Events

Rob Efird – Nature for Nurture: Environmental Education, Nature Experience, and the Healthy Chinese Child

CGIS Knafel K262 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

Speaker: Robert Efird, Professor of Anthropology and Asian studies, Seattle University For the past 15 years, the Chinese Ministry of Education’s attempt to promote environmental education in public schools has faced nearly insurmountable structural obstacles. By contrast, there is a growing popular embrace of the value of nature exposure for children’s health and well-being. Drawing […]

Wen-Yi Huang – Families Divided: Migration and Those Left Behind in Fifth- and Sixth-Century China

Speaker: Wen-Yi Huang, An Wang Post-Doctoral Fellow, Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University In this talk I explore the impact of migration on family members left behind, particularly those whose parents, children, siblings, and spouses were forcibly moved to the Northern Wei (386-534 CE) from four successive southern states of Eastern Jin (317-420 CE), Liu-Song (420-479 […]

Ruth Mostern – The Natural and Unnatural History of the Yellow River

Speaker: Ruth Mostern, University of Pittsburgh The geographer Jamie Linton has observed that under conditions of human entanglement, there is no such thing as a hydrological cycle, and that we should seek to understand the dynamics of hydrosocial cycles instead.  Under anthropogenic conditions, water still precipitates and evaporates. Rivers are still fluvial systems in which […]

Alex Wang – Symbolic Legitimacy and Chinese Environmental Reform

CGIS Knafel K262 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA, United States

Speaker: Alex Wang, UCLA At the heart of debates over Chinese rule of law is the question of state legitimacy. Critics argue that legitimacy requires liberal democratic rule of law. Chinese leaders have long relied on performance legitimacy – economic development and maintenance of social stability – as the core basis of their rule. Western […]

Yu Zhou – Technological Innovation: Exploring Chinese Models

CGIS South S020, Belfer Case Study Room 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge, MA, United States

Read the event summary here Speaker: Yu Zhou, Vassar College China’s technological ambition and trajectory have become a central concern for the US-China Trade War and will likely to define US-China relations for a long time to come.  This talk traces the evolution of Chinese policies on technological innovation.  Based on case studies on ten […]

***POSTPONED*** Environment in Asia Reunion Workshop – With a Special Tribute to Profs. Robert B. Marks and Peter C. Perdue

CGIS South S020, Belfer Case Study Room 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge, MA, United States

THIS EVENT IS POSTPONED DUE TO THE COVID-19 SITUATION. WE HOPE TO RESCHEDULE IT FOR APRIL 2021. WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE Organizer: Ling Zhang, Boston College Featuring roundtable conversations on: Multispecies Entanglement Imaginaries and Representations Land, Water, Fire, Air Energy and Resource Food, Body, Health Environmental Politics and Policies of Contemporary China Building a […]

Webinar: Chris Nielsen – China’s Air Quality and Climate Change: The Known and the Unknown

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrcL6ktHZp4 Read a full transcript of this event here Read event summary here Speaker: Chris Nielsen, Executive Director, Harvard China Project Chris Nielsen is the executive director of the Harvard-China Project on Energy, Economy and Environment. Working with faculty at collaborating Chinese universities and across the schools of Harvard, he has managed and developed the interdisciplinary […]

Environment in Asia Lecture Series Featuring David Fedman and Ian M. Miller – East Asian Forestry and Empires

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucMs2rz71b8&t=2s https://soundcloud.com/fairbank-center/east-asian-forestry-and-empires-with-david-fedman-and-ian-m-miller-moderated-by-ling-zhang Read the transcript of the event here. Speakers: David Fedman, Assistant Professor of History,University of California, Irvine Ian M. Miller, Assistant Professor of History, St. John's University Moderator: Ling Zhang, Boston College   David Fedman is Assistant Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Seeds of […]

Environment in Asia Series Featuring Judith Shapiro and Yifei Li – Authoritarian Environmentalism and Chinese Ecological Civilization

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sdJJU2JhZ0&t=2177s https://soundcloud.com/fairbank-center/authoritarian-environmentalism-and-chinese-ecological-civilization-with-judith-shapiro-and-yifei-li Read the transcript of the event here. Speakers: Judith Shapiro, Director of the Masters in Natural Resources and Sustainable Development for the School of International Service, American University Yifei Li, Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies at NYU Shanghai,Global Network Assistant Professor, New York University; Residential Fellow at the Rachel Carson Center for Environment […]

Environment in Asia Lecture Series – Infectious Diseases and Public Health Management in China: From Historical and Anthropological Perspectives

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQx3sgioXuI https://soundcloud.com/fairbank-center/infectious-diseases-and-public-health-management-in-china?in=fairbank-center/sets/public-lecture-series-fairbank Read the transcript of the event here. Speakers: Nicole Elizabeth Barnes, Duke University Mary Augusta Brazelton, The University of Cambridge Miriam Gross, The University of Oklahoma Elanah Uretsky, Brandeis University Moderator: Ling Zhang, Boston College Nicole Elizabeth Barnes is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of History and Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies […]

Environment in Asia Series featuring Zhang Meng – Timber and Forestry in Qing China: Sustaining the Market

Speaker: Zhang Meng, Assistant Professor of History, Vanderbilt University Part of the Environment in Asia lecture series https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXEB2NB7vhk&t=109s https://soundcloud.com/fairbank-center/timber-and-forestry-in-qing-china-with-zhang-meng?in=fairbank-center/sets/public-lecture-series-fairbank In the Qing period, China's population tripled, and the flurry of new development generated unprecedented demand for timber. Standard environmental histories have often depicted this as an era of reckless deforestation. The reality was more complex: […]

Environment in Asia Lecture Series featuring Ruth Mostern – The Yellow River: A Natural and Unnatural History

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OR4Z30g7gA https://soundcloud.com/fairbank-center/the-yellow-river-a-natural-and-unnatural-history-with-ruth-mostern?in=fairbank-center/sets/public-lecture-series-fairbank   Speaker: Ruth Mostern, University of Pittsburgh This talk showcases Ruth Mostern’s new book: The Yellow River: A Natural and Unnatural History (Yale University Press, 2021).  The Yellow River explains how environmentally transformative human activity has shaped the whole watershed and constituted the relationship between people and the river since Neolithic times.  […]