Department Faculty

" I am an intellectual historian of Warring States and early imperial China (500 BC to 200 AD). I am interested in the religions, philosophies and aesthetic and political ideas that were born and flourished during this time, a selection of which went on to prominence in the intellectual discourse of China and throughout East Asia for the next two thousand years. Recent research projects of mine include: a study of views of the self and individualism; discourses on music and its role in self-cultivation; and Yue (Viet) ethnicity in the early history of China's southern frontier. I am completing a book based on my doctoral dissertation, 'Individualism in Early Chinese Thought and Politics', which outlines a history of views on human agency and examines how such views relate to the rise of centralized states and a unified empire. In parallel I am beginning a book on the changing religious, ideological, and political implications of musical entertainments from pre-imperial times through the Han Empire. In addition to these research topics, I enjoy teaching about the notions of China and Chinese identity; the ideas of ethnicity and gender; and the nature of science, religion, and the body as reflected in pre-modern Chinese writings."