Dr. Alvyn Austin

Alvyn Austin is a longtime teacher and professor of Chinese history whose work has helped significantly enhance Canada-China relations. Born to missionary parents who fled China during the Japanese War, Austin was born in India and then moved with his family back to China where he witnessed the Chinese civil war. His family moved to Toronto in 1951 and Austin was enrolled in East Asian Studies at UC by the age of 17. He would go on to become one of our nation’s foremost scholars in Canada-China relations, writing influential publications and contributing to several cultural initiatives. One such post included working as interpretation planner for the Norman Bethune House in Gravenhurst, which is visited by nearly all Chinese delegations. Amongst Austin’s many publications is the book Saving China: Canadian Missionaries in the Middle Kingdom 1888-1959, which created a new field of scholarship and is required reading for Canadian diplomats to China. Austin retired from Brock University and his distinguished academic career in 2007.