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Chinese Identity (Sino-Centrism/Sino-Centrism and the Chinese Identity) Chinese people call their country ‘Zhongguo (中國/中国)’ in Chinese. The character zhong (中) means middle or central whilst guo (國/国) means land, kingdom or country; therefore zhongguo could be translated as “middle kingdom”. The name Zhongguo first appeared in documents relating to the late Zhou dynasty (1027-221 BC) in the Classic of History (shujing, 書經) and reflects the Zhou dynasty belief that China was the centre of civilization. Ruled by the dynasties that had obtained the Mandate of Heaven since ancient times, the Chinese tended to view themselves as indeed being at the centre of the world while the rest of the world consisted of barbarians, and they looked on the people in neighbouring countries as vassals. According to ancient Chinese political beliefs, the Emperor of China was considered the ruler of “all under heaven” (tianxia 天下), a phrase which was used to refer to the whole world. Although in practice there would have been some areas of the known world which were not under the control of the Emperor, it is believed that the political rulers of those areas derived their power from the Emperor of China. This traditional perspective is known as Sino-centrism (zhongguo zhongxin zhuyi 中國中心主意), which regards China as the central or unique relative to other countries. Sino-centrism was also strongly evident in China’s response to the first map of the world in Chinese, composed by the Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) in Zhaoqing, Guangdong province in 1584 during the Ming Dynasty, as follows: “Lately Matteo Ricci utilised some false teachings to fool people, and scholars unanimously believed him...take for example the position of China on the map. He puts it not in the centre but slightly to the west and inclined to the north. This is altogether far from the truth, for China should be in the centre of the world, which we can prove by the single fact that we can see the North Star resting at the zenith of the heaven at midnight. How can China be treated like a small unimportant country, and placed slightly to the north as in this map?” 1 Later on, another Jesuit, Guilio Aleni (1582-1649) modified Ricci’s earlier work and published the Complete Map of All the Countries (Wanguo Quantu 萬國全圖) in the 1620s by responding to China’s demands to have the Chinese Empire located in the centre of the world map, which resulted in the Sino-centric configuration. 2