Asian History Commons^™

Getting Out, Ron Baenninger

Headwaters

No abstract provided.

Did The Hakka Save China? Ethnicity, Identity, And Minority Status In China's Modern Transformation, P. Richard Bohr

Headwaters

No abstract provided.

The Origins Of Christian Society In Ancient India, Crista Nalani Anderson

Honors Scholar Theses

Approximately 2.4% of the Indian population identify themselves as Christians[1]. As the number of followers grows, it is only natural to question how this religion came to India. The Syrian Christians of Kerala have taken great pride for countless centuries in the fact that their church was personally founded by the apostle Thomas. However, does this legend accurately portray the historical reality? Numerous scholars claim that Christianity was brought to the continent by merchants, other evangelists, or Jewish settlers. This study seeks to identify the evidence behind these claims by comparing the existing primary source documents and observable …

Book Review: Dream Of Ding Village By Yan Lianke, Mike Frick

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Unsurprisingly, the Chinese government levied a “three nos” ban—no sales, no distribution, and no promotion—against Dream of Ding Village after its publication in 2005. Though the storytelling relies heavily on dream sequences, Yan takes little poetic license when exposing the depth of the state’s culpability in spreading HIV among poor, medically-naïve farmers. He is just as uncompromising when detailing how officials denied responsibility for the ensuing AIDS epidemic, even as they profited from its human tragedy. No one in Ding Village receives medical care, mental health counseling, food assistance, or a chance to hold the blood heads legally accountable. Cast …

Mao's Rise To Power: To What Extent Did Mao Zedong Utilize Edgar Snow’S Red Star Over China To Consolidate Power?, Dorothy Zhang

Young Historians Conference

Mao Zedong's rise to power has been viewed through many lenses, such as through the downfall of the Kuomintang or through his opportunism, but this paper examines: to what extent did Mao utilize Edgar Snow’s Red Star Over China to consolidate power? This question is answered by looking at Snow’s work, other historians' view of Snow's work, and reviews of Red Star when the book was first released in 1937. Snow's work was used to determine his aims in interviewing Mao and whether he intended to be a "mouthpiece" for Mao. Other historians' views were used to research Mao's previous …

Changsha: Photographs By Rian Dundon, Rian Dundon

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Rian Dundon, whose photographs have previously appeared at China Beat, will soon be releasing a new book of photography on China, Changsha. Dundon’s book will feature a forward written by friend of the blog Gail Hershatter and includes his photos of and essays on the Hunan province city of Changsha. For more information, and to pre-order a copy of the book, see the book’s website (pre-sales of the book are part of a crowd-funding campaign raising funds for its first run with the publisher, Emphas.is). Below is a special teaser of Changsha material that Dundon has prepared for China Beat …

The Successful Integration Of Buddhism With Chinese Culture: A Summary, Xinyi Ou

Grand Valley Journal of History

Buddhism has commonly been credited as the sole foreign religion to truly gain access to the hearts and minds of the Chinese people. Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam were likewise spread along the Silk Roads to China, yet these religions did not take root. What culminating factors played a role in the acceptance of Buddhism into Chinese culture? Is it possible that Buddhism should not be regarded as a foreign religion, but as a seed of thought that was nurtured by the missionary monks and the Chinese into a form almost unrecognizable from it's initial origins? Through a survey …

Directorate Of Education (Guo Zi Jian) And The Imperial University (Tai Xue) In The Northern Song (960-1127)-Interaction Between Politics And Education In Middle Period China, Ming Kin Chu

Lingnan Theses

The Imperial University played a significant political role in China’s imperial past. When established in the ancient Zhou, its mission was predominantly to nurture prospective officials for eventual service in government. This marks the inseparability of education and politics from the very onset of the University’s founding. Nevertheless, its diminished success in producing officials under subsequent dynasties caused a comparable diminution in the political significance of the metropolitan school. Not until the Northern Song, founded by the Zhao clan, did signs emerge of a resurrection of sorts.

Three major educational reforms were attempted in the reigns of Renzong, Shenzong, and …

Pure Land And The Social Order In Twelfth-Century China: An Investigation Of "Longshu’S Treatise On Pure Land", Trevor Davis

Student Work

A 2012-2013 William Prize for best essay in East Asian Studies was awarded to Trevor Davis (Saybrook College '13) for his essay submitted to the History Department, “Pure Land and the Social Order in Twelfth-Century China: An Investigation of Longshu’s Treatise on Pure Land.” (Valerie Hansen, Professor of History, advisor.)

Davis' essay makes a powerful argument about the Pure Land Buddhist Wang Rixiu's understanding of Southern Song (1127-1279) society. Although Pure Land Buddhism is often thought to be egalitarian - or at least to challenge traditional hierarchies - Trevor shows that for Wang Rixiu, an egalitarian Pure Land coexists …

A Comparative Analysis Of The Transitional Effect Of Democratic Regime Change On Human Rights Development, Alana Mcelhinney

Political Science Theses and Capstones

It has been a long-standing topic of discussion within the field of political science on the extent to which the establishment of democratic regime characteristics influences the development of human rights. While there is considerable research in the areas of democracy and human rights, what the literature lacks is research towards the growth of democratic regime characteristics being causal to the development of human rights practices. This analysis shows that a transition in democratic regime characteristics is directly linked to the development of human rights. After completing case-study analysis and developing causal theory I take data from the years 1981 …

The Human Flesh Search Engine: Democracy, Censorship, And Political Participation In Twenty-First Century China, Vincent Capone

Graduate History Conference, UMass Boston

The Human Flesh Search Engine is a recent, unique phenomenon on the Chinese internet. Comprising of thousands of forum, micro-blog, and entertainment websites and mobilizing the overwhelming number of Chinese internet users, or netizens, the search engine is able to quickly find obscure information and identify seemingly anonymous internet personalities. These websites allow netizens to have their voices heard in an otherwise restrictive government, however these websites also become a hotbed for dissent, with web users highlighting stories and figures which they deem harmful to society. Through clever investigative work, netizens hunt down an individual's identity with the goal of …

Village Elections And The Rise Of Capitalist Entrepreneurs, Yusheng Yao

Faculty Publications

This study examines a series of four direct elections and their impact in an industrialized Chinese northern village. It finds that direct elections empowered villagers and the new economic elite to remove the old, entrenched and corrupt leadership. However, the few capitalist entrepreneurs who dominated elections and the new leadership neither abided by the rules for political competition nor tried to govern democratically. On the other hand, villagers did not feel empowered to participate in the governing process or to make officials accountable. They either became politically apathetic or hoped for a return of a benevolent authoritarian leader. This study …

Asoka As Philanthropist, Roger A. Lohmann

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Philanthropy is one of the oldest concepts associated with western civilization. Although it is generally traced to ancient Greece, there is no clear indication where the Greeks got the idea. My earlier paper on Buddhist philanthropy was one of the first published studies in the third sector literature of evidence of Buddhist practices in this area. This unpublished paper explores more fully the history and legends associated with one of the major figures in the Buddhist philanthropic division. Asoka was the third ruler of the Maurian empire in northern India. A great warrior, Asoka is reputed to have given up …

Korean Perceptions Of Chastity, Gender Roles, And Libido; From Kisaengs To The Twenty First Century, Katrina Maynes

Grand Valley Journal of History

The kisaengs were highly educated performing artists that contradicted the historical view that Korean women should be chaste, quiet, and inconspicuous. Beginning in the twentieth century, kisaengs declined in popularity as sexual services became widely available, and despite the abiding insistence on chastity, millions of Koreans became involved in the prostitution industry. Although the traditional kisaengs have disappeared, the sexual and social oppression that has pervaded throughout Korean history has resulted in the enduring dominance of the prostitution industry. This paper accordingly traces the historical foundation of Korean kisaengs, analyzing the contradictions they posed to traditional values and accounting for …

Correlating The Nevius Method With Church Planting Movements: Early Korean Revivals As A Case Study, Wesley L. Handy

Liberty Theological Review

John Nevius served as a missionary to China in the late nineteenth-century. From his field experience, Nevius argued for radical changes in missionary methodology. His greatest influence may have been on the mission to Korea beginning in the 1890s. David Garrison, currently serving in South Asia, served for several years in influential administrative roles within the International (formerly Foreign) Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. He studied and advocated Church Planting Movements [CPM], necessitating a change in contemporary missionary methodology. Both men have made major contributions to the practice of missions. This article endeavors to show the similarities between …

The Taiwan Elections In Historical Perspective, Sebastian Veg

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

During a recent trip to Taipei to observe the January presidential and legislative elections, like many people with little first-hand knowledge of Taiwan, I was struck by the unique traits of Taiwan’s democracy. The elections also seemed relevant to many debates in China, not only because they were closely followed and tweeted by critical voices on the mainland, but also because of their significance against the broader historical and geographical context of the history of modern China, a connection which holds true even if one subscribes to the view that Taiwan had no previous connection with this history before 1945 …

Book Review: Developmental Fairy Tales, Nicole Kwoh

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

At the 1996 APEC Economic Leaders Meeting, Jiang Zemin concluded his speech on economic development with a quote from Lu Xun: “For actually the earth had no road to begin with, but when many men pass one way, a road is made” (1921). This quote highlights the important role played by the first generation of modern Chinese literature in shaping the current rhetoric of building a road to progress. In Developmental Fairy Tales: Evolutionary Thinking and Modern Chinese Culture, Andrew F. Jones explains the construction of this ubiquitous concept of cultural and historical progress. With a focus on Lu …

Salvaging Memories From The Ruins Of The Three Gorges, Daisy Yan Du

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The Three Gorges Dam is the largest hydro-electric power station in the world. The construction of the dam began in 1994 and was completed in 2009. Proponents bill it as a symbol of China’s rise on the global stage, while critics worldwide see it as a huge humanitarian crisis that has the potential to worsen in years to come. The biggest controversy of this project concerns the forced migration of around two million people, who, due to the rising water, have been displaced from their hometowns along the upper reaches of the Yangzi River in Chongqing and Sichuan and Hubei …

Digital Chinese Whispers: Death Threats And Rumors Inside China’S Online Marketplace Of Ideas, James Leibold

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The Chinese internet is a wonderfully raucous and interesting place. It has greatly expanded the scope of public discourse and activity, despite the party-state’s extensive censorship regime. Not surprisingly, the world’s largest cyber-community exhibits tremendous depth and diversity: progressive cyber-activists and professional agitators; navel-gazing starlets and steam-venting gamers; mundane infotainment and the banal waxing of quotidian life; and, sadly, dark corners of fear, hatred and paranoia. It’s all there; it simply depends on where one looks. Like other technologies before it, the internet is normatively neutral, and thus can be put to good, bad and anodyne uses: individuals—not tools—shape the …

Behind Bo Xilai’S Halo, Xujun Eberlein

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

In the wake of Bo Xilai’s sudden downfall, shortly after what could be called an online carnival among China watchers—probably more in celebration of a rare, real-life political drama than anything else—international media is changing its tune and beginning to paint a more sympathetic image of Bo than previously reported, by focusing on Chinese people’s love of him. Reuters, for example, has a report titled “In China’s Chongqing, dismay over downfall of Bo Xilai” that quotes a working “stick man” (棒棒军, a porter-for-hire) who praises Bo as “a good man” that “made life a lot better here.” The Telegraph‘s Malcolm …