Welcome to our book review site go-pdf.online!
You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
The Chinese Market Economy, 10001500
Documents the rise and fall of a market economy in China from 10001500. Since the economic liberalization of the 1980s, the Chinese economy has boomed and is poised to become the worlds largest market economy, a position traditional China held a millennium ago. William Guanglin Lius bold and fascinating book is the first to rely on quantitative methods to investigate the early market economy that existed in China, making use of rare market and population data produced by the Song dynasty in the eleventh century. A counterexample comes from the century around 1400 when the early Ming court deliberately turned agrarian society into a command economy system. This radical change not only shrank markets, but also caused a sharp decline in the living standards of common people. Lius landmark study of the rise and fall of a market economy highlights important issues for contemporary China at both the empirical and theoretical levels.
East-Asian Archaeoastronomy
Historical astronomical records can play an important role in modern research, especially in the case of ancient Chinese observational data: sunspot and aurora records are important for the study of solar variability; solar and lunar eclipse records for the study of the Earth's rotation; records of Comet Hally for the study of orbital evolution; "guest star" records for the study of supernova remnants; planetary conjunction records for research in astronomical chronology. In the past, Western scientists have not been able to exploit these valuable data fully because the original records were difficult to gather and interpret, and complete English translations have not been available. East-Asian Archaeoastronomy is the first comprehensive translation into English of such historical records for modern research. The book also features an introduction to East Asian astronomy and offers guidance on how to use the records effectively. It will not only be a valuable research tool for astronomers but should also be of great interest to historians of China and Chinese science.
The Making of Song Dynasty History
A revisionist analysis of the major sources for Song history, explaining their master narrative as the product of political tension.
Song shi
None
Japan and China
Brings together the study of modern China and Japan for the period prior to the 20th century. The chapters deal with Chinese and Japanese works written in response to events in the other country and give a view of how they saw each other at a time when there were few personal contacts allowed.
Competition over Content
"Between the sixth and twentieth centuries, the civil service examinations created and maintained political coherence across the Chinese polity. Preparation for the examinations transformed the lives of literate elites by defining educational standards and disseminating a language that determined elite status. However, as participation in the examinations became central to that status, an intense competition to determine the educational curriculum and the subject matter of the examinations erupted between intellectual and political rivals. The principal goal of this book is to explain the restructuring of the examination field during a critical point in its history, the Southern Song dynasty...
Men of Letters within the Passes
The main theme of this book is the interaction between two “places,” China and Guanzhong, the capital area of several dynasties. It addresses such questions as What do we mean by “local”? Did the inhabitants of a locality believe that being “local” required them to assume a certain identity? If so, how did they talk and write about it? Were there spatial and temporal differences in the representation of locales? This work examines how Guanzhong literati conceptualized three sets of relations: central/regional, “official”/“unofficial,” and national/local. It further traces the formation over the last millennium of the imperial state of a critical communal self-consciousness, the role of this consciousness in constructing a local identity and promoting an “unofficial” space for nonofficial elite activism, and the effect of the presence (or absence) of this consciousness on literati views of central-regional relationships. The issue here is not whether there can be a shared national culture, but whether this culture can be perceived as having regional variations and therefore contributing to the formation of a local identity.
Ancient Chinese Academy, Confucianism, and Society I
As the first volume of a two-volume set that studies the ancient Chinese academy from a socio-cultural perspective, this title explores the history of the academy and its relationship with the development of Confucianism in the Song, Yuan, and Ming dynasties. Inaugurated in the Tang dynasty and eventually abolished in the late Qing dynasty, the academy, as a unique cultural and educational organization in Chinese history, exerted extensive and profound influences on ancient Chinese culture, politics, and social life. The book first revisits the inception and development of the academy by anaylzing the socio-cultural context and different driving forces including social mentality, print culture, education systems, and so on. It then examines the reciprocity and thriving relationships between the academy and Neo-Confucianism in the Song and Yuan dynasties and Yangming School of Mind in the Ming dynasty. The title will be a useful reference for scholars, students, and general readers interested in cultural history, intellectual history, and educational history of ancient China and especially the Chinese academy culture.
World Antiquarianism
The term antiquarianism refers to engagement with the material heritage of the past—an engagement that preceded the modern academic discipline of archaeology. Antiquarian activities result in the elaboration of particular social behaviors and the production of tools for exploring the collective memory. This book is the first to compare antiquarianism in a global context, examining its roots in the ancient Near East, its flourishing in early modern Europe and East Asia, and its manifestations in nonliterate societies of Melanesia and Polynesia. By establishing wide-reaching geographical and historical perspectives, the essays reveal the universality of antiquarianism as an embodiment of the human mind and open new avenues for understanding the representation of the past, from ancient societies to the present.
Chinese Archery Studies
This book, the first research publication on China’s archery culture to appear in the English language, introduces the historic development, key concepts, and research methodologies for archery studies. Archery was the most important weapon of war in pre-modern China; at the same time, archery practice was intimately tied to Confucius’ cultural and pedagogic ideals. Chinese archery was divided into the domains of military archery (wushe) and ritual archery (lishe), and may be further distinguished into han (Chinese) and hu (barbarian) archery traditions. Bringing together the leading scholars in this field, including Ma Mingda, Stephen Selby, Ma Lianzhen, Peter Dekker, and others, this book presents the most comprehensive statement on archery studies to date. In particular, it provides an in-depth survey of archery development during the Qing period and offers a unique cultural perspective to understanding China’s last imperial dynasty—through the lens of Manchu archery.
