‘Laying out a Model Village’: George Gushue-Taylor and Missionary Leprosy Work in Colonial Taiwan

Abstract

At a time when colonial governments were reluctant to launch comprehensive anti-leprosy programmes in the first half of the twentieth century, international charity organisations and medical missionary workers were keen on tackling this highly moralised disease. The same applied in colonial Taiwan under Japanese rule. Following the works of Michael Worboys, Sanjiv Kakar and others, the present study looks into the work of charitable and religious organisations through a historical account of the career of the Canadian leprologist Dr George Gushue-Taylor (1883–1954).