Sidney Rittenberg
| Sidney Rittenberg | |||||||||||||||||||
| Chinese | 李敦白 | ||||||||||||||||||
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| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Lǐ Dūnbái |
| Wade–Giles | Lǐ Tūnpái |
| Yale Romanization | Lǐ Dwūnbái |
| Yue: Cantonese | |
| Yale Romanization | leíh deuī baahk |
| IPA | [le̬i tɵ́y pàːk] |
| Jyutping | lei5 deoi1 baak6 |
Sidney Rittenberg (Chinese: 李敦白; pinyin: Lǐ Dūnbái; born August 14, 1921) is an American journalist, scholar, and Chinese linguist who lived in China from 1944 to 1979. He worked closely with People's Republic of China (PRC) founder Mao Zedong, military leader Zhu De, statesman Zhou Enlai, and other leaders of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) during the war, and was with these central Communist leaders at Yan'an. He witnessed first-hand much of what occurred at upper levels of the CCP and knew many of its leaders personally. Later, he was imprisoned in solitary confinement, twice, for a total of 16 years. He was the first American citizen to join the CCP.
Rittenberg's connections and experience have enabled him to run a successful consultancy business representing some of the world’s biggest brands, such as Intel, Levi Strauss, Microsoft, Hughes Aircraft and Teledesic.
Rittenberg was born into a Jewish family in Charleston, South Carolina, and lived there until his college studies. After attending Porter Military Academy, he turned down a full scholarship to Princeton University and instead attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he majored in philosophy. While attending Chapel Hill, he became a member of the Dialectic Society and the US Communist Party. In 1942, following the entry of the US into World War II—and after his leaving the Communist Party—Rittenberg joined the Army and was sent to Stanford's Army Far Eastern Language and Area School to learn Japanese. Rittenberg did not wish to be assigned to study Japanese, and was able to be assigned to learn Chinese instead. This led to his being sent to China in 1944. Rittenberg said that one of the turning points in his life came shortly after he arrived in China. He was sent to bring a $26 check to the family of a girl who was killed by a drunken US soldier. Despite the family's devastation, they gave Rittenberg $6 for his help. It was at that point that "something inside Sidney Rittenberg shifted." After the end of the war, he decided to stay in China as part of the United Nations famine relief program. This led to his meeting the leaders of the Communist movement at Yan'an in 1946.
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