MCLC: China's dynasties in song (1)

Denton, Kirk denton.2 at osu.edu
Thu Nov 7 10:35:14 EST 2013


MCLC LIST
From: Magnus Fiskesjö <nf42 at cornell.edu>
Subject: China's dynasties in song (1)
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One could add that this kind of dynasties mantra also perpetuates a
profoundly misleading view of Chinese history as a series of repeat
dynasties. Not only does the listing of Shang Zhou and Qin as equals
severely obscure and mystify the process of state formation, but it
perpetuates, perhaps unwittingly, but still, an essentialist and
fundamentally wrongheaded notion of unproblematic continuity, itself a
mystification that is often repeated, and often embraced, but wrong.

But then again they probably discuss this issue in the course itself
(one hopes).

--sincerely,
Magnus Fiskesjö



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