CfP for an exciting animal panel at the upcoming Association of Art History Conference (University of Cambridge, 8-10 April 2026). A great opportunity for Chinese animal / art scholars! 🎨🐝🐸

Dear friends, As have become a habit, I mark each #autumnequinox by sharing a small poem by Xin Qiji. I also start my translation cycle of Chinese and Japanese poems and prose that mark the twenty-four lunisolar micro-seasons. Translation notes blogged here: #everynightapoem

imagine if a family of beavers randomly showed up right now and finished whatever thing you've been putting off

Writing history aficionados -- 注意！ Detailed analyses of Tang brushes, paper & ink from Murong Zhi's tomb: doi:10.1038/s40494-025-01989. Even if one doesn’t have to go along with the “deep Sinicization of the Tuyuhun royal family” bit in the discussion, a fascinating paper.

New Otter just dropped. www.earth.com/news/scienti...

“Confucius was terrorized by the bouncers. ‘Wuhu!’ he exclaimed. ‘How America’s virtue has declined! If even this may be called a ‘gentleman’s club,’ what might *not* be called a ‘gentleman’s club?’”

Yanwei (延維), also known as Weiyi (委蛇), is a formidable snake god in Chinese #mythology. With a human head atop a serpentine body, and two red heads emerging from its purple form, it stretches as long as a cart’s yoke. Though fierce in presence, it fears thunder, freezing in place at the sound.

The Fourth Middle-Period China Humanities conference in Hong Kong, summer 2026. Hope to see many of you there!

Our friend the Linanit Dwarf Toad is only known to live in a single place on Mount Murud in Borneo! Their call sounds like a metallic "ping" that is repeated several times! Ping ping ping ping ping! (photo by Pui Yong Min)

Thai cat treatises — called “Tamra Maew” — pair illustrations of auspicious felines with poetic notes: one has “eyes like dewdrops on a lotus,” another’s are “lit like fireflies, applied liquid gold”. Pages of a fine 19th-century example here: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/tamra-maew/

In-laws of the Marsh

have never clicked a headline so fast www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Did you know medieval people didn’t understand germ theory? And neither do dogs today. That’s why dogs still believe in the four humors.

My favorite Chekhov short story was told from the point of view of a dog. It makes me wonder if they’d all be improved if they were retold from the point of view of a dog.

Today is #TofuDay! Tofu was likely a staple in China as far back as 2000 years ago. The cultivation of its key ingredient, soy, has been going on even longer, dating back 5000-3500 years. However, this is far from the first plant resource exploited on a large scale 1/2 🏺 #Archaeology

Happy weekend! From c. 3,600 years ago, here’s an ancient Egyptian bead in the form of a curled-up hedgehog! 🦔💙 Blue faience, c. 1985 -1650 BC. National Museum of Scotland www.nms.ac.uk/search-our-c... 📷 by me #Archaeology

We were taken into the mountains of Shennongjia in central #China to meet the golden snubbed nosed monkeys which have - for the moment - been saved from extinction... CLICK ON LINK TOO SEE. www.bbc.com/news/article...

Le nouveau numéro des Annales est sorti sur @universitypress.cambridge.org Au programme, un numéro double consacré aux #animaux (pour la première fois dans l'histoire presque centenaire des #Annales). Bonne lecture et à bientôt pour une présentation détaillée ! ▶️ www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Before I take a break, I leave you with more shark joy. Look at this teeny tiny little shark! One of only two specimens ever found of a pocket shark. Adorable, amazing, and just utterly wonderful.

With free access to Roel Sterckx on "Fish-Farming in Pre-Modern China" (As he reminds us, "If not for Yu, we would all be fish" 微禹，吾其魚乎)

Saving #China’s finless porpoise from extinction, a piece from me. Click on link below… www.bbc.com/news/article...

We founded the U of Arizona Center for East Asian Studies three years ago with a US Dept of Education grant. Last Friday marked the end of year 3 of 4. Though the grant was for four years, we have not received word about year 4 funding. Without this support, we have no choice but to close down.

Well, UChicago has paused new PhD admissions in my department now, too. One of the flagship departments for anthropology in the US and worldwide. This on top of hum, social thought, social work, and others. What happens to UChicago's brand--the so-called "life of the mind"--now?

Plus having to be fluent with tons of archaic cricket terminology etc, about which you otherwise know 0

Never hit “purchase” so fast

For my China studies friends here: new Wilkinson just dropped. 7th edition, huge news. On Pleco, too. If you don’t know what that means, do you even sinologize, bro? @pleco.com #Sinology🀄️📚

Pottery Yellow-glazed Dog, Eastern Han (25-220). Height 48.5cm © Shanghai Museum

In ancient China, dreams were seen as glimpses into the future, and cats played a unique role in dream interpretation. Here’s how feline visions were once interpreted: 1/4 👇 #caturday Source in ALT.

An unintellegible language - whether another Sinitic language or an unrelated language altogether - is described in Chinese as ‘bird language’ 鳥語. Mencius has a passage speaking of the ‘shrike-tongued barbarians of the south’ 南蠻鴃舌之人…

Update: I read them but I wish I hadn’t

Saw Reni’s “Massacre of the Innocents” today - weighs heavy

Just in case anyone else finds the idea of blood-stained tears oddly appealing, here's a piece I wrote on the subject www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10....

The UK did have one standout product that was considered globally valuable- universities- and unilaterally decided to stop providing the product because it was more important to be xenophobic than successful

The town of Ferrandina-Scalo, Basilicata, getting ahead of any prospective extraterrestrial invasion by pre-emptively surrendering

Germany will be the last to admit it www.nytimes.com/2025/07/15/o...

Thrilled to announce a new volume I've co-edited with Benjamin Brose: Inner Worlds: Individuals and Interiority in Chinese Religious Life. It’s out now from Brill and you can find it here: brill.com/edcollbook/t... ✨ #NewBooks #ReligiousStudies #BuddhistStudies

'Just a short time earlier, people had believed they were living in the Qing dynasty; after the Date, they discovered they had formerly been inhabiting premodern China.' Stephen Owen (2001), 'The End of the Past: Rewriting Chinese Literary History in the Early Republic'.

A new volume of the De Gruyter Library of Chinese Humanities! The Finest Souls of Our Rivers and Alps A parallel text translation of the only extant contemporaneous poetry anthology from the High Tang (completed ca 753 CE).

The only ones ever

季姬擊雞記 by 趙元任 季姬寂，集雞，雞即棘雞。棘雞飢嘰，季姬及箕稷濟雞。雞既濟，躋姬笈，季姬忌，急咭雞，雞急，繼圾幾，季姬急，即籍箕擊雞，箕疾擊幾伎，伎即齑，雞嘰集幾基，季姬急極屐擊雞，雞既殛，季姬激，即記《季姬擊雞記》。

Chinese text dissolves to an English translation in THE FORBIDDEN CITY (1918), a common effect-- but the Chinese is upside down! A common refrain is that "You can't judge an old movie by modern standards!" and I won't. Audiences of 1918 were calling this out immediately!

Who up stroking they sword while lamenting social realities

From today’s generals reading, for no reason at all

"L'animal est omniprésent dans l'œuvre de Bergson, apparaissant comme un modèle nécessaire à la fois pour penser l’humanité, et pour la replacer dans le mouvement général de l’évolution." 🐁🦩🐘🐒 Penser l'animal avec Bergson, par @drmathildetahar.bsky.social ⤵️

Some cool things I saw in Anyang, which weren’t necessarily beautiful.

I didn’t know this was in the works, exciting!! 😍

My partner on watching Three Kingdoms with me: Zhuge Liang is Bugs Bunny and Zhou Yu is Elmer Fudd

Harvard, aka Resistance U, is taking advantage of the Trumpist NLRB to crush its grad student union by stripping it of 800 members. Sounds about right. www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...