Research Interests
Literature, religion, and material culture of early China (5th century BCE-3rd century CE); early Chinese historical writing; excavated texts; politics and cultures of dynastic and monarchical courts; ancient empires; religious ritual.
Education
B.A., Yale University
M.A. (Asian Studies), University of California, Berkeley
Ph.D. (History), University of California, Berkeley
Publications
Books:
Forming the Early Chinese Court: Rituals, Spaces, Roles. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2018.
Articles (earliest to latest):
"The Sage and His Associates: Confucius and His Disciples Across Early Texts." In The Norton Critical Edition of The Analects. Edited by Michael Nylan. Translated by Simon Leys. New York: Norton, 2014. 178-91.
"Text, Performance, and Spectacle: The Funeral Procession of Marquis Yi of Zeng, 433 BC." Early China 37 (2014): 181-219.
"Recasting the Court in Late Western Han: Rank, Duty, and Alliances in the Process of Institutional Change." In Chang'an 26 BCE: An Augustan Age in China, edited by Michael Nylan and Griet Vankeerberghen. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2015. 239-62.
"How and Why Do We Praise the Emperor? Debating and Depicting a Late Western Han Court Audience." Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient. 60.5 (2017): 683-714.
"A Government in Verse: Bureaucratic Aesthetics and Voice in Han and post-Han Admonitions (zhen 箴)." Oriens Extremus 58 (2018-2019) [in print, 2020], 231-66.
"Water Control and Policy-Making in the Shiji and Hanshu." In Technical Arts in the Han Histories: Tables and Treatises in the Shiji and Hanshu. Edited by Michael Nylan and Mark Csikszentmihlayi. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2021. 101-34.
“Forms and Narratives of Sovereignty in Early Imperial China: Beyond Heaven's Mandate, All-Under-Heaven, and So Forth." In Sovereignty: A Global Perspective (Proceedings of the British Academy, 253). Edited by Christopher Smith. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. 99-119.
"Notes on the Note (Ji 記) in Early Administrative Texts." Early China 45 (2022): 135-65.
"Leaking Rulers and Confidential Officials: Secrecy and Status in Early Chinese Political Culture." Journal of Chinese History 8.1 (2024): 1-22.
"Local Administration, History, and Geography in the Han and Roman Empires: Ban Gu's 'Dili zhi' and Strabo's Geographika." In Place and Performance in Ancient Greece, Rome, and China. Edited by Hans Beck and Griet Vankeerberghen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2024. 59-86.
Book reviews (earliest to latest):
Savage Exchange: Han Imperialism, Chinese Literary Style, and the Economic Imagination, by Tamara Chin. Journal of the American Oriental Society 135.2 (2015).
The Collapse of China's Later Han Dynasty, 25-220 CE: The Northwest Borderlands and the Edge of Empire, by Wicky W. K. Tse. Journal of Chinese Military History 10 (2021): 73-6.
The Politics of the Past in Early China, by Vincent S. Leung. Journal of Chinese History 6 (2022): 377-80.
Honor and Shame in Early China, by Mark Edward Lewis. Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 83.2 (2023, in print 2024): 175-80.