Tristan Brown
@tristangbrown.bsky.social
Associate Professor of Chinese History @MIT
Quoted in today’s @WSJ on Sanxingdui and what it means for how China understands its own origins: www.wsj.com/world/china/...
A Lost Civilization Is Baffling Experts and Rewriting China’s Origin Story
The otherworldly beasts and enigmatic masks of Sanxingdui still enthrall China, decades after the unearthing of ceremonial pits.
wsj.com
'(...) we calculated how much of their body fat reserves elephants, horses, and men would have consumed during the crossing. Accordingly, when crossing the Col de la Traversette, elephants would have lost 4% of their body fat reserves, horses 11%, and men 19%.' www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Energy costs of Hannibal’s alpine crossing | PNAS
Hannibal crossed the Alps with a large army containing 37 war elephants in 218 BC. Details of his route have scholars regularly debate historical r...
pnas.org
Happy 250th! 🎉 New article in AHR: a Chinese tea chest label at Boston’s Old South Meeting House has long been displayed as a 1773 Tea Party relic. It isn’t one. Linguistic clues and a Cantonese merchant in Yokohama crack the case.
This is from a year earlier, 1654 (De bello Tartarico historia). It's interesting how he consistently capitalizes the K in PeKing, unlike for other toponyms like Leaotung (Liaodong)
In the early twentieth century, tin extraction on the island of Bangka, Indonesia, rested on Chinese workers. Koen van der Lijn argues that their labour was not a temporary expedient but the structural foundation of Dutch colonial mining, central to both its profitability and long-term viability.
Chinese Labour, Dutch Empire: Tin Extraction on Bangka in the Early Twentieth Century
Seen from above, the island of Bangka is etched with scars: open pits and flooded craters that bear witness to centuries of tin extraction. This landscape is
globalchinapulse.net
In case you were wondering about 天涼好個秋
eileen chengyin chow@chowleen.bsky.social · 2y agoOne of my favorite poems since childhood, and a poem I share every #autumnequinox. By the 12thc warrior poet Xin Qiji 辛棄疾, sidelined during peacetime, demoted, drifting through a decade of minor posts in remote lands. Poetry, then, is that which is left unsaid. “My, what a cool and lovely autumn.”
If you’re in the Cambridge/Boston area, join us today or tomorrow! Saturday’s lineup is especially exciting. Today I’ll be presenting new work on the meanings and uses of ice and frozen water in late imperial China, across political and religious dimensions.
"Once a mere carrier of goods, the red-white-blue bag now carries multiple names and meanings, reflecting, like a mirror, its ties to people: global or local, personal or indifferent, about “us” or “them.” But for many around the world, it is just a bag—either a cheap carryall or a fashion item."
The Red-White-Blue Bag – AHA
From the dollar store to fashion runways and museums, the red-white-blue bag can be found around the world.
historians.org
Losing SLACs (small liberal arts colleges) is absolutely a sign of American academia's decline and the gutting of the humanities in particular. I'm pretty sure SLACs are a uniquely American phenomenon. Most countries don't have hundreds of small, non-research-oriented colleges dedicated to teaching.
Kevin Gannon (now a Moo Deng fan account)@thetattooedprof.bsky.social · 4mo agoDamn it. Damn it damn it damn it damn it this sucks
Looking for to co-hosting this upcoming symposium on Buddhism and the environment on April 24-25 at MIT. Registration link here below: calendar.mit.edu/event/sympos...
Symposium: "The Environment and Ecological Crises: Buddhist Perspectives in Dialogue" Sponsored by: MIT's T.T. and W.F. Chao Distinguished Buddhist Lecture Series
Symposium: "The Environment and Ecological Crises: Buddhist Perspectives in Dialogue"Co-sponored by the The T.T. and W.F. Chao Distinguished Buddhist Lecture Series at MIT and the Fo Guang Shan Institute of Humanistic Buddhism. Friday, April 24, 04:00 PM - 05:30 PM Saturday, April 25, 08:30 AM - 05:00 PM Samberg Conference Center, MIT, Chang Building (E52), 7th FloorCambridge, MA Free and open to the public. Registration required. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-environment-and-ecological-crises-buddhist-perspectives-in-dialogue-tickets-1979734742909?aff=oddtdtcreator The deadline to register is April 17, 2026 at 11:59PM EDT.
calendar.mit.edu
Mes amies, I’ll be in #montreal soon to give a book talk on #territorialnatures, hosted by @dcporter.bsky.social: FASCIST SHEEP (yes, really) Land and Livestock in Inner Mongolia under Japanese Rule Wednesday April 8 at 4:00 PM McGill University 680 Sherbrooke, Room 1041 #envhist #envirohist
A reminder that the deadline for nominations to our book prize in Chinese law (any era, any subject) is coming up. We are open to both books about law & books that use legal cases to talk about broader issues. China Mainland/Taiwan/Hong Kong/Singapore focused studies all welcome!
Thanks @asianstudies.org staff for putting on a great #aas2026 in beautiful Vancouver! So delightful as always to see friends like @eastasiascitech.bsky.social @xiaoshuoing.com @devinfitz.bsky.social @dcporter.bsky.social @tristangbrown.bsky.social @matthewmosca.bsky.social @jeffweng.bsky.social!
Your book prominently displayed and reserved (not by me).
Very moving memorial panel for Prof. Janet Theiss, a sore loss to #qinghistory #genderhistory here at #aas2026 w a wonderful roster including Profs. Tobie Meyer-Fong, Paola Zamperini, Stephanie Painter, Wen-hsin Yeh, and Maram Epstein. What an exemplar of the generosity w which we should live.
Super excited to discussant for this panel tmrw! Thank you @damiandamiani.bsky.social for inviting me. #aas2026
Damian M@damiandamiani.bsky.social · 5mo agoOff to #AAS2026 in Vancouver — come say hi, and join our panel on “BAD” PEOPLE IN THE PRC: CRIMINALS & VILLAINS UNDER MAO! On Sat., 14 March 2026, at 10:30 AM - 12:00 PM in the VCC, Room 21, w/ @puckengman.bsky.social, Haiyan Lee, @amindarella.bsky.social, Wenqing Kang, and @yyvonwang.bsky.social
Taking a short break from my regular dire posts (my areas of expertise/interest are Chinese ethnic politics, UK migration policy and UK academia, there's just so much dire), as I am about to take off for the Association of Asian Studies conference in Vancouver and I am really very excited.
I have waited for this book for a long time. Healy sheds fresh light on tourism in China during the Mao era, offering a new & rare perspective on foreign relations and the origins of what has become a massive domestic industry + great title and book cover. Congrats @gavinhealy.bsky.social!
Gavin Healy@gavinhealy.bsky.social · 5mo agoComing June 2026: www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501...
Oooh 👀 This is really important, actually - when writing ‘Silence of the Gods’ I became very aware that a history of the Golden Horde in English was a key deficiency in our historiography of Eastern Europe/Central Asia, so thank you @romanhautala.bsky.social!
Roman Hautala@romanhautala.bsky.social · 5mo agoHautala, Roman. Masters of the Earth: A History of the Golden Horde, 1219–1502. London: Reaktion Books, 2026. reaktionbooks.co.uk/work/masters... #mongolsky #tengri #medievalsky
Join us tomorrow at MIT for our environmental symposium on modern China and India. We hope to see you there!
The new issue of the Made in China Journal is out! This time we explore how queerness offers a lens for understanding contemporary Chinese society, as state visions of family and citizenship collide with diverse lived realities and unevenly translated global LGBTQIA+ discourses.
Queer China | Made in China Journal
Across the world, debates around gender and sexuality have become closely tied to questions of belonging, citizenship, and moral order. In China, these issues have taken on particular urgency as the s...
madeinchinajournal.com
Super excited to see this book in print; Christmas offers a compelling history of imperial Japan’s interests in Mongolia, complementing and expanding beyond the now well drawn picture of Manchukuo’s history. Congratulations Sakura!
sakura christmas@prof-christmas.bsky.social · 6mo ago2/ My first book, “Territorial Natures: Imperial Japan and the Mongolian Question,” is coming out with @uchicagopress.bsky.social this August 2026. You can find it here: press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
Please join in person at MIT on Friday, February 27 for a fantastic lineup of speakers—including Prakash Kumar, Sigrid Schmalzer, Micah Muscolino, Benjamin Siegel, and Heather Roller—exploring conservation, ecology, and food production in China&India. Hope to see you there!
Bad Bunny has a consulting historian. news.wisc.edu/pop-star-bad...
Pop star Bad Bunny needed a Puerto Rican history scholar. UW–Madison had just the one.
Bad Bunny collaborated with UW–Madison history professor Jorell Meléndez-Badillo on Puerto Rican narratives that accompany the new album “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS.”
news.wisc.edu
