New Books Network
Chinese Studies
Chinese Studies February 24, 2021

Writing for Print

Publishing and the Making of Textual Authority in Late Imperial China

Suyoung Son

Hosted by Aliki Semertzi
Suyoung Son’s book Writing for Print: Publishing and the Making of Textual Authority in Late Imperial China (Harvard UP, 2018) examines the widespread practice of self-publishing by writers in late imperial …

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East Asian Studies February 24, 2021

Buddhism after Mao

Negotiations, Continuities, and Reinventions

Zhe Ji, Gareth Fisher, André Laliberté

Hosted by Daigengna Duoer
With over 100 million followers, Buddhism in the People's Republic of China now fosters the largest community in the world of individuals who self-identify as Buddhists. Although Buddhism was harshly persecuted …
Chinese Studies February 19, 2021

Forgotten Ally

China's World War II, 1937–1945

Rana Mitter

Hosted by Keith Krueger
If we wish to understand the role of China in today’s global society, we would do well to remind ourselves of the tragic, titanic struggle which that country waged in …
Asian Review of Books February 18, 2021

The Myth of Chinese Capitalism

The Worker, the Factory, and the Future of the World

Dexter Roberts

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
Around the Chinese New Year period, millions of Chinese migrant workers return home from jobs in China’s major cities to their rural villages to visit their families. China’s urban centers …
East Asian Studies February 17, 2021

Comfort Women Activism

Critical Voices from the Perpetrator State

Eika Tai

Hosted by Nathan Hopson
Eika Tai’s Comfort Women Activism: Critical Voices from the Perpetrator State (Hong Kong University Press, 2020) tackles the complex histories of Japanese “military sexual violence” and the activism by women …
Japanese Studies February 12, 2021

Embracing 'Asia' in China and Japan

Asianism Discourse and the Contest for Hegemony, 1912-1933

Torsten Weber

Hosted by Samee Siddiqui
Embracing ‘Asia’ in China and Japan: Asianism Discourse and the Contest for Hegemony (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) by Torsten Weber examines how Asianism became a key concept in mainstream political discourse between China …
Law February 8, 2021

Asia's New Geopolitics

Essays on Reshaping the Indo-Pacific

Michael R. Auslin

Hosted by Jane Richards
Is the Indo-Pacific already the most dominant in terms of global power, politics, and wealth? In his newest book, Michael R. Auslin considers the key issues facing the Indo-Pacific which have ramifications …
East Asian Studies February 1, 2021

A Fourth-Century Daoist Family

The Zhen'gao, Or Declarations of the Perfected, Volume 1

Stephen R. Bokenkamp

Hosted by Natasha Heller
The Zhen’gao, or Declarations of the Perfected is one of the most important Daoist texts, and a literary classic in its own right. The Declarations of the Perfected collects fragmentary …
East Asian Studies January 29, 2021

Heritage and Romantic Consumption in China

Yujie Zhu

Hosted by Victoria Lupascu
The drums beat, an old man in a grand robe mutters incantation and three brides on horseback led by their grooms on foot proceed to the Naxi Wedding Courtyard, accompanied …
East Asian Studies January 25, 2021

Constructing Empire

The Japanese in Changchun, 1905–45

Bill Sewell

Hosted by Daigengna Duoer
What happens to everyday-life in a city when it becomes subsumed into an empire? Who becomes responsible for the everyday building and management of the new imperial enclave? How do …
East Asian Studies January 25, 2021

The Chinese Revolution on the Tibetan Frontier

Benno Weiner

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos
In The Chinese Revolution on the Tibetan Frontier (Cornell University Press, 2020) Benno Weiner provides an in-depth study of what happened when the Chinese Revolution came to Amdo, a Tibetan …
East Asian Studies January 21, 2021

Fir and Empire

The Transformation of Forests in Early Modern China

Ian M. Miller

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos
Ian M. Miller’s book Fir and Empire: The Transformation of Forests in Early Modern China (University of Washington Press, 2020) offers a transformation of our understanding of China’s early modern …
East Asian Studies January 20, 2021

Rural Origins, City Lives

Class and Place in Contemporary China

Roberta Zavoretti

Hosted by Suvi Rautio
Many of the millions of workers streaming in from rural China to jobs at urban factories soon find themselves in new kinds of poverty and oppression. Yet, their individual experiences …
East Asian Studies January 18, 2021

Realistic Revolution

Contesting Chinese History, Culture, and Politics after 1989

Els van Dongen

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos
What is the role of the intellectual? Is violence, not to mention radical change, necessary? Can there be a revolution without them? Realistic Revolution: Contesting Chinese History, Culture, and Politics …
East Asian Studies January 14, 2021

Staging Personhood

Costuming in Early Qing Drama

Guojun Wang

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos
Much is known about the Qing sartorial regulations and how the Qing conquerors forced Han Chinese males to adopt Manchu hairstyle and clothing. But what happened on the stage? What …
Asian Review of Books January 14, 2021

Three Asian Divas

Women, Art and Culture In Shiraz, Delhi and Yangzhou

David Chaffetz

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
The “diva” is a common trope when we talk about culture. We normally think of the diva as a Western construction: the opera singer, the Broadway actress, the movie star …
East Asian Studies January 13, 2021

A Fashionable Century

Textile Artistry and Commerce in the Late Qing

Rachel Silberstein

Hosted by Sarah Bramao-Ramos
Rachel Silberstein’s book A Fashionable Century: Textile Artistry and Commerce in the Late Qing (University of Washington Press, 2020) reveals how Qing fashion was produced at the intersection of commerce …
Chinese Studies January 8, 2021

Recovering Histories

Life and Labor after Heroin in Reform-Era China

Nicholas Bartlett

Hosted by Suvi Rautio
Heroin first reached Gejiu, a Chinese city in southern Yunnan known as Tin Capital, in the 1980s. Widespread use of the drug, which for a short period became “easier to …
Japanese Studies January 7, 2021

The Japanese Discovery of Chinese Fiction

The Water Margin and the Making of a National Canon

William C. Hedberg

Hosted by Jingyi Li
The classic Chinese novel The Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan) tells the story of a band of outlaws in twelfth-century China and their insurrection against the corrupt imperial court. Imported into …
East Asian Studies December 30, 2020

China's Muslims and Japan's Empire

Centering Islam in World War II

Kelly A. Hammond

Hosted by Ed Pulford
The 1930s-40s expansion of the Japanese empire was marked by significant interest among Japan-based scholars and policy-makers in China’s Muslim population and how best to write them into a new …