How did commerce, law, and politics shape the rise of modern capitalism? In this episode, we explore the political and economic history of Argentina’s transformation from colony to republic, tracing the evolution of commerce, property, and state-building. We discuss how merchants and capitalists navigated political upheavals, the transition from Natural Law to formalized property rights, and the role of liberal intellectuals in crafting a centralized political economy.
Drawing parallels to the broader Atlantic world, we also examine mechanisms of pre-industrial commerce—shops, markets, trade networks, and banking—that laid the foundation for modern capitalism. What can Argentina’s struggles tell us about the connections between economic justice, political institutions, and the global economy? Join us for a deep dive into how trade, commodities, and legal frameworks shaped a nation’s economic destiny.
What is objectivity, and how has it evolved? In this episode, we explore historical epistemology through the works of Lorraine Daston, Peter Galison, and Ian Hacking. We discuss how scientific practices and visual culture shaped the concept of objectivity, tracing its history from "truth-to-nature" ideals to "trained judgment" in disciplines like anatomy, crystallography, and astronomy.
We also highlight Ian Hacking's reflections on the philosophical uses of history, exploring how concepts emerge and transform through styles of reasoning, language, and historical contexts. From Michel Foucault's influence on intellectual history to the creation of scientific personas, we uncover the dynamic relationship between seeing, knowing, and being. Join us to rethink how knowledge is created, preserved, and challenged through history and philosophy.
How did capitalism evolve, and what role did the global economy play in its development? In this episode, we explore economic history, focusing on Sven Beckert’s Empire of Cotton and foundational Marxist critiques of capitalism. We uncover how European imperialism, slave labor, and industrial innovation reshaped global economies, creating vast inequalities and modern capitalist structures that persist to this day.
Drawing on key insights from Marx's Capital and other writings, we discuss how labor exploitation, commodification, and class struggles became central to capitalism's growth. What can this history tell us about the relationship between power, economics, and inequality? Join us as we dive into the history of capital, empire, and labor to rethink the origins of modern economic systems.
In this episode, we explore In Search of Admiration and Respect, Yanqiu Zheng’s insightful book on Chinese cultural diplomacy in the United States between 1875 and 1974. Faced with Western misunderstandings and stereotypes, China sought to reshape its image through cultural initiatives. The discussion highlights key players, including the China Institute in America and the Nationalist government, and their contrasting approaches to promoting Chinese culture abroad. We delve into the concept of “infrastructure of persuasion,” where American philanthropy and cultural institutions influenced intercultural exchanges, often within a power-imbalanced global context. Join us for a nuanced exploration of how China navigated cultural diplomacy to combat Orientalism and gain international respect.
South Korea faces a demographic crisis characterized by an alarmingly low birth rate and a rapidly aging population. In this episode, we discuss the cultural, economic, and social factors contributing to these trends, including shifting attitudes toward marriage, family, and the impact of forced early retirement policies. We examine the government’s efforts to boost the birth rate, why financial incentives have failed, and the challenges posed to national security, particularly for the military. The episode also explores the potential of increased immigration as a solution, the societal implications of such a shift, and how South Korea’s approach compares with strategies in other East Asian nations like Japan and China. Join us for an insightful analysis of one of the most pressing issues facing South Korea today.
In this episode, Professor Taylor Fravel of MIT explores the evolution of China’s military strategy since 1949, analyzing its transformation from preparing for total war to focusing on localized conflicts and informatised warfare. Drawing insights from his acclaimed book Active Defense, Fravel discusses the goals and components of China’s current military strategy, with a special emphasis on Taiwan, territorial disputes, and nuclear policy. He highlights key moments of strategic change, such as in 1956, 1980, and 1993, and explains the conditions under which China has adjusted its defense policies.
This book rewrites the story of classical Chinese philosophy, which has always been considered the single most creative and vibrant chapter in the history of Chinese philosophy. Works attributed to Confucius, Mozi, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi and many others represent the very origins of moral and political thinking in China. As testimony to their enduring stature, in recent decades many Chinese intellectuals, and even leading politicians, have turned to those classics, especially Confucian texts, for alternative or complementary sources of moral authority and political legitimacy. Therefore, philosophical inquiries into core normative values embedded in those classical texts are crucial to the ongoing scholarly discussion about China as China turns more culturally inward. It can also contribute to the spirited contemporary debate about the nature of philosophical reasoning, especially in the non-Western traditions.This book offers a new narrative and interpretative framework about the origins of moral-political philosophy that tracks how the three normative values, humaneness, justice, and personal freedom, were formulated, reformulated, and contested by early Chinese philosophers in their effort to negotiate the relationship among three distinct domains, the personal, the familial, and the political. Such efforts took place as those thinkers were reimagining a new moral-political order, debating its guiding norms, and exploring possible sources within the context of an evolving understanding of Heaven and its relationship with the humans. Tao Jiang argues that the competing visions in that debate can be characterized as a contestation between partialist humaneness and impartialist justice as the guiding norm for the newly imagined moral-political order, with the Confucians, the Mohists, the Laoists, and the so-called fajia thinkers being the major participants, constituting the mainstream philosophical project during this period. Thinkers lined up differently along the justice-humaneness spectrum with earlier ones maintaining some continuity between the two normative values (or at least trying to accommodate both to some extent) while later ones leaning more toward their exclusivity in the political/public domain. Zhuangzi and the Zhuangists were the outliers of the mainstream moral-political debate who rejected the very parameter of humaneness versus justice in that discourse. They were a lone voice advocating personal freedom, but the Zhuangist expressions of freedom were self-restricted to the margins of the political world and the interiority of one's heartmind. Such a take can shed new light on how the Zhuangist approach to personal freedom would profoundly impact the development of this idea in pre-modern Chinese political and intellectual history.
This episode celebrates the life and scholarship of Ezra Vogel, one of the most influential figures in East Asian studies, and examines his groundbreaking work on Deng Xiaoping. Through a panel discussion featuring Vogel’s colleagues, family, and students, we explore his contributions to understanding East Asia, his mentorship of a global network of scholars, and his dedication to cross-cultural dialogue. The discussion highlights Vogel’s seminal publications, including Japan as Number One and Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China. Dive into Vogel’s reflections on Deng, China’s boldest reformist, and his pivotal role in reshaping global history through economic reform and modernization.
Winner of the 2022 Joseph W. Elder Prize in the Indian Social Sciences
Merchants of Virtue explores the question of what it meant to be Hindu in precolonial South Asia. Divya Cherian presents a fine-grained study of everyday life and local politics in the kingdom of Marwar in eighteenth-century western India to uncover how merchants enforced their caste ideals of vegetarianism and bodily austerity as universal markers of Hindu identity. Using legal strategies and alliances with elites, these merchants successfully remade the category of “Hindu,” setting it in contrast to “Untouchable” in a process that reconfigured Hinduism in caste terms. In a history pertinent to understanding India today, Cherian establishes the centrality of caste to the early-modern Hindu self and to its imagination of inadmissible others.
How did U.S. immigration policies cultivate the "model minority" narrative for Asian Americans? In this episode, we explore Madeline Hsu’s The Good Immigrants, which examines a century of Chinese elite migration to the U.S. through the lens of immigration exemptions for intellectuals, businessmen, and students.
From the earliest restrictions targeting Chinese laborers to exemptions for those with professional skills or Western education, we discuss how U.S. policies shaped the characteristics of Chinese migrants. Through stories of figures like Madame Chiang Kai-shek and I. M. Pei, we delve into how geopolitical events such as World War II and the Cold War further transformed Chinese immigrants into symbols of American competitiveness and modernity. Join us as we uncover how talent and training created pathways to citizenship for a select few while reinforcing broader immigration inequalities.
Julia Andrews's extraordinary study of art, artists, and artistic policy during the first three decades of the People's Republic of China makes a major contribution to our understanding of modern China. From 1949 to 1979 the Chinese government controlled the lives and work of the country's artists--these were also years of extreme isolation from international artistic dialogue. During this period the Chinese Communist Party succeeded in eradicating most of the artistic styles and techniques it found politically repugnant. By 1979, traditional landscape painting had been replaced by a new style and subject that was strikingly different from both contemporary Western art and that of other Chinese areas such as Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Through vivid firsthand accounts, Andrews recreates the careers of many individual artists who were forced to submit to a vacillating policy regarding style, technique, medium, and genre. She discusses the cultural controls that the government used, the ways in which artists responded, and the works of art that emerged as a result. She particularly emphasizes the influence of the Soviet Union on Chinese art and the problems it created for the practice of traditional painting.
This book opens the way to new, stimulating comparisons of Western and Eastern cultures and will be welcomed by art historians, political scientists, and scholars of Asia.
What is the state of Tibetan studies today, and how did we get here? In this episode, we dive into the history and current challenges of global Tibetology with insights from Professor Shen Weirong, a leading expert in Tibetan studies. We explore the evolution of Tibetology, from the missionary scholars and pioneers of the 20th century to its golden age in the 1990s and the subsequent decline in Western interest.
Professor Shen reflects on the contributions of figures like Giuseppe Tucci, the influence of post-colonial critique, and how political, social, and cultural trends continue to shape this interdisciplinary field. Why has interest in Tibetan studies waned in the West? How are institutions in China and Europe navigating these shifts? Join us as we uncover the past, present, and potential future of Tibetan studies on a global scale.
This book traces the changing and long-term history of the vast Brahmaputra valley region, that has distinct languages, faiths, monastic traditions, and lay-monk relationship, in different orders and gender and household relations. It examines the political and economic order of Buddhist, Vaisnava, Saiva, Tantric, and Sufi teachers and their disciples, students, and adherents in the northeast India. In the course of the nineteenth century, war, changes in revenue regimes, and the growth of the plantation economies fragmented this landscape and dissolved the relationships. The economic and military processes also reshaped the moral-political economy in which wives of monastic males, female cultivators and labour-servants were the key constituents. These substantive changes were obscured by the language used by colonial officials to describe monks as 'savages', and female-dependent communities as 'primitive tribes'. After the formation of the new nation, Indian historians and anthropologists began to write histories using colonial terms. In the process, both colonial and postcolonial historians erased the erstwhile monastic relationships across the region. They contributed to a widespread forgetting of the women who had made it all possible. The study examines how the new nation as well as its new history rests on many layers of forgetting.
What is history, and how do we write it? In this episode, we explore how historians have approached their craft over the past century, focusing on concepts of objectivity, temporality, and the evolution of historical discourse. We examine Peter Novick's exploration of American historians' struggle to present the past "as it really happened" and Reinhart Koselleck's groundbreaking theories on historical time, social reality, and the language of history.
How has the aspiration for historical objectivity evolved? What makes modernity a product of our awareness of history itself? Join us as we bridge foundational ideas in historiography with contemporary cultural studies and uncover how history not only records the past but shapes our understanding of society and knowledge.
What drives the high educational and economic attainment of Asian Americans? In this episode, we explore The Asian American Achievement Paradox by Jennifer Lee and Min Zhou, which delves into the intersection of immigration policies, community resources, and cultural expectations to uncover the factors behind this phenomenon.
We examine how "hyper-selectivity" in immigration shapes the "success frame" that drives academic achievement, while also creating an intense pressure to conform to narrow definitions of success. What are the institutional and societal forces at play? How does the "model minority" stereotype obscure the complexities and consequences of this narrative? Join us as we navigate the nuanced realities of Asian American success, cultural stereotypes, and the broader implications for meritocracy and racial equity.
In this episode, we explore the driving forces behind China's foreign policy, including its response to U.S. containment strategies, the trend of counter-globalization, and the role of digital technology. Drawing insights from the perspectives of YAN Xuetong, a leading Chinese academic, we discuss how Beijing navigates strategic competition with Washington while maintaining its opening-up policies initiated in 1978. The conversation also covers China’s focus on digital cooperation through initiatives like the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its opposition to Cold War-era ideological divides in global technology partnerships. Join us to better understand the complexities of China’s approach to achieving national rejuvenation in a rapidly evolving global landscape.
In this episode, we explore the rise of Gönpo Namgyel, a minor Tibetan chieftain from Eastern Kham who challenged the power centers of Central Tibet and Qing China during the 19th century. Situated on the periphery, the Kham region was more than just a battleground between empires—it was a dynamic political landscape where local leaders actively shaped their own destinies.
Drawing from Tibetan and Chinese primary sources, we examine the governance of Kham, its cultural milieu, and the complex interactions between the Qing court, Lhasa, and regional chieftains. This story sheds light on the overlooked agency of borderland communities and challenges traditional historiographical narratives that portray peripheries as passive. Join us as we reframe Sino-Tibetan relations through a local lens, uncovering the rich history of this contested region.
In this episode, we explore the concept of connected histories as developed by historian Sanjay Subrahmanyam. Moving beyond traditional narratives of isolated regions, we examine the deep interconnections between Europe, South Asia, and the broader Eurasian world from the 15th to 18th centuries.
From the Portuguese presence in Asia to the Persianate influence in the Bay of Bengal and the global flow of commodities, ideas, and power, we reveal how regions historically interacted and shaped each other's development. Drawing on insights from Subrahmanyam's Explorations in Connected History and his reflections on early modern Eurasia, we discuss the importance of rethinking area studies and embracing global linkages to understand early modernity. Join us as we navigate empires, trade, travel, and acculturation across vast geographies.
The Labrang Tibetan Buddhist Monastery in Amdo and its extended support community are one of the largest and most famous in Tibetan history. This crucially important and little-studied community is on the northeast corner of the Tibetan Plateau in modern Gansu Province, in close proximity to Chinese, Mongol, and Muslim communities. It is Tibetan but located in China; it was founded by Mongols, and associated with Muslims. Its wide-ranging Tibetan religious institutions are well established and serve as the foundations for the community's social and political infrastructures. The Labrang community's borderlands location, the prominence of its religious institutions, and the resilience and identity of its nomadic and semi-nomadic cultures were factors in the growth and survival of the monastery and its enormous estate.This book tells the story of the status and function of the Tibetan Buddhist religion in its fully developed monastic and public dimensions. It is an interdisciplinary project that examines the history of social and political conflict and compromise between the different local ethnic groups. The book presents new perspectives on Qing Dynasty and Republican-era Chinese politics, with far-reaching implications for contemporary China. It brings a new understanding of Sino-Tibetan-Mongol-Muslim histories and societies. This volume will be of interest to undergraduate and graduate student majors in Tibetan and Buddhist studies, in Chinese and Mongol studies, and to scholars of Asian social and political studies.
How has xenophobia shaped America’s past, present, and future? In this episode, we examine the roots of xenophobia in the United States, from the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 to present-day immigration policies. Drawing on insights from Erika Lee's At America’s Gates, we explore how the U.S. transformed into a "gatekeeping nation" through laws, surveillance, and deportation aimed at controlling immigration and racial boundaries.
We also discuss stories of resilience and survival among immigrants, including Chinese laborers, refugees, and other marginalized communities who fought against discrimination. By connecting historical exclusion with current debates on immigration and race, we reveal how xenophobia remains a powerful force—and what we can do to challenge it. Join us for a conversation about history, justice, and solidarity.
