Journal of The American Association For The History of

Nursing 58, no. 4 (1996): 129-149.

5. D. Smith and S. Tang, “Nursing in China: Historical development, current issues,

and future challenges,” 大分看護科学研究 (Nursing Research), no. 5 (2) (2004):

16- 20.

6. Gwen Sherwood and Huaping Liu, "International collaboration for developing

graduate education in China," Nursing Outlook 53, no. 1 (2005), 15.

Miss Pu