Zhifeng Zhong

Dr. Zhifeng Zhong, is an Assistant Professor of the School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China, and a Research Fellow of the Institute for the Studies of Buddhism and Religious Theory at Renmin University. He got his training in Sociology, Political Science and Religious Studies from various institutions. He received his first PhD in Political Science from Renmin University, and got his second doctorate in Religion, Politics and Society from Baylor University. Dr. Zhong’s main research interests include religion and politics in the modern world (with a special focus on the United States), and the development of Christianity in contemporary China. He has published several articles in World Religious Culture, Journal of Church & StateLogos & Pneuma, Sociology of Religion, Open Times and China Governance Review.

Dr. Zhong is working on a project on the rise of Chinese Christians in the Republican Era (1911-1949) and its impact on Christianity’s later development. In this project, he uses various sources (e.g. China Christian Year Book, name lists from Miner Searle Bates and Tianfeng, and other reliable secondary researches) to reconstruct the biographical information of prominent Chinese Christians. He will use sociological theory and network analysis to examine how education, social networks (both internal and transnational) and opportunity resulted from the social, political and cultural transformation in the first half of the Twentieth Century had contributed to the rise of Chinese Christians. He will also examine their roles in the indigenization of Christianity and China’s early modernization.