Today, at nearly 100 years of age, Michael Loewe is the foremost Han historian. In many ways, it is his numerous publications (which include such foundational reference works as The Biographical Dictionary of Qin and Western Han and Early Chinese Texts) that has allowed the fledgling field of Han history to establish itself firmly in the Anglo-American world. Coming from a distinguished Anglo-Jewish family, he studied Greek and Roman Classics and Hebrew before 1941, when he was assigned, after a short course, to Bletchley Park, to undertake the breaking of Japanese codes. (He began his study of Chinese in his spare time.) After the war, he worked briefly for the British government, while deciding to return to university (The School of African and Oriental Studies, University of London) to begin the serious study of Chinese language and history. By 1951, he had earned his undergraduate degree, and by 1963, his Ph.D. Quite soon thereafter, he became University Lecturer in Cambridge, which position he retained until his mandatory retirement in 1990. He continues to live at his home near Cambridge, and has devoted himself to ongoing research ever since.
In this scheduled Zoom talk, Michael Loewe aims for a relaxed conversation with Michael Nylan, whom he invited to co-edit one book (China's Early Empires, Cambridge University Press, 2010), and for whom he has made important contributions to several other edited books. At present, Michael Loewe has been thinking about what we currently know and do not know about Eastern Han and its capital at Luoyang, also about several other topics he has remained keenly interested in, including the place of Kongzi/Confucius in Han thinking, the role of the classicists, and the shifting conditions of land tenure over the second century of Eastern Han. Talk about these topics will begin the conversation, but questions from the audience will also be welcome, the point being to use this occasion to reflect upon the past and how historians contribute to the shaping of that past, always.
UC Berkeley Campus Footage featured at the beginning of the video is by Street Musicians: tinyurl.com/2p8jk44w -- Footage is free for use - Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike CC BY-NC-SA
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9 май 2022
