The Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University is a post-graduate research center promoting the study of modern and contemporary China from a social science perspective. The center hosts and organizes academic activities, provides research funds for faculty and students, and helps policy-makers and news media to understand modern China. [1] The center sponsors the Edwin O. Reischauer Lectures.
The center was established in the 1955 as the Center for East Asian Research. and on the retirement of its founding director, John K. Fairbank. The center was renamed the John K. Fairbank Center for East Asian Research. From its beginnings in 1955, its focus was on modern and contemporary China, diverging from classic sinology, which emphasized the study of texts from a humanistic perspective. [1]
To celebrate its 60th anniversary, the center organized a symposium discussing the changes in the landscape of Chinese studies and the changing role of the center. [2]
List of directors of the Fairbank Center: [1]
Ezra Feivel Vogel was an American sociologist who wrote on modern Japan, China, and Korea. He was Henry Ford II Professor of the Social Sciences at Harvard University.
Sinology, also referred to as China studies, is a subfield of area studies or East Asian studies involved in social sciences and humanities research on China. It is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of the Chinese civilization primarily through Chinese language, history, culture, literature, philosophy, art, music, cinema, and science. Its origin "may be traced to the examination which Chinese scholars made of their own civilization."
John King Fairbank was an American historian of China and United States–China relations. He taught at Harvard University from 1936 until his retirement in 1977. He is credited with building the field of Sinology in the United States after World War II with his organizational ability, his mentorship of students, support of fellow scholars, and formulation of basic concepts to be tested.
Roderick Lemonde MacFarquhar was a British China scholar, politician, and journalist.
William C. Kirby is an American historian and sinologist currently serving as T. M. Chang Professor of China Studies and Spangler Family Professor of Business Administration at Harvard University. He is the chairman of the Harvard China Fund, Faculty Chair of the Harvard Center Shanghai, Harvard's first University-wide center located outside the United States, former Director of Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, former Chair of the History Department and the former Dean of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
Rudolf G. Wagner was a German sinologist. He was Senior Professor at the Department of Chinese Studies at the Heidelberg University and Co-Director of the Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context: Shifting Asymmetries in Cultural Flows".
The Cambridge History of China is a series of books published by the Cambridge University Press (CUP) covering the history of China from the founding of the Qin dynasty in 221 BC to 1982 AD. The series was conceived by British historian Denis Twitchett and American historian John King Fairbank in the late 1960s, and publication began in 1978. The complete History will contain 15 volumes made up of 17 books with volumes 5 and 9 consisting of two books each.
The Harvard–Yenching Library is the primary location for East Asia-related collections at Harvard Library. In addition to East Asian languages, it houses collections in European languages and Southeast Asian language (Vietnamese). Totaling more than 1.5 million volumes, the Harvard-Yenching Library has one of the largest collections in East Asian studies outside of Asia. The library has been located at 2 Divinity Avenue on the Cambridge campus of Harvard University since around 1957. The building was originally built in 1929 for Harvard's Institute of Geographical Exploration and currently houses part of the Harvard-Yenching Institute and the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, in addition to the Harvard-Yenching Library.
Philip A. Kuhn was an American historian of China and the Francis Lee Higginson Professor of History and of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University.
The Harvard University Asia Center is an interdisciplinary research and education unit of Harvard University, established on July 1, 1997, with the goal of "driving varied programs focusing on international relations in Asia and comparative studies of Asian countries and regions (...) and supplementing other Asia-related programs and institutes and the University and providing a focal point for interaction and exchange on topics of common interest for the Harvard community and Asian intellectual, political, and business circles," according to its charter.
Paul A. Cohen is Edith Stix Wasserman Professor of Asian Studies and History Emeritus at Wellesley College and Associate of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University. His research interests include 19th-20th century China; historical thought; American historiography on China.
Benjamin Isadore Schwartz was an American political scientist and sinologist who wrote on a wide range of topics in Chinese politics and intellectual history.
Roy Mark Hofheinz Jr. is an American academic, sinologist who was Professor of Government at Harvard University. He is best-known for his work on the Chinese Communist Revolution.
Dwight Heald Perkins II is an American academic, economist, Sinologist and professor at Harvard University. He is the son of Lawrence Bradford Perkins, architect, and Margery Blair Perkins and the grandson of Dwight Heald Perkins, the architect. He married Julie Rate Perkins in 1957 and they have three adult children.
Teng Ssu-yü was a Sinologist, bibliographer, and professor of history at Indiana University. Born in Hunan Province, Qing China, he died in Bloomington, Indiana, after being struck by a car. Teng was trained in China in both the traditional skills of the Confucian scholar and contemporary historical attitudes and techniques. When he came to the United States in 1937, he became a member of the founding generation of American China studies. He wrote not only specialized monographs and bibliographical tools for academics but also such broad studies for introductory students as China's Response to the West.
Merle Dorothy Rosenblatt Goldman was an American historian and sinologist of modern China. She was professor of history at Boston University, especially known for a series of studies on the role of intellectuals under the rule of Mao Zedong and on the possibilities for democracy and political rights in present-day China.
Ronald Suleski is a historian, anthropologist and author specializing in East Asia. He has been the longest serving president of the Asiatic Society of Japan, served on the National Committee on US-China Relations and associated with the Harvard University's East Asian research center. He is currently serving as the Director of the Rosenberg Institute at Suffolk University in Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
This bibliography covers the English language scholarship of major studies in Chinese history.
Klaus Mühlhahn is a German historian and sinologist who was a Professor and Vice President of the Free University of Berlin. Since 2020 he serves as president of Zeppelin University. He was awarded the John K. Fairbank Prize in 2009 for his book Criminal Justice in China: A History.
Liu Kwang-ching, who sometimes published under the name K.C. Liu, was a Chinese-born American historian of China. He taught at University of California-Davis from 1963 until his retirement in 1993. He is best known for his scholarship in late-Qing history, astute bibliographical work, and edited volumes, including co-editing Cambridge History of China volumes.