I wrote for @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social on Palantir, the chip industry, US-China competition, and what tech firms mean when they talk about "defending Western civilization." Thanks to @jwassers.bsky.social, @bspivey.bsky.social, and the LARB team for the edits! lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...

Here's my recent talk at CIW about how a Maoist approach to "environmental protection" emerged during the Cultural Revolution--an important period wherein many leaders and people began to seriously think about and grapple with the externalities of industrialization. www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfpC...

So grateful to write for @dissentmag.bsky.social's Fall 2025 issue "Authoritarianism and Resistance." I drafted the piece in June with the new school year in mind, as an immigrant scholar severed from her homeland: What can we teach the young about how to exist and persist at this historic juncture?

Weekly Wanderings returns after a late-summer hiatus, with new book recommendations, lots of China links, interesting stories from around the world, and Tiya Miles on searching for the right words.

From Sanmenxia and Three Gorges to the Yarlung Tsangpo Dam, China has long relied on monumental hydropower to prove state capacity. @zenel25.bsky.social and @pguer.bsky.social show how such projects, while promising development and security, often deepen the very insecurities they claim to resolve.

Sad news 😔 www.crikey.com.au/2025/09/04/m...

A new essay from me synthesizing the rich body of media criticism in Japanese focused on the practice of "August journalism" (八月ジャーナリズム): the tendency for rehearsed, compressed, and hollowed-out coverage of war memory each August. apjjf.org/2025/9/fedman

I've given talks about my new @columbiagr.bsky.social book at various places (including in Culver City at @wendemuseum.bsky.social), but this October 20 dual book launch with Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow at @ucirvine.bsky.social will be my first in Orange County www.humanities.uci.edu/events/art-i...

Looking forward to giving my first talks ever in the Netherlands October 22-24, first link up is for one I'll give in The Hague (sponsored by the University of Leiden's Asia Centre) on the 23rd: leidenasiacentre.nl/event/jeffre... cc @hvistendahl.bsky.social @krishraghav.bsky.social

🥹 Can't ask for a better review by @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social: "A stunning tale of government violence, organized protest, and radical hope... In its depiction of commitment, cowardice, and change, You Must Take Part in Revolution proves both heartbreaking and heartening." 🔗 bit.ly/larb-revolution

What did "environmental protection" 环境保护 mean in the Cultural Revolution? How did revolutionary Maoists approach pollution and other environmental problems caused by industrialization? 🇨🇳 🏭 ♻️ Talking about this on Thu 18 Sept, 4–5:30pm @ CIW (Canberra) (in person, recording later) shorturl.at/MIDTs

Happy to be recognized as a finalist for the @washingtonmonthly.com's Kukula Ward for my review of @ewong.bsky.social's At the Edge of Empire. Sincere thanks @jwassers.bsky.social, @bspivey.bsky.social, and @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social Read the Review 👇 lareviewofbooks.org/article/stra...

Love the look of the @cwclub.bsky.social Bookstore, my talk here begins in 20 minutes

CIW is hiring two more multiyear postdocs. I'm loving it here and highly recommend for those interested to apply. Great place with great people and lots of support for research. Deadline is July 30 🦘 jobs.anu.edu.au/jobs/postdoc...

Was pleased to write this review of the second edition of @jwassers.bsky.social’s “Vigil: The Struggle for Hong Kong,” published in January. It’s a great book that’s only gained importance since its first publication in 2020. Read the review online here: chajournal.blog/2025/07/11/v...

On the contingency of history - writing in LA Review of Books.

lareviewofbooks.org/article/ther... @drjanehayward.bsky.social "Finally, at a time when China’s rise must seem, to many, to have been inevitable, both books serve well to remind us of the contingency of history and the opaqueness of the future when viewed from the present."

In recent months, we have lost a significant portion of our funding. Yet we remain committed to helping the world better understand China at this critical juncture in global politics. We are asking for your help to keep our websites up and running. giving.chinadigitaltimes.net/page/serverc...

What I got ✨

Very excited that I just saw a 50% leap after Saturday’s West Coast launch in the number of people the Good Reads site lists reading The Milk Tea Alliance www.goodreads.com/book/show/22... /okay, it went from 2 on Saturday to 3 on Monday but phrasing it in terms of percentages sounds more impressive

A review of my book Chinese Characters Across Asia has come out in the LA Review of Books, alongside Uluğ Kuzuoğlu’s Codes of Modernity: Chinese Scripts in the Global Information Age. lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-...

Review of two books on post-Mao China, The Great Transformation by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian, and China’s Age of Abundance by Wang Feng. Thank you to @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social for the invitation! lareviewofbooks.org/article/ther...

Interesting (and discouraging) example of how PRC desperation to whitewash their policies in Xinjiang hurts its international relations and makes it harder for those trying to maintain engagement with China. A 🧵regarding Princeton Press' trip to Xinjiang:

It seems a small thing, but a first academic citation is very gratifying--particularly when put in service of an important book like @josephtorigian.bsky.social's bio of Xi Zhongxun (www.sup.org/books/histor...) (my article on Uyghur student protests in the 80s: read.dukeupress.edu/journal-of-a...)

It was a great honor to share my thoughts at some length on how the landscape of U.S.-China relations looks to me now, especially through the prism of academic exchange, as part of the @scmpnews.bsky.social Open Questions interview series:

Last Friday afternoon in DC, I got a chance to share a stage w/ @eosnos.bsky.social (always a pleasure) to talk about my new book on resistance and repression in Asia and many other subjects, from our past collaborations to the challenges of writing about Xi Jinping www.youtube.com/watch?app=de...

I had a lot of fun reviewing the new Hsu-Tang Library Project. Indebted to @jwassers.bsky.social and Brian Spivey for their trust and help with getting it in shape. We do pretty cool work. Let's talk about it in public venues too. #chineseliterature #premodernchinese #sinology

Excellent review from @laujessie.bsky.social !

I'll speak at Luther College (Iowa) on April 16 www.luther.edu/event/youth-... (really love the eye-catching poster below that students there came up with for it!), I'll also do a session for there on writing about history & contemporary issues the next morning www.luther.edu/event/studen...

Elizabeth Keith (1887-1956). 'The Forbidden City Wall, Peking', c.1920s

Glad to see The Seed of the Sacred Fig getting this attention. Easily the best movie about authoritarian politics in years. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/w...

This Friday at UCI in person & everywhere via live stream, Dean Baquet keynote on “Crisis in the Newsroom,” then response from a stellar panel moderated by @amywilentz.bsky.social & then a full day of in person events Saturday, details here sites.uci.edu/factsunderfi...

*The Milk Tea Alliance: Inside #Asia's Struggle against Autocracy and Beijing* @columbiagr.bsky.social, forthcoming, June 2025. @jwassers.bsky.social gave a fascinating talk on this project at @fairbankcenter.bsky.social last month. indiepubs.com/products/the...

Very cool to see my "Xi Jinping’s Russian Lessons" on the @foreignaffairs.com Editors' Best of 2024, along with work by @zoe-liu.bsky.social @radchenko.bsky.social Audrey Kurth Cronin and others www.foreignaffairs.com/lists/best-2...

My book, “Making Mao’s Steelworks,” is now available online via Cambridge Core. doi.org/10.1017/9781...

🧵"The question of cultural survival haunts Patigül’s * #Bloodline*《 #百年血脉》 (2015). "The novel situates the narrator—who, like the author, is half- #Uyghur and half- #Hui —within the matrix of the #Han majority’s aggressive promotion of #Chinese: . . ." 1/

My new book, Women and Their Warlords, was published last month. You can order it at the press website w/a 30% discount using the code UCPNEW. But why would you want to buy a book when you don’t know what it’s about? Here’s the argument. 🧵 press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

New edition of my very short Hong Kong book Vigil comes out in two weeks, detail below 👇 —launch events in Berlin Jan 20 & various English cities 22 to 27

Jeff chose my new book as one of his five for 2024! I’m beyond flattered to be in this great company. (Michelle King’s book is amazing - highly recommend; and my review of Westad & Chen’s book will be out w/TLS soon - I loved it too.)

I’m always glad to be asked to name China books of the year by @fivebooks.com (as challenging as the selecting is—I see it as just picking 5 of the many recent worthy books on the topic broadly defined that I’d like more readers to know about). Here are my 2024 choices fivebooks.com/best-books/t...

Thinking for some reason about my teacher, Jonathan Spence. With the third anniversary of his passing (Christmas day) approaching, I would like to share this remembrance of him (and my favorite book of his) that I wrote for my @thechinaproject.bsky.social column thechinaproject.com/2022/01/26/t...

“As the #historian searches for coherence, the #poet weaves possible futures. . . . The grace of the historian poet is to caution us that neither individual nor communal #history is foreordained.” On Julian Gewirtz's *Never Turn Back: #China ...* & *Your Face My Flag* @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social

Just published: Part II of Zha Jianying's family memoir "Trains." This section tracks her grandfather from his student days in France through personal tragedy in Manchuria. www.chinafile.com/re...

If you live in or near Sheffield & have ties to or are simply interested in Hong Kong, this event I’m doing there on Saturday 25 January may be of interest www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-strugg...

At #AHAPerspectives, we've rounded up some of our most popular articles of 2024 for your enjoyment! Includes pieces by @dig-history.bsky.social, @kawulf.bsky.social, @jwassers.bsky.social, and lots of other great historians. 🗃️