Abstract

After being introduced to the USA and the UK, Confucianism and Taoism are more and more popular and have more influence, which are reflected in the rising trend of the keywords related to Confucianism and Taoism in the Google English books from 1800s to 2000s. Based on corpora GBAE and GBBE, the author studies the diachronic spreading of Confucianism and Taoism in the UK and the USA. It is found that: (1) Confucianism and Taoism are more welcomed in the UK than in the USA; (2) compared with Taoism, Confucianism is more popular in the UK and the USA; (3) Confucius is more popular both in the UK and in the USA than Lao Tzu; and (4) the general spreading trend of Confucianism and Taoism is rising in 1810s–2000s in the UK and the USA. The author quantitatively answers the frequently asked questions related to the spreading of Confucianism and Taoism.

Highlights

  • Culturomics is the portmanteau combination of culture and genomics, which is defined as the application of high-throughput data collection and analysis to study human culture (Michel et al, 2011)

  • It is found that: (1) Confucianism and Taoism are more welcomed in the UK than in the USA; (2) compared with Taoism, Confucianism is more popular in the UK and the USA; (3) Confucius is more popular both in the UK and in the USA than Lao Tzu; and (4) the general spreading trend of Confucianism and Taoism is rising in 1810s–2000s in the UK and the USA

  • Google Books are crystallization of wisdom of elites and ordinary people, and the diachronic data of Google books N-gram can reflect the diachronic change of the native culture or the foreign culture spreading in the UK and the USA

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Summary

Introduction

Culturomics is the portmanteau combination of culture and genomics, which is defined as the application of high-throughput data collection and analysis to study human culture (Michel et al, 2011). Juola (2013) applies 2-gram data based on Google books to measure cultural complexity. Caruana-Galizia (2016) uses 1-gram data from Google Books from 1870–1945 to test George Orwell’s hypothesis that everyday language deteriorates under dictatorships. Google Books are crystallization of wisdom of elites and ordinary people, and the diachronic data of Google books N-gram can reflect the diachronic change of the native culture or the foreign culture spreading in the UK and the USA. Google Books N-gram is powerful sources to study native culture changes. The data of Google books published in the UK and the USA may reflect the diachronic spreading status of certain Chinese culture in the two countries. The present research tries to research the diachronic spreading of Confucianism and Taoism in the UK and the USA based on data of Google books N-gram

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