Asian American / Asian Research Institute
The City University of New York
This lecture is based on a book that Dr. Lee has recently published ‘The Bible and the Gun: Christianity in South China, 1860-1900’ (2003). Drawing on unpublished Chinese archival materials and ethnographic data collected by him at several Christian villages in Guangdong Province, he argues that Christianity became far more indigenous in China than has … Read more
The familiar debate over language and thought rears its head again with the publication of William C. Hannas’s controversial book, “The Writing on the Wall: How Asian Orthography Curbs Creativity” (University of Pennsylvania Press). In brief, Hannas contends that the writing systems of China, Japan, and Korea are inherently deterrent to abstract construction and those … Read more
In her new one-hour documentary Between the Lines: Asian American Women’s Poetry , Yunah Hong combines interviews with and readings by sixteen Asian American women poets to examine the complex convergence of experience, memory, and language behind the impulse to write. Encompassing a breathtaking diversity of histories, both public and personal, the sixteen poets include … Read more
Nagarjuna is generally recognized as the founding father of Mahajuna Buddhism. Based on his work “Mulamadhyamika Karika,” the discussion will focus on the original contribution of the Buddha, and Nagarjuna’s elaboration of the middle way, and the relationship between Pratityasmautpada (inter-relatedness of everything) and Sunyata (emptiness). Online Notes
The publication of Zhongguo Shuyuan earlier this year by Shanghai Educational Press is a significant turning point, in the study and appreciation of the educational role academies played in traditional China. I wrote the English introduction for the book, which is richly illustrated with pictures. Academies dated to the eighth century and have until the … Read more
Ethnic boundaries between communities are age old. Geographic boundaries are established by nature. National boundaries are established on the basis of nationalities that control the land, the people and the natural resources of the land. Mother Earth has other boundaries that are important but not realized by most people except the geologists and those working … Read more