About Marion Naifeh

Marion Naifeh (born April 11, 1928) was an educator on four continents, teaching classes at all levels, from literacy programs in Nigeria to graduate schools including Georgetown University and The School of Advanced International Studies of John Hopkins University. With her husband, George Naifeh, she represented the United States in diplomatic missions in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia. She is also an author, who has published two books. A 2003 publication, The Last Missionary in China, was described by Ezra F. Vogel, Harvard Professor and leading Sinologist, as “A touching, well-written, well-researched account of the life and times of a missionary who died in China in 1951 after 34 years there, by his daughter. Objective, nuanced, broad-gauged.” Her second book, Foreign Service, published in 2016, is a memoir of Naifeh’s life in the U.S. diplomatic corps with her husband George and children Steven and Carolyn. In 2019, Naifeh published Finding My Mother: The Red Box, which details the extraordinary life of her mother in China, as inspired by a remarkable collection of writings and memorabilia assembled some 90 years before.