Zheng He’s Maritime Voyages (1405-1433) and China’s Relations with the Indian Ocean World: A Multilingual Bibliography provides a multidisciplinary guide to publications on this great navigator’s activities and their impact on Chinese and world history. Admiral Zheng He commanded the fifteenth-century world’s largest fleet. In the course of seven voyages made between 1405 and 1433, his massive ships visited over thirty present-day countries in Asia and Africa. Those voyages reflected and reinforced the development of complex networks of trade, migration, cultural exchange, and political interactions between China and the Indian Ocean world. This bibliography lists sources in thirteen languages, including both scholarly studies and popular works like Gavin Menzies’s controversial bestsellers claiming the Chinese sailed around the world before Columbus. Relevant translations, transliterations and annotations are provided to aid the reader.

This bibliography lists sources in thirteen languages, including both scholarly studies and popular works like Gavin Menzies's controversial bestsellers claiming the Chinese sailed around the world before Colombus. Relevant translations, transliterations and annotations are provided to aid the reader

This book is open access under a CC BY-NC-ND license. This book addresses the issue of how a country, which was incorporated into the world economy as a periphery, could make a transition to the emerging state, capable of undertaking the task of economic development and industrialization. It offers historical and contemporary case studies of transition, as well as the international background under which such a transition was successfully made (or delayed), by combining the approaches of economic history and development economics. Its aim is to identify relevant historical contexts, that is, the ‘initial conditions’ and internal and external forces which governed the transition. It also aims to understand what current low-income developing countries require for their transition. Three economic driving forces for the transition are identified. They are: (1) labor-intensive industrialization, which offers ample employment opportunities for labor force; (2) international trade, which facilitates efficient international division of labor; and (3) agricultural development, which improves food security by increasing supply of staple foods. The book presents a bold account of each driver for the transition.

China is building a New Silk Road that runs through the heartland of the Muslim world, promising it will create integrated economies and stronger ties across Eurasia and Africa. Robert R. Bianchi argues that while China has the financial and technical resources to accomplish its infrastructure goals, it is woefully unprepared to deal with the social and political demands of its partner countries' citizens. China and the Islamic World explores how China's leaders and citizens are learning-through their relationships with Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria and Egypt-that they have to respect and adjust to the aspirations of ordinary people throughout the Islamic world, not just cater to the narrow band of government and business elites. Bianchi demonstrates that turbulent countries along the New Silk Road are likely to transform Chinese society at least as much as China changes them. This realization will be deeply unsettling for China's authoritarian rulers, who desperately want to monopolize power domestically. The party and state bosses have responded to challenges with a contradictory blend of flexibility abroad and rigidity at home, compromising with popular demands in one country after another while refusing to negotiate many of the same issues with their own citizens. This book shows how China faces a growing struggle to maintain their double-sided statecraft as it becomes apparent that the New Silk Road is not a one way street.

A Companion to Chinese History presents a collection of essays offering a comprehensive overview of the latest intellectual developments in the study of China’s history from the ancient past up until the present day. Covers the major trends in the study of Chinese history from antiquity to the present day Considers the latest scholarship of historians working in China and around the world Explores a variety of long-range questions and themes which serves to bridge the conventional divide between China’s traditional and modern eras Addresses China’s connections with other nations and regions and enables non-specialists to make comparisons with their own fields Features discussion of traditional topics and chronological approaches as well as newer themes such as Chinese history in relation to sexuality, national identity, and the environment

Demonstrates that the pre-Islamic Sahara was a more connected region than previously thought, with trade an essential linking element.

In the second millennium CE, long before English became the language of science in the twentieth century, the act of translation was crucial for understanding and disseminating knowledge and information across linguistic and geographic boundaries. This volume considers the complexities of knowledge exchange through the practice of translation over the course of a millennium, across fields of knowledge—cartography, health and medicine, material construction, astronomy—and a wide geographical range, from Eurasia to Africa and the Americas. Contributors literate in Arabic, Catalan, Chinese, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Minnan, Ottoman, and Persian explore the history of science in the context of world and global history, investigating global patterns and implications in a multilingual and increasingly interconnected world. Chapters reveal cosmopolitan networks of shared practice and knowledge about the natural world from 1000 to 1800 CE, emphasizing both evolving scientific exchange and the emergence of innovative science. By unraveling the role of translation in cross-cultural communication, Knowledge in Translation highlights key moments of transmission, insight, and critical interpretation across linguistic and faith communities.

A compelling examination of the ultimate global commodity, blue and white porcelain, from kiln to consumers across the globe.

This important book demonstrates why geography matters in the modern-day world through its examination of 100 moments throughout history that had a significant impact on the study of geography—literally, "writing about the earth." Geography is not simply accounts of the lands of earth and their features; it's about discovering everything there is to know about our planet. This book shows why geography is of critical importance to our world's 21st-century inhabitants through an exploration of the past and present discoveries that have been made about the earth. It pinpoints 100 moments throughout history that had a significant impact on the study of geography and the understanding of our world, including widely accepted maps of the ancient world, writings and discoveries of key thinkers and philosophers, key exploration events and findings during the Age of Discovery, the foundations of important geographic organizations, and new inventions in digital mapping today. The book begins with a clear explanation of geography as a discipline, a framework, and a way of viewing the world, followed by coverage of each of the 100 discoveries and innovations that provides sufficient background and content for readers to understand each topic. The book concludes with a concise synopsis of why it all matters and a look forward to 10 possible future discoveries in the next 50 years of geography. Students will gain a clear sense of what is truly revolutionary about geography, perhaps challenging their preconceived notion of what geography actually is, and grasp how important discoveries revolutionized not only the past but the present day as well.

This rich and enjoyable book by the acclaimed author of Japan Story explores the many ways in which Asia has influenced Europe and North America over centuries of tangled, dynamic encounters From the time of the ancient Greeks onwards the West's relationship with Asia consisted for the most part of outrageous tales of strange beasts and monsters, of silk and spices shipped over vast distances and an uneasy sense of unknowable empires fantastically far away. By the twentieth century much of Asia might have come under Western rule after centuries of warfare, but its intellectual, artistic and spiritual influence was fighting back. The Light of Asia is a wonderfully varied and entertaining history of the many ways in which Asia has shaped European and North American culture over centuries of tangled, dynamic encounters, and the central importance of this vexed, often confused relationship. From Marco Polo onwards Asia has been both a source of genuine fascination and equally genuine failures of comprehension. China, India and Japan were all acknowledged to be both great civilizations and in crude ways seen as superseded by the West. From Chicago to Calcutta, and from antiquity to the new millennium, this is a rich, involving story of misunderstandings and sincere connection, of inspiration and falsehood, of geniuses, adventurers and con-men. Christopher Harding's captivating gallery of people and places celebrates Asia's impact on the West in all its variety.