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Kate Merkel-Hess

@katemh.bsky.social

1.2K followers 670 following 210 posts

Also 梅凯悦. Historian of Modern China. Books: Women and Their Warlords (2024), The Rural Modern (2016).

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · Nov 9

My new book, Women and Their Warlords, was published last month. You can order it at the press website w/a 30% discount using the code UCPNEW. But why would you want to buy a book when you don’t know what it’s about? Here’s the argument. 🧵 press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Women and Their Warlords

Explores the complex history and legacy of elite wives, concubines, and daughters of warlords in twentieth-century China. In Women and Their Warlords, historian Kate Merkel-Hess examines the lives a...

press.uchicago.edu

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Reposted by Kate Merkel-Hess

Yangyang Cheng @yangyangcheng.bsky.social · 5d

"Generations of Chinese women have been rendered voiceless by the patriarchy. Their stories refuse soft burials."
So honored to have a review essay out in Banned Books Week @chinabooksreview.com on two of Fang Fang's most acclaimed novels, Soft Burial & The Running Flame, tr. @bairuiwen.bsky.social:

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · 8d

Looking forward to reading this!

Reposted by Kate Merkel-Hess

Guobin Yang @guobin-yang.bsky.social · 8d

In this piece on "genre borrowing" I study why netizens use Sima Qian's "arrayed biography" (列传) form to write biographies of Li Wenliang & how the narrative devices of this ancient genre align with the logic of digital culture. Open access! @asc.upenn.edu journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

journals.sagepub.com

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · 9d

This is beautifully translated! I love the line “preached the Dharma so movingly that even the pebbles nodded.” Thank you for sharing it.

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Brendan O’Kane @bokane.org · 9d

For the Mid-Autumn Festival, I translated the 17th century failson, epicure, and memoirist Zhang Dai's account of the annual Mid-Autumn singing competition on Tiger Hill in Suzhou. www.burninghou.se/p/mid-autumn...

Mid-Autumn, Tiger Hill, Late Ming

"Everyone was perfectly silent, even the mosquitoes."

www.burninghou.se

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Jeff Wasserstrom @jwassers.bsky.social · 15d

Very nice to see a piece by @laujessie.bsky.social of @nuvoices.bsky.social in @thetls.bsky.social

The TLS @thetls.bsky.social · 15d

'When, in 1991, China opened its doors to foreign adoption, international demand led to the trafficking of babies overseas'

Jessie Lau: Two victims of China’s one-child policy

Baby snatchers

www.the-tls.com

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · 15d

No convincing needed for me on the importance of both. My framing was more persuasive (getting people who might assume it isn't relevant to them bc of the venue to read it) than value-based or about disciplinary boundary-policing.

Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · 15d

Of course! I simply meant that the ideas and reflections on computer vision/related ideas also have relevance for those of us who primarily work with texts. Perhaps I ought to have said: relevant and useful for all humanists.

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · 15d

Incredibly thoughtful piece on the uses (or lack thereof) of AI. Historians will find this thinking relevant too.

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 17d

Read the long version here. www.artforum.com/features/gen...

MACHINE YEARNING

Sonja Drimmer critically examines art historians’ recent embrace of generative AI as a tool for humanities research.

www.artforum.com

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Reposted by Kate Merkel-Hess

Dr. Lucky Tran @luckytran.com · 21d

“We are told by leaders that we are the future. But when it comes to the ongoing pandemic, our present is being stolen right in front of our eyes.”

Incredible speech by Violet Affleck who warned about the ongoing dangers of COVID & Long Covid, & advocated for masks and clean air at the UN today!

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Jeff Wasserstrom @jwassers.bsky.social · 22d

My tribute to Paul Cohen as historian & mentor to many www.asianstudies.org/in-memoriam-... cc @lmansley.bsky.social

In Memoriam: Paul A. Cohen (1934-2025) - Association for Asian Studies

Paul A. Cohen, who died on September 15, 2025 at the age of 91, made significant contributions to both the interdisciplinary field of Chinese studies and the discipline of history. The most obvious wa...

www.asianstudies.org

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Patrick Iber @patrickiber.bsky.social · Sep 8

This powerful essay by @yangyangchen is in the special section on Authoritarian and Resistance

Yangyang Cheng @yangyangcheng.bsky.social · Sep 8

So grateful to write for @dissentmag.bsky.social's Fall 2025 issue "Authoritarianism and Resistance." I drafted the piece in June with the new school year in mind, as an immigrant scholar severed from her homeland: What can we teach the young about how to exist and persist at this historic juncture?

To Outlive Tyranny - Dissent Magazine

Flesh and blood alone cannot halt the advance of iron and steel. To stop the tanks, we need people to place blocks on the road and throw sand into the gears.

www.dissentmagazine.org

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · Sep 2

Thoughtful interview with Stanford Prof Matthew Sommer (by @mauracunningham.bsky.social) about Sommer's new book, which is on my to-read list for the fall. Lots of insights and observations for further thought just in this q-and-a.

Association for Asian Studies @asianstudies.org · Aug 6

New #AsiaNow post: Historian Matthew Sommer talks with editor @mauracunningham.bsky.social about his 2024 @columbiaup.bsky.social book, The Fox Spirit, the Stone Maiden, and Other Transgender Histories from Late Imperial China.

buff.ly/FsvJaIm

Cover image of The Fox Spirit, the Stone Maiden, and Other Transgender Histories from Late Imperial China, by Matthew H. Sommer

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Reposted by Kate Merkel-Hess

Leta Hong Fincher洪理达 @letahongfincher.bsky.social · Aug 24

The Japanese editions of BETRAYING BIG BROTHER: The Feminist Awakening in China just arrived! My book has now been translated into Italian, Korean, Portuguese and Japanese. The New York Public Library named Betraying Big Brother one of its “essential reads on feminism”: bookshop.org/p/books/betr...

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Emily Matson @emilymatson.bsky.social · Aug 21

I'm excited to share that my first monograph, "China's Date Debate: How Manchurian Scholars Rewrote World War II," is available for preorder through the University of Michigan Press, China Understandings Today series!

China’s Date Debate press.umich.edu/Books/C/Chin...

China’s Date Debate

China’s Date Debate is an in-depth investigation of the Chinese Communist Party’s remapping of China’s World War II timeline from eight years (1937-–1945) to fourteen years (1931–1945). Instead of the...

press.umich.edu

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Jeff Wasserstrom @jwassers.bsky.social · May 25

Glad to see this reposted, gave me a chance to give shout outs for good books that were largely under the radar, eg a set of Liang Qichao essays, an accessible book by @katemh.bsky.social w/a great title:Women & Their Warlords, also includes an early plug for a 2025 book: by @emilyzfeng.bsky.social

Five Books - Expert Book Recommendations @fivebooks.com · May 25

"I find appealing works that push back against monolithic views of this big country, and I want to do a bit to amplify their impact."
fivebooks.com/best-books/t...

The Best China Books of 2024

American professor and modern Chinese history specialist, Jeffrey Wasserstrom, talks us through some of his favorite books about China published in 2024.

fivebooks.com

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Jeff Wasserstrom @jwassers.bsky.social · May 23

🧵 I'm not doing a full-scale tour to promote my forthcoming very short trade book that discusses some inspiring activists in Thailand and exiles from Hong Kong and Burma globalreports.columbia.edu/books/the-mi... but I'll do events related to it in NYC June 9, DC June 10-13, some details below....

The Milk Tea Alliance · Columbia Global Reports

Why are activists in Thailand, Hong Kong, and Burma willing to court danger to help one another? The political situations in Burma, Thailand, and Hong Kong are radically different. Only Burma is in a ...

globalreports.columbia.edu

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Kate Merkel-Hess @katemh.bsky.social · May 20

Smart piece by Violet Affleck on COVID, climate response, & disability activism:

"The climate resilience our society needs to build relies upon the skills and systems of pacing that disabled and chronically ill people have built to manage both their own symptoms and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic."

Denis - The COVID Info Guy @thecovidinfoguy.bsky.social · May 20

A Chronically Ill Earth: COVID Organizing as a Model Climate Response in Los Angeles. By Violet Affleck

May 18, 2025

"After all, the promised end to the pandemic has been more a matter of public relations than public health."

yaleglobalhealthreview.com/2025/05/18/a...

A Chronically Ill Earth: COVID Organizing as a Model Climate Response in Los Angeles

BY VIOLET AFFLECK I spent the January fires in Los Angeles arguing with my mother in a hotel room. She was shell-shocked, astonished at the scale of destruction in the neighborhood where she raised…

yaleglobalhealthreview.com

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Joseph Torigian @josephtorigian.bsky.social · May 15

If you're in the Bay Area, the @hooverinstitution.bsky.social
book launch for my @stanfordpress.bsky.social biography of Xi Jinping's father will be on June 3: the day of the book's release. You can also join virtually.

www.hoover.org/events/party...

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Stephen R. Platt @stephenplatt.bsky.social · May 13

Happy to report that I've got a new book out, The Raider.

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Reposted by Kate Merkel-Hess

Asawin Suebsaeng @swin24.bsky.social · Apr 25

I don’t do this often but I highly encourage yall to preorder my friend John Beck’s book; out next month. It’s extremely good; like a modern day but real life ‘The Americans’

“Those Who Should Be Seized Should Be Seized”

www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/774464...

Those Who Should Be Seized Should Be Seized by John Beck: 9781685891794 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books

A shocking, on-the-ground investigation of the Chinese government’s brutal oppression of its Muslim citizens — the Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, and others — from Xinjiang to the streets of...

www.penguinrandomhouse.com

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Elizabeth Jacobs, PhD @elizabethjacobs.bsky.social · Apr 2

This. We are currently in a situation where our national defense against pathogens is on the ropes. I will continue to mask indoors in public, because I can only control my choices and not anyone else’s.

Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · Apr 2

Masking discourse is on again and I’ll just say if you see people masking when few others are it’s likely because they’ve determined that for them, in that setting, the benefit of not catching (or spreading) whatever’s going around is worth the cost of masking. It’s rarely more complicated than that

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China Books Review @chinabooksreview.com · Mar 28

Read Winifred Dongyi Wang's essay about Pai Hsien-yung's "New Yorkers" and immigrant identity: buff.ly/raPftnP

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Yuen Chan @yuenchan.bsky.social · Mar 28

Your periodic reminder that we are experiencing a mass disabling event.

Lab of Lived Experience (Lab OLE) @laboflivedexp.bsky.social · Mar 28

1/ No amount of "back to work" incentives can overcome neurological damage, vascular disease, and multi-system dysfunction…..

Here’s a short clip on the #Politics vs #bioreality - that sooner or later will affect all of us:
#LongCovid

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