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Anthropologist and political scientist Alan McFarlane recorded many of his lectures while visiting China [0]. I really enjoyed some of them I found online, but

Anthropologist and political scientist Alan McFarlane recorded many of his lectures while visiting China [0]. I really enjoyed some of them I found online, but it raised a hard question for me; outside of SOAS or Harvard, where are the visiting professors from China teaching Westerners some of the great stories and value from 5000 years of Chinese history (the stuff the CCP now wants to bury). [0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54229792-understanding-the-chinese-a-personal-a-z https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54229792-understanding-t... (sorry for low quality link, but the book is a good summary )

wolverine876 3y ago
> where are the visiting professors from China teaching Westerners some of the great stories and value from 5000 years of Chinese history A great question, and I would love to take a class - even online - from a top Chinese professor on leading Chinese texts. I imagine part of the answer is that the reputations of and demand for American universities have been far beyond Chinese universities, though recently that's changing some. (That's not a criticism of people in China - it takes awhile to build those institutions and they are already moving pretty fast.)
- Symbiote 3y ago
  I thought one possibility might be SOAS, the School of Oriental and African Studies, part of the University of London. They have a visiting professor from Guizhou University, but his interest is politics: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/news/soas-china-institute-welcomes-new-visiting-scholars-and-professorial-research-associate https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/news/soas-china-institute-welco... Their reader in modern Chinese culture and language is from China: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/xiaoning-lu https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/xiaoning-lu https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/institutes-and-regional-centres/soas-china-institute/members-soas-china-institute https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/institutes-and-regional-centres...
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    Thank you!
- hnfong 3y ago
  I suspect there's also the language barrier... If an institution in China invites a western scholar to teach the Iliad for example, they wouldn't insist the person teach it in Chinese. But I presume, when you said you wanted to take a class from a top Chinese professor on leading Chinese texts, that you would want English instruction, and that you'd prefer the material be translated from Classical Chinese to English? (Just knowing Mandarin isn't quite enough) But then, it's really hard to translate Classical Chinese to English. Even the longer important texts haven't been fully translated, eg. 史記 ("Records of the Grand Historian", which has kind of a similar standing as the Iliad in the West) is only partially translated AFAICT. Written Chinese is admittedly quite hard to learn given that you have to recognize the characters etc. Classical Chinese is even harder since there's nobody you can converse with. But if you know Mandarin, there's probably a huge amount of high quality stuff you can find online that satisfies what you want.
  - nonrandomstring 3y ago
    You're absolutely right. That's the answer. I'm probably too old to learn languages of many of the cultures that interest me, much to my disadvantage. So what we get, as the sibling comment said, is an interpreted and outdated account through "liberal arts".
    - wolverine876 3y ago
      Speaking generally: learning those things is often the best thing you can do for your brain, and then you won't be so old anymore. I think people overestimate the effect of age on learning. Children spend years becoming fluent in their native language, and with little focus or study of it. I could learn a language faster. (Not an apples-apples comparison, obviously, because children's brains and behavior are so much different.)
      - nonrandomstring 3y ago
        > then you won't be so old anymore. haha, thanks for the encouragement. Project for my 6th decade Russian or Chinese,, still not sure :)
nonethewiser 3y ago
The liberal arts. We learned Confucius, Mencius, Daosim, legalism, the dynasties, bits of the Chinese language etc. I still remember all the dynasties in order. Of course that didn’t really pay the bills so I redid a bachelors in STEM. But its pretty common in many liberal arts curriculums. Taught right alongside the classics.
- nonrandomstring 3y ago
  An occidental account, tainted by orientalism and packaged for, as you say, liberal arts students. My point was to the asymmetry of authentic visiting pedagogy. In other words, for the past 20 or 30 years Chinese universities have been enthusiastic and open to first hand accounts of western culture, ancient and modern. They've been keen to take the best of what we have and learn from it. On our side we have a cannon prepared for the most-part before 1900 and taught by aging white professors. McFarlane seems unusual, albeit that he is indeed the archetypal western Oxford don. It would be nice to avoid the implication of a "successful and scientific" Western cannon versus "failed" and primitive alternatives that don't pay bills. FWIW, I like to assume, in all discussions of interest, that the bills have been paid. Bill paying is, after all rather dull. On the other hand I casually wondered on Friday, amidst all the fireworks and what with it being a dragon new year, what we're missing about a problem that we seem to be struggling with - namely how a society, despite huge technological change and diversity, remains relatively stable for thousands of years. I would love to watch a YouTube video lecture series on something like that, from the horse's mouth as it were, but I suspect all the authentic professors who would have taught us were rounded up or starved in some Great Leap Backwards.
  - hnfong 3y ago
    > namely how a society, despite huge technological change and diversity, remains relatively stable for thousands of years Most people in the west wouldn't want to hear the solution: value the collective over the individual, install benevolent authority figures empowered to make the final decision so that minor disputes don't get out of control (i.e. "authoritarianism"), ensure everyone is incentivized to perform their roles, and discourage troublemakers. > suspect all the authentic professors who would have taught us were rounded up or starved in some Great Leap Backwards The sad thing is that the Chinese tradition didn't just get wrecked during the Mao era. It started much earlier, though Mao probably handed them the nail in the coffin. In the early 20th century when the Qing dynasty collapsed, the prevailing theory among Chinese intellectuals was that China was weak because the Chinese cultural/intellectual tradition was inferior to that of the West, so to make the nation strong, everyone should just adopt Western thought instead. Within a decade or two the old system of learning was abandoned, and then there were decades of war and strife in China. This is one of the various reasons communism took a hold in China -- back then in the early 20th century, communism seemed like a progressive(?) "western" idea, and it sounded like a great way to run a nation. By the time of the "Great Leap" and the "Cultural Revolution", there wasn't that much left of traditional Chinese thought to destroy. Some prominent academics went to Taiwan or Hong Kong, but if you ask me, they were faint echos of what the classical Chinese thought had to offer. If you actually wanted to "hear from the horse's mouth", you might have to go back a couple hundred years.

wolverine876 3y ago

> where are the visiting professors from China teaching Westerners some of the great stories and value from 5000 years of Chinese history A great question, and I would love to take a class - even online - from a top Chinese professor on leading Chinese texts. I imagine part of the answer is that the reputations of and demand for American universities have been far beyond Chinese universities, though recently that's changing some. (That's not a criticism of people in China - it takes awhile to build those institutions and they are already moving pretty fast.)

Symbiote 3y ago
I thought one possibility might be SOAS, the School of Oriental and African Studies, part of the University of London. They have a visiting professor from Guizhou University, but his interest is politics: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/news/soas-china-institute-welcomes-new-visiting-scholars-and-professorial-research-associate https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/news/soas-china-institute-welco... Their reader in modern Chinese culture and language is from China: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/xiaoning-lu https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/xiaoning-lu https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/institutes-and-regional-centres/soas-china-institute/members-soas-china-institute https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/institutes-and-regional-centres...
- wolverine876 3y ago
  Thank you!
hnfong 3y ago
I suspect there's also the language barrier... If an institution in China invites a western scholar to teach the Iliad for example, they wouldn't insist the person teach it in Chinese. But I presume, when you said you wanted to take a class from a top Chinese professor on leading Chinese texts, that you would want English instruction, and that you'd prefer the material be translated from Classical Chinese to English? (Just knowing Mandarin isn't quite enough) But then, it's really hard to translate Classical Chinese to English. Even the longer important texts haven't been fully translated, eg. 史記 ("Records of the Grand Historian", which has kind of a similar standing as the Iliad in the West) is only partially translated AFAICT. Written Chinese is admittedly quite hard to learn given that you have to recognize the characters etc. Classical Chinese is even harder since there's nobody you can converse with. But if you know Mandarin, there's probably a huge amount of high quality stuff you can find online that satisfies what you want.
- nonrandomstring 3y ago
  You're absolutely right. That's the answer. I'm probably too old to learn languages of many of the cultures that interest me, much to my disadvantage. So what we get, as the sibling comment said, is an interpreted and outdated account through "liberal arts".
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    Speaking generally: learning those things is often the best thing you can do for your brain, and then you won't be so old anymore. I think people overestimate the effect of age on learning. Children spend years becoming fluent in their native language, and with little focus or study of it. I could learn a language faster. (Not an apples-apples comparison, obviously, because children's brains and behavior are so much different.)
    - nonrandomstring 3y ago
      > then you won't be so old anymore. haha, thanks for the encouragement. Project for my 6th decade Russian or Chinese,, still not sure :)

nonethewiser 3y ago

The liberal arts. We learned Confucius, Mencius, Daosim, legalism, the dynasties, bits of the Chinese language etc. I still remember all the dynasties in order. Of course that didn’t really pay the bills so I redid a bachelors in STEM. But its pretty common in many liberal arts curriculums. Taught right alongside the classics.

nonrandomstring 3y ago
An occidental account, tainted by orientalism and packaged for, as you say, liberal arts students. My point was to the asymmetry of authentic visiting pedagogy. In other words, for the past 20 or 30 years Chinese universities have been enthusiastic and open to first hand accounts of western culture, ancient and modern. They've been keen to take the best of what we have and learn from it. On our side we have a cannon prepared for the most-part before 1900 and taught by aging white professors. McFarlane seems unusual, albeit that he is indeed the archetypal western Oxford don. It would be nice to avoid the implication of a "successful and scientific" Western cannon versus "failed" and primitive alternatives that don't pay bills. FWIW, I like to assume, in all discussions of interest, that the bills have been paid. Bill paying is, after all rather dull. On the other hand I casually wondered on Friday, amidst all the fireworks and what with it being a dragon new year, what we're missing about a problem that we seem to be struggling with - namely how a society, despite huge technological change and diversity, remains relatively stable for thousands of years. I would love to watch a YouTube video lecture series on something like that, from the horse's mouth as it were, but I suspect all the authentic professors who would have taught us were rounded up or starved in some Great Leap Backwards.
- hnfong 3y ago
  > namely how a society, despite huge technological change and diversity, remains relatively stable for thousands of years Most people in the west wouldn't want to hear the solution: value the collective over the individual, install benevolent authority figures empowered to make the final decision so that minor disputes don't get out of control (i.e. "authoritarianism"), ensure everyone is incentivized to perform their roles, and discourage troublemakers. > suspect all the authentic professors who would have taught us were rounded up or starved in some Great Leap Backwards The sad thing is that the Chinese tradition didn't just get wrecked during the Mao era. It started much earlier, though Mao probably handed them the nail in the coffin. In the early 20th century when the Qing dynasty collapsed, the prevailing theory among Chinese intellectuals was that China was weak because the Chinese cultural/intellectual tradition was inferior to that of the West, so to make the nation strong, everyone should just adopt Western thought instead. Within a decade or two the old system of learning was abandoned, and then there were decades of war and strife in China. This is one of the various reasons communism took a hold in China -- back then in the early 20th century, communism seemed like a progressive(?) "western" idea, and it sounded like a great way to run a nation. By the time of the "Great Leap" and the "Cultural Revolution", there wasn't that much left of traditional Chinese thought to destroy. Some prominent academics went to Taiwan or Hong Kong, but if you ask me, they were faint echos of what the classical Chinese thought had to offer. If you actually wanted to "hear from the horse's mouth", you might have to go back a couple hundred years.