The sextants of Beijing : global currents in Chinese history
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The sextants of Beijing : global currents in Chinese history
W. W. Norton & Company, c1999
1st ed
Available at 2 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. [293]-297) and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
A surprising survey of a cosmopolitan China, a civilization actively engaged with other cultures and societies. It is time to shed the long-held myth that Chinese civilization is monolithic, unchanging, and perennially cut off from the rest of the world. This persistent stereotype has long obscured China's diverse and dynamic history. Drawing on the latest research in the field, Joanna Waley-Cohen gives us an accessible account of China's fertile relations with other Asian cultures and indeed the West from the days of the Silk Road to the present. Around 200 B.C. the Han empire was establishing its capital at Chang'an and Rome was becoming a political force. Between them traders shipped silk and gold west, and spices, woolens, and horses east. It was over this Silk Road that Buddhism spread from India to China, where the foreign religion soon made permanent inroads. Later, Catholic missionaries would interpret the Chinese resistance to their religion as evidence of an arrogant complacency, just as Western emissaries would interpret China's objections to trade on Western terms. But whether in trade, religion, ideology, or technology, China has shown a pattern of engagement with the rest of the world, so long as the rules of engagement are not externally imposed.
by "Nielsen BookData"