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Announcing Our 2026-27 Desmond and Whitney Shum Fellows
The Fairbank Center is excited to award three doctoral students with Shum Fellowships supporting their research in China. For the 2026-27 academic year, the Fairbank…
Six Harvard seniors awarded the Hoopes Prize for outstanding senior theses on China and Taiwan
Six Harvard College seniors with ties to the Fairbank Center are among the 71 winners of the 2026 Thomas Temple Hoopes Prize. The Prize, administered…
Videos
Faculty Spotlight
Professor Michael Szonyi doesn’t mind that his students sometimes feel uncomfortable in his undergraduate class on rural China. In fact, when it comes to learning about the land reform movement in the early years following the Communist Party’s victory in 1949, when hundreds of thousands of landlords were executed and land was redistributed to the poorest, that’s exactly the point.
Blog
Reimagining the Past: Rhodes Scholar Helen He on Technology, Art, and Chinese History
Helen He ’26 graduated last spring with a bachelor’s degree in computer science and East Asian studies and a secondary in Classics. A 2026 Rhodes Scholar, Helen will continue her studies at…
Bringing Fujian’s Rural History to Life, One Document at a Time
A group of Harvard graduate students cluster around Jin Huaxia, the 33-year old Communist Party Secretary of Yuhu (Jade Pond), a village in the Fujian countryside, as he proudly shares…
Spotlight on Fairbank Center Research Grant Recipients
For many years, the Fairbank Center has supported undergraduate students who need to travel to China, Taiwan, or other locations to complete research for their theses with our Research Grants,…
In Memoriam: Barry R. Bloom (1937-2026)
Barry R. Bloom, a pioneering immunologist, global public health leader, and former dean of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, passed away on March 18, 2026, after a…
Interview | How China Is Struggling to Handle the Urban-Rural Divide – Professor Michael Szonyi
Interview With Professor Michael Szonyi | How China Is Struggling to Handle the Urban-Rural Divide Professor Michael Szonyi (Harvard) reflects on the transformation of rural China, the resilience of village…