Download or read book Cracks in the Oracle Bone written by Brenda Hillman and published by Bancroft Library, University. This book was released on 2008 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Judith Lee Stronach Memorial Lectures on the Teaching of Poetry was established in 2003 in memory of a poet and an inspired teacher of poetry to children and to the underprivileged. This series of lectures on teaching poetry by distinguished poets was conceived of by her family as a contribution to the role poetry plays at Berkeley.
Download or read book Sources of Shang History written by David N. Keightley and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1985 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Oracle Bone Inscriptions from Huayuanzhuang East written by Adam C. Schwartz and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2019-11-18 with total page 487 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 1899 more than 73,000 pieces of inscribed divination shell and bone have been found inside the moated enclosure of the Anyang-core at the former capital of the late Shang state. Nearly all of these divinations were done on behalf of the Shang kingsand has led to the apt characterization that oracle bone inscriptions describe their motivations, experiences, and priorities. There are, however, much smaller sets of divination accounts that were done on behalf of members of the Shang elite other than the king.First noticed in the early 1930's, grouped and periodized shortly thereafter, oracle bone inscriptions produced explicitly by or on behalf of "royal familygroups" reveal information about key aspects of daily life in Shang societythat are barely even mentioned in Western scholarship. The newly published Huayuanzhuang East Oracle Bone inscriptions are a spectacular addition to the corpus of texts from Anyang: hundreds of intact or largely intact turtle shells and bovine scapulae densely inscribed with records of the divinations in which they were used. They were produced on the behalf of a mature prince of the royal family whose parents, both alive and still very much active, almost certainly were the twenty-first Shang king Wu Ding (r. c. 1200 B.C.) and his consort Lady Hao (fu Hao). The Huayuanzhuang East corpus is an unusually homogeneous set of more than two thousand five hundred divination records, produced over a short period of time on behalf of a prince of the royal family. There are typically multiple records of divinations regarding the same or similar topics that can be synchronized together, which not only allows for remarkable access into the esoteric world of divination practice, but also produce micro-reconstructions of what is essentially East Asia's earliest and most complete "day and month planner." Because these texts are unusually linguistically transparent and well preserved, homogeneous in orthography and content, and published to an unprecedentedly high standard, they are also ideal material for learning to read and interpret early epigraphic texts. The Huayuanzhuang East oracle bone inscriptions are a tremendously important Shang archive of "material documents" that were produced by a previously unknown divination and scribal organization. They expose us to an entirely fresh set of perspectives and preoccupationscentering ona member of the royal family at the commencement of China's historical period. The completely annotated English translation of the inscriptions is the first of its kind, and is a vibrant new source of Shang history that can be accessedto rewrite and supplement what we know about early Chinese civilization and life in the ancient world. Before the discerning reader are the motives, preoccupations, and experiences of a late Shang prince working simultaneously in service both for his Majesty, his parents, and hisown family.
Download or read book Oracle Bones Poems from the Time of Misrule written by Keith Holyoak and published by Goldfish Press. This book was released on 2019-01-12 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Oracle Bones is a new form of political satire-the state of current American politics reimagined as a sequence of poetic warnings to a foolish and dissolute king who ruled back at the dawn of Chinese civilization. Thousands of years ago, a shaman would query the gods by carving a question on a bone and applying heat until cracks formed. The answer was then recorded on the "oracle bone." Keith Holyoak-poet, psychologist, and translator of classical Chinese poetry-has created oracle bones for modern America, "translated" into short English poems. Using symbols dating back to the Shang dynasty, these messages allude to the tyrannical regime of a long-forgotten king. The common people are exploited and divided against one another; impoverished migrants are brutalized; greed and nepotism go unchecked. Meanwhile the king leads a life of joyless debauchery. Warnings of loyal advisors are ignored even as rebellion begins to stir. Of course, the primitive form of government that can be glimpsed in these oracle bones vanished long ago. Nothing like this could happen in the modern democracy of America.
Download or read book China Promise or Threat written by Horst Jürgen Helle and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2017-04-11 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In China: Promise or Threat? Helle compares the cultures of China and the West through both private and public spheres. For China, the private sphere of family life is well developed while behaviour in public relating to matters of government and the law is less reliable. In contrast, the West operates in reverse. The book’s twelve chapters investigate the causes and effects of threats to the environment, military confrontations, religious differences, fundamentals of cultural history, and the countries’ orientations for finding solutions to societal problems, all informed by the Confucian impulse to recapture the lost splendour of a past versus faith in progress toward a blessed future. The West has promoted individualism while China is locked in its kinship society.
Download or read book The Oracle Bone Inscriptions from Huayuanzhuang East written by Adam C. Schwartz and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2019-11-18 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 1899 more than 73,000 pieces of inscribed divination shell and bone have been found inside the moated enclosure of the Anyang-core at the former capital of the late Shang state. Nearly all of these divinations were done on behalf of the Shang kingsand has led to the apt characterization that oracle bone inscriptions describe their motivations, experiences, and priorities. There are, however, much smaller sets of divination accounts that were done on behalf of members of the Shang elite other than the king.First noticed in the early 1930's, grouped and periodized shortly thereafter, oracle bone inscriptions produced explicitly by or on behalf of "royal familygroups" reveal information about key aspects of daily life in Shang societythat are barely even mentioned in Western scholarship. The newly published Huayuanzhuang East Oracle Bone inscriptions are a spectacular addition to the corpus of texts from Anyang: hundreds of intact or largely intact turtle shells and bovine scapulae densely inscribed with records of the divinations in which they were used. They were produced on the behalf of a mature prince of the royal family whose parents, both alive and still very much active, almost certainly were the twenty-first Shang king Wu Ding (r. c. 1200 B.C.) and his consort Lady Hao (fu Hao). The Huayuanzhuang East corpus is an unusually homogeneous set of more than two thousand five hundred divination records, produced over a short period of time on behalf of a prince of the royal family. There are typically multiple records of divinations regarding the same or similar topics that can be synchronized together, which not only allows for remarkable access into the esoteric world of divination practice, but also produce micro-reconstructions of what is essentially East Asia's earliest and most complete "day and month planner." Because these texts are unusually linguistically transparent and well preserved, homogeneous in orthography and content, and published to an unprecedentedly high standard, they are also ideal material for learning to read and interpret early epigraphic texts. The Huayuanzhuang East oracle bone inscriptions are a tremendously important Shang archive of "material documents" that were produced by a previously unknown divination and scribal organization. They expose us to an entirely fresh set of perspectives and preoccupationscentering ona member of the royal family at the commencement of China's historical period. The completely annotated English translation of the inscriptions is the first of its kind, and is a vibrant new source of Shang history that can be accessedto rewrite and supplement what we know about early Chinese civilization and life in the ancient world. Before the discerning reader are the motives, preoccupations, and experiences of a late Shang prince working simultaneously in service both for his Majesty, his parents, and hisown family.
Download or read book Oracle Bones written by Peter Hessler and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-03-17 with total page 531 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A century ago, outsiders saw China as a place where nothing ever changes. Today the country has become one of the most dynamic regions on earth. In Oracle Bones, Peter Hessler explores the human side of China's transformation, viewing modern-day China and its growing links to the Western world through the lives of a handful of ordinary people. In a narrative that gracefully moves between the ancient and the present, the East and the West, Hessler captures the soul of a country that is undergoing a momentous change before our eyes.
Download or read book A Grammar of Mandarin written by Jeroen Wiedenhof and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2015-10-15 with total page 477 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating description of a global language, A Grammar of Mandarin combines broad perspectives with illuminating depth. Crammed with examples from everyday conversations, it aims to let the language speak for itself. The book opens with an overview of the language situation and a thorough account of Mandarin speech sounds. Nine core chapters explore syntactic, morphological and lexical dimensions. A final chapter traces the Chinese character script from oracle-bone inscriptions to today’s digital pens. This work will cater to language learners and linguistic specialists alike. Easy reference is provided by more than eighty tables, figures, appendices, and a glossary. The main text is enriched by sections in finer print, offering further analysis and reflection. Example sentences are fully glossed, translated, and explained from diverse angles, with a keen eye for recent linguistic change. This grammar, in short, reveals a Mandarin language in full swing.
Download or read book Cheng Ho and Islam in Southeast Asia written by Tan Ta Sen and published by Flipside Digital Content Company Inc.. This book was released on 2003-08-01 with total page 213 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tan Ta Sen has modestly suggested that, as a book to illustrate the peaceful impact of culture contact, he is concerned to show how such cultural influences not only led to transmissions, conversions and transferences involving Inner Asian Muslims from China and Yunnan Muslims, Chams, Javanese, Malays, Arabs and Indians, but also enabled many Chinese in the Malay world to retain their non-Muslim cultural traits. In placing Cheng Ho's voyages in this context, the author offers a fresh perspective on a momentous set of events in Chinese maritime history. Professor Wang Gungwu, National University of Singapore.Tan Ta Sen's book on Cheng Ho and Islam in Southeast Asia is not the first one on the subject, but it is the first book that puts Cheng Ho's voyages in the larger context of "e;culture contact"e; in China and beyond. He has garnered numerous sources, from published documents to architectural sites and buildings, to support his arguments. He has done much more than previous scholars writing on this subject. - Professor Leo Suryadinata, Chinese Heritage Centre (Singapore).This long-awaited book is welcomed by the academic community ... Tan Ta Sen has used historical facts to strengthen the argument on the existence of the "e;Third Wave"e;, i.e. "e;the Chinese Wave"e;, in the spread of Islam in the Southeast Asian region. Until now, we only know two major waves, i.e. the India-Gujarat Wave and the Middle East Wave through the development of trade relations. - Professor A. Dahana, University of Indonesia (Jakarta).
Download or read book Ritual and Economy in East Asia written by Rowan Flad and published by Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press. This book was released on 2023-12-31 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In commemoration of Lothar von Falkenhausens 60th birthday, this volume assembles eighteen scholarly essays that explore the intersection between art, economy, and ritual in ancient East Asia. The contributions are clustered into four themes: Ritual Economy, Ritual and Sacrifice, Technology, Community, Interaction, and Objects and Meaning, which collectively reflect the theoretical, methodological, and historical questions that Falkenhausen has been examining via his scholarship, research, and teaching throughout his career. Most of the chapters work with archaeological and textual data from China, but there are also studies of materials from Mongolia, Korea, Southeast Asia and even Egypt, showing the global impact of Falkenhausens work. The chronological range of studies extends from the Neolithic through the Bronze Age in China, into the early imperial, medieval, and early modern periods. The authors discuss art, economy, ritual, interaction, and technology in the broad context of East Asian archaeology and its connection to the world beyond.
Download or read book The Greatest Invention written by Silvia Ferrara and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2022-03-01 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this exhilarating celebration of human ingenuity and perseverance—published all around the world—a trailblazing Italian scholar sifts through our cultural and social behavior in search of the origins of our greatest invention: writing. The L where a tabletop meets the legs, the T between double doors, the D of an armchair’s oval backrest—all around us is an alphabet in things. But how did these shapes make it onto the page, never mind form complex structures such as this sentence? In The Greatest Invention, Silvia Ferrara takes a profound look at how—and how many times—human beings have managed to produce the miracle of written language, traveling back and forth in time and all across the globe to Mesopotamia, Crete, China, Egypt, Central America, Easter Island, and beyond. With Ferrara as our guide, we examine the enigmas of undeciphered scripts, including famous cases like the Phaistos Disk and the Voynich Manuscript; we touch the knotted, colored strings of the Inca quipu; we study the turtle shells and ox scapulae that bear the earliest Chinese inscriptions; we watch in awe as Sequoyah single-handedly invents a script for the Cherokee language; and we venture to the cutting edge of decipherment, in which high-powered laser scanners bring tears to an engineer’s eye. A code-cracking tour around the globe, The Greatest Invention chronicles a previously uncharted journey, one filled with past flashes of brilliance, present-day scientific research, and a faint, fleeting glimpse of writing’s future.
Download or read book The Paradox of Being written by Poul Andersen and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2021-03-01 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question of truth has never been more urgent than today, when the distortion of facts and the imposition of pseudo-realities in the service of the powerful have become the order of the day. In The Paradox of Being Poul Andersen addresses the concept of truth in Chinese Daoist philosophy and ritual. His approach is unapologetically universalist, and the book may be read as a call for a new way of studying Chinese culture, one that does not shy away from approaching “the other” in terms of an engagement with “our own” philosophical heritage. The basic Chinese word for truth is zhen, which means both true and real, and it bypasses the separation of the two ideas insisted on in much of the Western philosophical tradition. Through wide-ranging research into Daoist ritual, both in history and as it survives in the present day, Andersen shows that the concept of true reality that informs this tradition posits being as a paradox anchored in the inexistent Way (Dao). The preferred way of life suggested by this insight consists in seeking to be an exception to ordinary norms and rules of behavior which nonetheless engages what is common to us all.
Download or read book This is China written by Haiwang Yuan and published by Berkshire Publishing. This book was released on 2010 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Is China contains, in brief, everything we need to know about 5,000 years of history, 30 years of "opening," and a future that promises to shape the 21st century for all of us. Drawn from the vast resources of the Berkshire Encyclopedia of China, this concise 120-page book is recommended for classroom use, curriculum development, and student review.
Download or read book Violence Kinship and the Early Chinese State written by Roderick Campbell and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-03 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The violence of war and sacrifice were not the antithesis of civilization at Shang Anyang, but rather its foundation.
Download or read book Divination and Prediction in Early China and Ancient Greece written by Lisa Raphals and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-17 with total page 499 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book compares the intellectual and social history and past and present contexts of mantic practices (divination) in Chinese and Greek antiquity.
Download or read book Reading of Sh ng Inscriptions written by Kuang Yu Chen and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-11-09 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book introduces readers to oracle bone inscriptions (OBI), the oldest known form of Chinese writing. It presents 120 rubbings made from unearthed animal bones and turtle shells that the Shang royal court employed to record royal divinations 3500 years ago, covering topics ranging from ancestor worship, rituals, and astronomy to agriculture, war, and hunting. Each rubbing is accompanied by a graph-to-graph transcription, a translation and a detailed annotation. The book is intended for both general readers and scholars who are interested in ancient civilizations and Early China in particular, acquainting them not only with OBI graphs and the development of the Chinese writing system, but also the history of the Shang Dynasty. The didactic and tutorial format makes this book ideal for teaching and for self-learning. Sumerian, Egyptian, Chinese OBI and Mayan constitute the four pristine writing systems. Of these, only Chinese writing has remained logographic and survived to the present day. The study of OBI not only plays a pivotal role in connecting archaeology to history, but is also of great importance to the comparative study of the origin of writing and civilization. Though there are numerous books on Mayan and Egyptian hieroglyphs, there are very few on OBI; this book fills that gap.
Download or read book Animals Through Chinese History written by Roel Sterckx and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This innovative collection opens a door into the rich history of animals in China. This title is also available as Open Access.
