Teaching
The Roman orator and philosopher Cicero once wrote that "historia magistra vitae"-history is the teacher of life. In teaching Chinese history and world history, I have three goals: 1) to cultivate wisdom as well as knowledge; 2) to understand the present by learning from the past experience of others; and 3) to become more aware of the global dimensions of all human activity. In the classroom I aim to treat students, insofar as it is possible to do so, as whole persons.
Recent Courses Taught
BIS 303 History and Globalization
BIS 334 Traditional China
BIS 402 Modern China
BIS 427 Global History I
Research/Scholarship
I was trained as a historian of China, specifically Chinese intellectual history. In the past few years, I have been teaching and writing about global history and globalization.
Selected Publications
"What is Renewal? Why Now?" in Education and the Making of a Democratic People, ed. By John Goodlad, Roger Soder, and Bonnie McDaniel. Boulder: Paradigm Publishers, 2008.
Asian Democracy in World History. New York: Routledge, 2004. Translated into Farsi, 2005
Entries (ten) on Ming dynasty philosophers for the Encyclopedia of Confucianism, edited by Yao Xinzhong, London: RoutledgeCurzon Press, 2003
What Does It Mean to be Human?: A New Interpretation of Freedom in World History. New York: Peter Lang, 2001.
World Civilizations. Co-author, ninth edition. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997.
"Nelson Trusler Johnson." Entry in Notable U.S. Ambassadors, 1775-1996: A Biographical Dictionary. Edited by Cathal J. Nolan. Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1997.
Limits to Autocracy: From Sung Neo-Confucianism to a Doctrine of Political Rights. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1995.