Ya Zuo 左娅

Always a happy day when the latest journal arrives from across the pond @ssycds.bsky.social Lots of interesting stuff inside, including a special section on the human senses!! #histbookchat #sinology #China #SongDynasty

At the AAS in Vancouver, We also proudly sponsor two panels. Please come support our wonderful colleagues!

Come join us at the AAS in Vancouver! Come early, enjoy some dim sum, and catch up with everyone!

Right up my alley and wish I could be there. Also, the speaker is my college classmate 😀

*a healthy new year 😀

My new piece on the history of the chickpea in premodern China just came out. Wishing you a health near year full of good food! www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

‘Insider and Outsider’ | Josephine Quinn How did Saint Augustine’s African origins and his life among Christians there shape his theology?

St. Augustine (yes, that one), the African. www.nybooks.com/articles/202...

My chapter “Knowledge and Knowing in Neo-Confucianism” is out in the Routledge Companion to Chinese Philosophy edited by Brook Ziporyn and Stephen Walker. It was a pleasure working with philosophers! www.zuoya.org/_files/ugd/6...

Congratulations to those whose panels got accepted by the AAS in 2026! If your panel or any of its speakers engage with the 10th-14th century in China, please consider applying for the Society's sponsorship. We look forward to receiving your proposals!

I also assigned his writings whenever I taught Classical Chinese thought. Student interest in him remained strong, even among those younger students who had never met him either.

Bowdoin president's message one Kidder Smith's passing. He was my predecessor as the China historian at Bowdoin. I never met him, but I’ve heard so much about him as a campus legend.

With lovely Rutgers colleagues

Wrapped up my talks at Princeton and Rutgers. Had a great time catching up with old friends and teachers, and meeting new ones too. Took NJ Transit to and from the airport and landed on the old cars. They look exactly the same as 20 years ago! Felt like I was zapped right back into a time capsule…

I'm excited to return to New Jersey next week to give two talks respectively at Princeton and Rutgers. I'll be speaking about my recent work on Zhu Xi and his theory of emotions. I hadn't excepted a classical topic to spark so much joy of discovery, and I look forward to sharing that.

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

Oxford Studies in Medieval History is now Oxford Studies in the New Medieval History. Glad to be part of the opening up of this great series to global approaches. We are looking forward to receiving book manuscripts in global #medieval history.
More info in the flyer:
fdslive.oup.com/www.oup.com/...

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....

'Echoes of Great Brightness: The Ming Dynasty and Beyond' In Oxford, 16-17 September. Booking now open. I'm honoured (my goodness, I really am, so grateful to this amazing roster of colleagues)
web.cvent.com/event/a4ff13...

Xuelei Huang. Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell. Xuelei Huang’s Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell is a cultural history of smell in modern China. It delineates an “olfactory revolution” that link

My review of Xuelei Huang's Scents of China: A Modern History of Smell is out in the American Historical Review. This is the first monograph ever written on the history of olfaction in China studies. A pleasant read! academic.oup.com/ahr/article-...

谢谢🙏

My friend Chen Hao passed away a month ago. He was a historian of medicine and middle-period Chinese history. He would have turned 42 this July. I wrote this obituary for him. Though I’ve written it, I still don’t have the words for such grief. www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_f...

Thank you!

Thank you. The brewery has given their beer a variety of sexy names, but unfortunately Male Tears isn't one of them!

Glass in hand, but don’t be fooled—it’s just water. 💧

I gave a talk on male tears in premodern China as part of the Profs at the Pub series, held at the Third Window Brewery in Santa Barbara. First time for me to speak among beer barrels!

Many thanks to everyone who came to the SSYCDS annual meeting at AAS Columbus! We’re so grateful for your support and excitement!

For those attending the AAS in Columbus, our Society has prepared a great lineup of activities! Be sure to come find us – see the schedule attached. See you there! #AAS2025 #SongYuanStudies

For those attending the AAS in Columbus, we’d like to warmly invite you to our roundtable discussion on Christian Lamouroux's La dynastie des Song: Histoire générale de la Chine (960-1279). Join us from 12:15–1:45 PM at Pheoris West A, Hilton Columbus.

My review of Peter Bol's Localizing Learning: The Literati Enterprise in Wuzhou is out in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies. A must-read book please check it out!

muse.jhu.edu/pub/109/arti...

For SoCal friends,

Here is a list of resources for shelter, animal boarding, free items, and distribution hubs. These places can also use donations (e.g., food, water, masks, and blankets). Please consider donating if you can.

For more info, visit Instagram: mutualaidla

Posting on behalf of the Society for Song, Yuan, and Conquest Dynasties: we are hosting this exciting roundtable at the AAS in March. This promises to be a wonderful occasion to reflect on the present and future of our field and celebrate the study of Song. Everyone is warmly welcome—see you there!