Most People’s Government: 4-H and Urbanization in East Asia

Thanks to the HMUI and other granting agencies, I was able to travel to DC and conduct substantial dissertation research on the history of 4-H clubs in the US and abroad. 4-H was the largest rural youth club throughout most of the US-allied world after 1945, and many of the largest in the world were in East Asia. 4-H’s main purpose was educating rural youth not formally enrolled in schools with life skills, so its history is also a history of the shifting position of the countryside in a quickly urbanizing East Asia. My research draws heavily on internal publications and handwritten ephemeralia, mostly old homework written by children participating in its programs. These intimate sources allow me to write a narrative that is very much alive to individual, human experiences within rural-urban transitions. Although this project is still ongoing, the HMUI grant this summer allowed me to make substantial progress in the face of ongoing border closings.