Written by a friend from Vancouver

"This post offers a detailed, firsthand account of how a community worked with its national archives to open racist government records needed to understand and confront this history. It shows how a community’s agency, self-determination, and right to remember its past can move an institution to action."
https://activehistory.ca/blog/2025/03/27/the-right-to-remember-the-past-opening-chinese-immigration-records-in-canadas-national-archives/

This morning I woke up with a realization, my MMC for this novel is a Tang soldier and while I have tons of books and articles on merchants, frontier poetry and Chang'An. I have nothing on military structure, organization and life. #histodons and #ChineseHistory enthusiasts, what are some good books and articles in English and Chinese on the Tang military?

@histodon @medievodons #history @bookstodon #medieval #medievalhistory #AsianMastadon

"Chen Yaozuo was a #Teochew prime minister & grand tutor of the crown prince of the #SongDynasty (960–1279) in the 11th century. Coming from a family of officials, he was a rising star at the start of his career, until he bravely, or some might say foolishly, answered a call of Emperor Zhenzong for open criticisms by submitting a memorial that spelt out the ills of the times, including matters that no one else dared to speak about. As a result, Chen Yaozuo was banished & demoted to become an assistant prefect in the Teochew prefecture. This happened in 998, almost 180 years after Han Yu of the Tang dynasty suffered a similar fate."

"....Chen Yaozuo was more of a problem-solver than Han Yu, and he knew this. At the same time, he sensed the Teochew people’s deep admiration for his fellow Confucian. Cleverly capitalising on this, Chen Yaozuo erected a shrine in honour of Han Yu and he used it to commence his own programme to promote education among what was still a backward population. In pursuit of this goal, the Sichuan native also set up a Confucian temple and places of learning, while identifying and encouraging able families to send their children to schools.

Chen Yaozuo left Teochew after three years of devoted service to its people. He subsequently revealed in an inscription presented to a study room in Zhangpu (a county in Fujian adjacent to Teochew prefecture) that his time in Teo-yor was passed without major worries, despite it being enveloped in miasma."

"Chen Yaozuo’s heart remained with the place even many years after his departure. His poem below, “A note to Registrar Li Zi in Chaoyang” (送潮陽李孜主簿), illustrates this:

潮陽山水東南奇
The mountains and waters of Chaoyang are a wonder of the Southeast
魚鹽城郭民熙熙
Fishing boats, salt beds, and people going in and out of the city form a merry sight
當時為撰玄聖碑
Back then I had to write inscriptions for the sages
而今風俗鄒魯為。
Today its customs are like Zou and Lu [i.e. the home countries of Mencius and Confucius]

#Chinese #historians credit Han Yu for starting what we may call a #revolution through #literacy in Teochew. Yet the extent of Chen Yaozuo’s tireless contributions towards this cause can be seen by its fruits. Before his arrival, the Teochew prefecture produced only three men who attained the status of jinshi, the highest scholarly title awarded by the Chinese imperial court since the late 6th century. By the end of Song, the records show more than 170 jinshi from Teochew, of whom about a third came from Teo-yor.

Beyond scholarly titles, the creation of an educated class sparked a golden age in Teochew with accelerated advancements in agriculture and industry that ended its days as a backwater."

Ref: https://inf.news/en/history/08fbe530527e724eeeee5320bff4f3b9.html

Ref: https://www.theteochewstore.org/blogs/latest/teochew-through-the-eyes-of-its-visitors-chen-yaozou-an-unsung-hero

The "heavenly horse" of China could travel 400 miles in a day, its back was marked like a tiger's and at peak exertion, it sweated blood. JSTOR breaks down the true history of these legendary beasts, which were so desirable Emperor Wu, who ruled the Han Dynasty from 141 to 87 BCE, started a war over them.

https://flip.it/wxGfmu

#History @histodons #ChineseHistory #China #Legends #Culture

Edit: Found one! Tracked down a copy in Germany via www.vialibri.net. Thanks Joost Rekveld and everyone who gave advice and boosted!

I'm looking for a physical copy of "5000 Years of Chinese Costumes" and trying to avoid Amazon. Digitally I can borrow it from the Internet Archive, but this is a book I want irl. Anyone who wants to part with their copy? Yes, I'm ready to pay for it.

On 10 June 1907, the first edition of Tianyi (天義 – Natural Justice), a #Chinese #anarchist #feminist #magazine , was published in exile in #Tokyo. It had been founded by He-Yin Zhen (何震 – He "thunderclap"), a leading member of the #WomensRights Recovery Association (女子妇权会).

The Association advocated forceful #resistance against #oppression by men, as well as that by #capitalists and the ruling class. It also forbade its own members from being subservient to men or becoming a concubine or second wife, while offering to come to the assistance of any member who was being abused by their husband, or under some other form of male dominance. He-Yin urged:

"You women, do not hate the man: hate that you don't have food to eat. Why don't you have food to eat? Because you can't buy food without money. Why don't you have money? Because the rich have stolen our property and walk all over the majority of the people."

Tianyi argued for a #SexualRevolution and the abolition of the family, which it believed gave rise to selfishness, #patriarchy and private property.

He-Yin also argued that #women forming part of a government would be inadequate for the #liberation of women, believing that while a few women might be able to join the ruling class, they would only join men in oppressing everyone else. And so liberation would only come with the overthrowing of both patriarchy and the state:

"What we mean by equality between the sexes is not just that men will no longer oppress women. We also want men no longer to be oppressed by other men and women no longer to be oppressed by other women."

In total, 19 issues of the journal published over the next couple of years.

https://stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8210/Tianyi-first-published

Nohara Shiro, until his death in 1981, was a #Marxist #historian specializing in Chinese history and #ChinesePolitics who had also become strongly involved in the movement to eradicate pre-war feudal and fascist influences from #Japanese education and learning. The essay translated here originally appeared in his 1960 collection, History and Ideology in #Asia (Ajia no rekishi to shisb). Despite his personal preference for #Marxism over anarchism, Nohara’s approach to the subject is quite open-minded. The strengths of his essay are its focus upon practical organizing attempts rather than intellectual activities, and its revelation of the considerable #anarchist influence upon Li Dazhao, whom the #Communist Party has long claimed as its own. Whilst most of the early intellectual exponents of the anarchist idea either drifted away into obscurity, were converted to Marxism, or joined the bandwagon of the nationalist movement (some even becoming outright fascists), the organizing activities described here often became the building blocks for the subsequent communist movement. Nohara’s work is thus invaluable not only for shedding light on the role of anarchism as an intellectual stimulus for the Chinese #revolutionary movement as a whole, but also for making clear the political debt owed the anarchists in terms of practical activities.

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/nohara-shiro-anarchists-and-the-may-4-movement-in-china

#intro post for yr. villainous friend

Hello! I'm Rae and I'm here for #fandom, primarily #webnovels of the #danmei, #baihe, #wuxia, and/or #xianxia variety. I watch the occasional #cdrama too, but very slowly. As you can tell from my name, I am an #MDZS fan (also #SVSSS and #TGCF). I'm currently doing a #ChuLiuxiangReadalong, watching #LegendOfFei, and constantly thinking about #ALeagueOfNobleman and its source novel #ZhangGongAn. I love villains and stories about conflicting loyalties, dark pasts and mysterious secrets. I write fanfic and share it here.

Other than fandom, I post a little about #ChineseHistory, learning Mandarin (just passed HSK 3 and HSKK Elementary!), historical bookbinding, personal web dev, and so on. I'm in the Central European time zone and also read German, plus a tiny bit of Swedish.

Amazing find. Truly amazing.
#ChineseHistory #ChineseCanadian #Chinatown #vancouver
https://vancouversun.com/feature/chinatown-vancouver-archival-documents-discovery

The Global in the Local A Century of War, Commerce, and Technology in China by Xin Zhang

The story of globalization in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as experienced by ordinary people in the Chinese river town of Zhenjiang.

@bookstodon
#books
#nonfiction
#China
#ChineseHistory
#19thCentury
#colonisation
#globalisation

A fascinating paper for anyone who’s interested in art history, eunuchs, and court gossip from a thousand years ago.

'Magpies and Hare': Cui Bai's Commentary on Marriage, Eunuchs, and Self-awareness, by Alfreda Murck. https://muse.jhu.edu/article/775128

From @jackiantonovich

Hey friends, The Muhlenberg History Department is hiring an assistant prof. in Modern Chinese History. We're open to candidates with any thematic or geographic focus, but will privilege apps that display expertise in Pacific World, Transnational, and/or Diasporic histories.

https://muhlenberg.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/MuhlenbergCareers/job/Ettinger-Building/Assistant-Professor--Modern-Chinese-History--tenure-track-_R0000747

#AcademicJobs @histodons #History #ChineseHistory #Chinese

May in Canada is Jewish Heritage Month...AND...Asian Heritage Month. So it seems like the perfect excuse for me to share a fun documentary I made for CBC Radio's IDEAS program, back in my pre-Senate day, about the unlikely story of Moishe Two-Gun Cohen, Jewish gunslinger of the Canadian West AND hero of the Chinese Revolution. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-intermittently-true-adventures-of-moishe-two-gun-cohen-1.2913745 #CBC #IDEAS #CBCRadio #JewishHistory #ChineseHistory #jewishhistory #Canada #Edmonton #yeg #SunYatSen #yegheritage #ChineseRevolution #jewish

Reading a bit of late Qing history. Interesting the degree of modernisation. The comparison with Japan is poor and it hasn't been politically correct for both Chinese and Westerners to admit continuities rather than "modernity came with [preferred regime/Western influence". #ChineseHistory @histodons #China

#BOTD in #ChineseHistory: Su Shi #蘇軾 (1037–1101), aka 'Eastern Slope' #東坡, poet, politician, scientist, and a true '#Renaissance man' of the Song #宋. One of the most-cited authors in #ChineseLiterature, he also gave his name to a Hangzhou delicacy, Dongpo Pork Belly #東坡肉.

On ebay I found an affordable copy of a really handy South Manchuria Railroad report (around 300 pages including appendix with translated treaties) published on the eve of the Japanese invasion. I scanned and posted it to Internet Archive:

Second Report On Progress In Manchuria To 1930 (April, 1931)
https://archive.org/details/second-report-on-progress-in-manchuria-to-1930

#histodons #china #japan #japanesehistory #chinesehistory #primarysources @histodons

Borrowing some books for holiday #reading #ChineseHistory #Translation #China @bookstodon @sino_lit

These are the two books I have been waiting for!! #japanesehistory #chinesehistory

Hello! Our mission is to cover the incredible complexity of #ChineseFood—both the #cuisine inside #China and #diaspora #cooking.

We love showcasing #longform and #FoodIllustration. (By the way, we welcome #pitches!)

In recent years, we have published an illustrated #cookbook and trading cards featuring Chinese veggies.

Our next book project is a collection of Chinese #food #fables from legendary times to the modern day. Our current obsessions: #FoodHistory #ChineseHistory and #AncientChina

#Introduction post

Hello everyone I’m a non-binary writer/translator from Wales, former academic and current editor for a local #ScienceFiction and #Fantasy lit mag.

My nerdy interests include:
- The Romance of the Three Kingdoms #ChineseHistory
- Japanese writers like Dazai and Sōseki #JapaneseLiterature
- #SmallPress #Publishing and #Fiction
- #Communism
- #Buddhism and #Daoism

...but I'll mostly post about:
#RetroVideogames, #Danmei and #Yuri