An American pioneer of Chinese Studies in cross-cultural perspective: Benjamin Bowen Carter as an agent of global knowledge

Abstract

Benjamin Bowen Carter (1771–1831) will not be familiar to many readers, but this ‘scholar-linguist’ was ‘the only American engaged in the serious study of Chinese at the beginning of the nineteenth century’ (p. 297). Yeung Man Shun’s important new study establishes Carter’s place within the annals of American Sinology, while also throwing new light on other important topics, including the more active field of British Chinese Studies in the early 1800s. To this end, Yeung examines hitherto unknown and understudied primary sources from a wide range of collections (including the Royal Asiatic Society), harnessing varied material from the United States, France, Britain, and elsewhere—an especially notable achievement during pandemic conditions. Born in Providence, Rhode Island, Carter was the son of a publisher—his father served as a printer’s apprentice to Benjamin Franklin—and he was educated at Rhode Island College (now Brown University). Proficient in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, Carter trained as a physician and operated a medical practice until, in 1798, he signed on as ship’s surgeon for a trading voyage to Canton. This was the first of what would ultimately become five journeys to the Far East (four to Canton and one to Batavia), and the modest but increasing trading privileges which Carter secured on these trips would eventually make his fortune (pp. 32–36). Rhode Island had recently been at the heart of opposition to the British Crown during the American War of Independence, and it would now become prominent in America’s burgeoning trade with the Far East. At this time, all Western trade was conducted through the port of Canton, and it was here that Carter arrived at the end of 1798. The new environment would stimulate Carter’s curiosity about languages, a trait demonstrated during the journey to China when, after going ashore at Botany Bay, he made phonetic transcriptions of the speech of a local man known as Maroot the Elder (circa 1773–1817). These would later become a valuable source for the study of the history of the native languages of Australia (p. 39). If Carter’s trips to China rewarded him financially, they also allowed him the rare opportunity to mingle with Chinese merchants, and sympathetic contacts helped kindle a fascination with the richness and complexity of Chinese culture. Carter’s fifth and final journey, taking place between 1804 and 1806, allowed him to stay in Canton for over a year, and he clearly enjoyed this long period of relative liberty to indulge his interest in Chinese language. Drawing on Carter’s little-studied manuscript and archival collections, Yeung reconstructs Carter’s Chinese language studies, which took place ‘according