Introducing Dr Rachel Silberstein

rachel-silbersteinI am a historian of early modern and modern China with a focus on the history of women and gender, and visual/material culture. Funding from the BICC enabled me to pursue DPhil studies at the University of Oxford from 2008-14, where I wrote a dissertation entitled ‘Embroidered Figures: Commercial Production and Popular Culture in the Early Modern Chinese Fashion System’, supervised by Shelagh Vainker, Curator of Chinese Art at the Ashmolean Museum, and Associate Professor of Chinese Art at University of Oxford. The dissertation explored how textile handicraft commercialization and urban popular culture transformed women’s engagement with fashionable dress, enabling women to contribute to local economies and cultures, and was further supported by the KS Scholarship for Chinese Art, and the Gervers Fellowship for Textiles and Dress at the Royal Ontario Museum. Since graduating, I have published articles in Late Imperial China (2015), Costume (2016), and Fashion Theory (2016), and taught as Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of History of Art and Visual Culture at Rhode Island School of Design from 2015-16.

For 2016-17, I have been awarded an ACLS / Luce Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship to develop my dissertation into a book manuscript. I will also visit China to begin a new project which moves into the twentieth century, and examines needlework as a medium of encounter between Chinese and Western women as handicraft workers, missionaries, shop-owners, students and teachers, at a time when long-held notions of gender were uprooted, handicraft industries were revolutionized by industrialization and globalization, and embroidery’s materiality was transformed by new needlework forms introduced by foreign missionaries and merchants. The BICC played a crucial role in providing the financial support, training and academic freedom to develop my research interests in fashion and dress as a mode of cultural and economic creation, and how processes of commercialization, modernization and industrialization in textile handicrafts impact upon women’s experiences in the home, community and society.

Introducing Dr Nicola Horsburgh

9780198706113_140The global management of nuclear weapons and the ascendancy of China in international affairs pose two of the greatest challenges for international security today. Yet we know relatively little about the nuclear dimension of China’s rise, and the extent to which China has shaped global nuclear politics.

This new book, published in February 2015 by Oxford University Press, offers insight into these issues by offering an empirically rich study of Chinese nuclear weapons behaviour and the impact of this behaviour on global nuclear politics since 1949. In particular, the book advances the argument that, in the 1960s and 1970s, Maoist China –at the time highly critical of superpower attempts to curtail the spread of nuclear weapons– had a greater hand than previously thought in indirectly creating global nuclear order. Since then, China has become a fully-fledged member of global nuclear order, playing a direct and pivotal role in regional and global nuclear politics.

The book also offers theoretical reflections upon nuclear weapons and global order. The concept of global nuclear order is relatively new, but it has become popular among academics and policymakers working in the nuclear field. It is certainly an innovative lens through which to consider China as a nuclear weapons state because it draws attention to the inner workings –institutional and normative—of nuclear politics. It is also timely: the challenges to global nuclear order today are numerous, from Iranian and North Korean nuclear ambitions to the growing threat of nuclear terrorism. This book considers these challenges from a Chinese perspective, exploring how far Beijing has gone to the aid of nuclear order in addressing these issues.

Dr Nicola Horsburgh

Dr Nicola Horsburgh received an ESRC BICC scholarship to fund an MPhil in Modern Chinese Studies and DPhil in International Relations at Oxford University from 2006 to 2011. She is currently a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow based at the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Oxford. Dr Horsburgh is also a Stipendiary Lecturer in International Relations at Trinity College, Oxford, a BA Fellow in the Asian Studies Centre at St. Antony’s College and a research associate of the Oxford China Centre

The BICC played an important role in funding the research that lies at the heart of this book. From 2006 to 2011, Nicola was a BICC student (MPhil and DPhil) at the University of Oxford. Through this funding, she was able to conduct extended fieldwork in China and the United States, serving as a visiting scholar at Tsinghua University, Beijing, and as a pre-doctoral fellow at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, USA.

 

 

Introducing Dr Andrew Wormald

Wormald_PhotoMy Ph.D. was completed at the University of Bristol with support from the British Inter-University China Centre’s language based area studies scheme. As such, I was very fortunate to receive a year of language training at Peking University, and further training in reading classical Chinese Buddhist texts with my supervisor, Dr. John Kieschnick, in Bristol. My thesis, entitled ‘Voices of Experience: Modernity and Buddhist Meditation in Republican-era China,’ examines Chinese Buddhism’s response to the intellectual and political reconstructions which took place at the beginning of twentieth century. It looks at the writings of a number of important Buddhist figures from the period, examines the discourse taking place in the then newly emerging Buddhist journals, and compares these findings with current scholarly consensus regarding Buddhism’s adaptation to the modern period. I am currently working on converting this thesis into a monograph, and am preparing a journal article on the prominent reformist monk Shi Yuanying’s presentation of The Awakening of Faith in Mahāyāna. My intention, moreover, is to continue the research developed during my Ph.D., and I am therefore working on a project to investigate the reception of classical Buddhist mediation manuals in Republican era Buddhist journals, and the manner in which Buddhist meditation was secularised and made part of the self-strengthening discourse at this time.

Introducing Holly Snape

HollyI have always had a deep interest in Chinese culture, since as far back as I can remember. This grew to become a strong interest in the country’s language, society, and politics. What the BICC PhD scholarship has given me is an opportunity to develop an academic-based career and a life for myself in China.

Today, working in Beijing for the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau (CCTB) – a bureau directly under the Central Committee of the CPC – I have a job that I find fascinating, that challenges me, and that gives me great room to further develop my understanding of China. I work in a team of exceptionally skilled translators and scholars, and since starting at the Bureau in July 2014, have already had the opportunity to work on the translation of a book by President Xi Jinping and the official translation of the resolution from the Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee.

When asked recently by a friend, inspired by all the talk of the Chinese Dream, “What’s your dream Holly?”, I had to reply that, right now, this career, in the very heart of central Beijing, is what I had dreamt of. The position I am in today is in no small part due to the support of the BICC and its own leading China experts, particularly Professor Robert Bickers who has always offered me his kind advice and encouragement.

It was in 2007 while carrying out research for an MSc at the University of Bristol on Chinese grassroots NGOs that I realized how integral Chinese language would be if I wanted to develop a solid understanding of this almost impenetrably complex but vibrant area of activity in mainland China. My supervisor at that time, Dr Rachel Murphy, was a source of inspiration for me in this respect. The BICC enabled me to devote time to studying language at Peking University, which in turn helped me to secure another opportunity I remain deeply grateful for: to study at Tsinghua University’s NGO Research Center. Here, I was able to learn alongside scholars currently engaged in some of the country’s most cutting edge research on Chinese NGOs, and to gain invaluable guidance from leading expert, Professor Wang Ming, who has always been hugely generous in offering me his time and support.

The empirical work for my PhD thesis, titled “The Chinese Dream of the Good Society: Social & Political Transformation explored through the Quiet Approach of Grassroots NGOs,” led me to work at and research local grassroots NGOs, some of which I continue to work for today. All of this – my position at the CCTB, the academic foundation I draw on in this job, the great teachers I have gained and friends I have made at both Tsinghua and through BICC, the opportunity I have found to work with some truly inspiring NGO practitioners, and ultimately the career and the life I was looking for in China, which I hope in its own small way might contribute to fostering positive relations between Britain and China – all of this was made possible by the support of the BICC.

Introducing Dr David Tobin

David TobinAs a BICC student fellow, I conducted my doctoral research at the University of Manchester, with language training at Peking University and Xinjiang Normal University. My July 2013 thesis is titled ‘Nation-Building and Ethnic Boundaries in China’s North-West’, and was supervised by Professor William A Callahan and Dr Elena Barabantseva. It examines how the concept of performativity can be applied to the securitisation of identity in official discourse and the politics of the everyday.  The empirical focus is on how the party-state’s attempts to deepen integration of Xinjiang and Turkic-speaking Uyghurs into China shape popular responses and resistance to this nation-building project by both Han Chinese and Uyghurs. The interface between official and unofficial nationalisms is explored through discourse analysis of official documents and detailed semi-structured interviews with Han and Uyghur residents. The analysis is drawn from a year-long fieldwork period in Xinjiang’s largest city, Ürümchi. The training, expertise, and academic freedom provided by the BICC were absolutely indispensable in bringing this project to fruition.

My research interests are primarily identity politics, nationalism, and critical international relations theory using China and Xinjiang as case studies. Working with the BICC enabled me to develop networks, which have led to publications on nationalism and ethnic relations in the journal Inner Asia and a chapter in a forthcoming Routledge edited volume on identity politics amongst urban Uyghur youth.

I worked from September 2012 to September 2013 as Lecturer in Politics at the University of Manchester before taking up the position of Lecturer in Politics at the University of Glasgow. Most of my teaching is focused on the intersection between domestic and international politics using China as the key case study. I am currently working on converting my thesis into a monograph and writing several journal articles on ethnicity in contemporary China based on my fieldwork. My next large-scale research project will explore how China’s increasingly influential public intellectuals theorise the role of ethnicity in what they see as China’s rise to global superpower status.

Introducing Sam Geall

Sam Geall Photo (1)As the recipient of a BICC studentship from 2008-2012, I was able to pursue the research and fieldwork for a PhD in Social Anthropology at the University of Manchester, supervised by Dr Anna Lora-Wainwright and Prof Sarah Green. My dissertation focuses on climate change as it is explored in the contemporary Chinese public sphere.

My broader research interests include Chinese journalism, environmental activism and citizen science, themes that also run through the book I recently edited, China and the Environment: The Green Revolution (Zed Books, 2013) and the book-length report I authored, CIimate-change journalism in China: Opportunities for international cooperation (Caixin Media and International Media Support, 2011), as well as my writing for a number of publications, including The Guardian, The New Statesman, Foreign Policy, New Humanist, Index on Censorship, China Rights Forum, openDemocracy and Green Futures.

Sam Geall book front coverI am also Executive Editor of chinadialogue.net, a bilingual online journal devoted to open discussion of all environmental issues, with a special focus on China, and the International Coordinator of a Special Policy Study on Promoting Social Media and Public Participation in China’s Green Development for the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED), a high-level think tank.

From 2012-2013, I worked as Departmental Lecturer in Human Geography of China at Oxford University, where I taught undergraduate courses and graduate seminars on China, environmental policy and sustainable development. In November/December 2013 I expect to complete my PhD, and in December 2013 I will join the STEPS Centre at the University of Sussex as a post-doctoral research associate on the Low Carbon Innovation in China project.

Introducing Dr Tehyun Ma

IMG_4892As a BICC postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bristol’s history department this past year, I have had the opportunity to work on a number of fascinating projects that have expanded my research horizons and encouraged me to rethink the way I approach source material in my own work. The first of these has been the Historical Photographs of China – also known as the Visualising China – project. It introduced me to a rich visual record of the Chinese past, full of serendipitous interconnected personal histories and forgotten vistas.

The second, which is tied to the ACRE (Atmospheric Circulation Reconstruction over the Earth) endeavor at the MET Office, gave me a glimpse of how the travel writings and records of nineteenth-century adventurers and merchants could be put to use to measure historical patterns of climate change. Both projects have given me a sense of how history could be put to use both directly and indirectly: from heritage and educational work to thinking about perhaps the biggest challenge of our time.

My own research explores China and Taiwan. Over the past few years, with the help of a postdoctoral fellowship on the Leverhulme-funded China’s War with Japan project  that ran from 2009-2011, I’ve been looking at plans for rehabilitation and reconstruction in China during the war years. The first part of this research, which interrogates the transnational influence of reconstruction planning, recently appeared in the European Journal of East Asian Studies. This article analyses the influence of the Beveridge Report and the American Social Security Act on Chinese social policy planners, exploring what their interest in these designs can tell us about the contours of the Nationalist (Guomindang) state in an era of total war.

My interest in postwar planning developed from my Ph.D., which I undertook at Bristol under the supervision of Professor Robert Bickers. The thesis focused on the first decade of Guomindang rule on Taiwan from 1945-1955, considering how the problem of mobilising a disaffected (and terrorised) island population help shaped the way party leaders reformed what a decrepit party-state. Their state-building techniques, I argue, provide an insight into how party leaders and the rank-and-file conceived of how authority was earned and used. This work adds to the growing literature on the political culture of the early Cold War in East Asia. I will be giving a talk on this project next week, August 13, as part of Hoover Institute’s workshop series ‘Revisiting Modern China’.

The BICC postdoc this year afforded me some valuable time to advance my research and teaching as well as introduce me to realms of history and public engagement that I had not experienced before. It has proven a vital stepping stone in the development of career . As of September 2013, I will be taking up a permanent lectureship in Chinese History at Exeter University, but I am keen to keep up with the projects I’ve been involved with over the past few months.

Introducing Dr Kathleen Buckingham

Bamboo farmersBICC graduate Kathleen Buckingham (shown left talking with bamboo farmers in China) has now taken up a post as a Research Associate for Forest and Landscape Restoration in the People and Ecosystems Program at the World Resources Institute in Washington DC. Her research focuses on developing diagnostic tools to assist stakeholders to plan and implement successful forest and landscape restoration.

Kathleen holds a DPhil in Geography and the Environment from the University of Oxford, MSc Environmental Sustainability from the University of Edinburgh and certificate in Advanced Chinese from Beijing Language and Culture University.  Kathleen’s DPhil thesis- ‘The marginalization of an orphan species: Examining bamboo’s fit within international forestry institutions’ was inspired by working in China with the International Network for Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR). She found that the potential of bamboo was being constrained by outdated policy frames for natural resource management, with implications for social, economic and environmental development.  The project was funded by the BICC studentship which enabled research in both China and India.

Kathleen’s DPhil provided a stepping stone towards a career in policy focused research. Currently Kathleen’s WRI research focuses on forest and landscape restoration in Brazil, but will inevitably feature China in future.

Introducing Dr Mike Gow

Mike Gow ProfileI was fortunate enough to receive funding from BICC as part of the first cohort of scholarships awarded in 2006.  I undertook my academic training at Masters and Doctoral level at the Centre for East Asian Studies at the University of Bristol, supervised by Professor Susan Robertson and Professor Jeffrey Henderson.  BICC has been the determining factor in shaping my career, affording me an opportunity for academic development that I otherwise would not have had.  In addition, I have made some lifelong friends through BICC who are already active as China scholars across a range of disciplines.

My research focuses on the strategic transformation of Chinese higher education, and aims to understand how national modernization projects are materialized within China’s political society and then mediated and institutionalized.  The thesis recognizes processes of negotiation, consent and coercion between China’s political society and civil society, discerning a tightly interwoven relationship between the state and Chinese HE and also proposes that HE is central to the negotiation of hegemony within the contemporary Chinese historic bloc.  However, it also aims to understand the complex social, cultural and institutional environment of Chinese HE through which overarching national projects must be processed.  The research utilizes Burawoy’s Extended Case Method and theoretical framework constructed around Antonio Gramsci’s theory of hegemony and Bourdieu’s concepts of capital, field and habitus.

I have taught a range of subjects over the last few years, including Contemporary Chinese Society, Chinese Political Systems, Contemporary Chinese Cultural Conventions and Chinese Business Context.  As of August 2013 I will be taking a post at NYU Shanghai as Global Postdoctoral Fellow in the inaugural year of this new campus of New York University.  My role will be research-focused, but I am also looking forward to contributing to a Freshman course “Global Perspectives on Society” led by NYU Shanghai Vice Chancellor Professor Jeffrey Lehman.  The course will introduce students to some of the greatest thinkers from both western and Chinese traditions.

Chinese HE continues to be the focus of my research and I blog on Chinese HE, internationalization of Chinese HE and Chinese HE policy at http://www.thedaxue.org