Chen Da was a Chinese sociologist.

Chen was born in Yuyao

Yuyao

Yuyao is a city in Zhejiang province, China, capital of Yuyao County, Ningbo. Administratively Yuyao is under the direct jurisdiction of Ningbo....

, Zhejiang Province and his sobriquet was Tongfu (通夫). From 1912-1916, he studied at Tsinghua School in Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

. From 1916 to 1923, he studied in the United States, and obtained his doctorate degree from Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

. Upon graduation, he returned to China and taught at Tsinghua for many years. When Tsinghua School transformed into Tsinghua University

Tsinghua University

Tsinghua University , colloquially known in Chinese as Qinghua, is a university in Beijing, China. The school is one of the nine universities of the C9 League. It was established in 1911 under the name "Tsinghua Xuetang" or "Tsinghua College" and was renamed the "Tsinghua School" one year later...

 in 1929, Chen helped found the department of sociology and became a professor and the chair of the department. During Sino-Japanese War

Second Sino-Japanese War

The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...

, he moved south with the university to Kunming

Kunming

' is the capital and largest city of Yunnan Province in Southwest China. It was known as Yunnan-Fou until the 1920s. A prefecture-level city, it is the political, economic, communications and cultural centre of Yunnan, and is the seat of the provincial government...

 and became the chairman of department of sociology of Southwest Associated University, and the director of the institute of national information search at Tsinghua University.

After 1952, Chen served as professor at Central Institute of Finance and Economics, Renmin University of China

Renmin University of China

Renmin University of China; RUC, also known as People's University of China , colloquially Renda , is a major research university in Haidian District, Beijing, China. Its campus neighbors those of Peking University and Tsinghua University....

, and Labor Cadre College of Central Ministry of Labor. He died on January 16, 1975.

Chen excelled in teaching and studies of demographic problems and Chinese labor's problems. He emphasized on means of investigation and was one of pioneers of modern China's demography. Among his works, there are Overseas Chinese-A special investigation of working conditions (English version), Chinese Labor's Research, Demographic Research, Chinese in Southeast Asian and the Societies in Fujian

Fujian

' , formerly romanised as Fukien or Huguing or Foukien, is a province on the southeast coast of mainland China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, and Guangdong to the south. Taiwan lies to the east, across the Taiwan Strait...

 and Guangdong

Guangdong

Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...

, Overseas Chinese's Hometowns in South China (English version), and Demography in Modern China (English version).