Tom Mazanec
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tommazanec.bsky.social
Tom Mazanec
@tommazanec.bsky.social
Author, Poet-Monks (Cornell UP). Assoc prof at UC Santa Barbara. Premodern Chinese lit & religion, translation, digital humanities. JAOS editor. Father of 2. Cantonese learner. Christ follower.
https://eastasian.ucsb.edu/people/faculty/thomas-mazanec
Pinned
Getting close to 100 new followers in the last few days, so I guess it’s time to do the self introduction thread.

I’m a scholar and translator of medieval Chinese literature, especially Tang-dynasty (618-907) poetry. I teach Classical Chinese language & literature at UC Santa Barbara.
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Reposted by Tom Mazanec
WE JUST KEEP WINNING. (UC President's Postdoctoral Fellowship Program RESTORED!!!!)
November 18, 2025 at 10:34 PM
Cornell University Press is having a sale of 44% off. If you wanted to get a physical copy of my book, Poet-Monks, you can do so for $27 (paperback) including shipping. Just use the code 09WINTER.
www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501...
November 13, 2025 at 9:43 PM
My latest publication is now online. "Literary Virtue: A Moral Cornerstone of Chinese Literary Theory." In this essay, Zhou Xinglu 周興陸 of Peking University and I explore the history of the concept of literary virtue (wende 文德) across 2000 years.
#Sinology🀄️📚

read.dukeupress.edu/jclc/article...
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Literary Virtue: A Moral Cornerstone of Chinese Literary Theory | Journal of Chinese Literature and Culture | Duke University Press
read.dukeupress.edu
October 21, 2025 at 3:07 PM
Reposted by Tom Mazanec
To read the university’s triumphant all-campus email about restored NIH funding, you’d think UC administrators made it happen. But that’s not true. In fact the UC *Faculty Association* organized the lawsuit; administrators kept their heads down and hoped it’d go away.
September 25, 2025 at 2:44 PM
Reposted by Tom Mazanec
UC faculty, please take note of who is being fearless and decisive in standing up for our rights. It’s not the admin, it’s not the senate. They’re structurally unsuited to the way we need to fight right now. It’s @uc-faculty.bsky.social. It’s time to join, if you haven’t already.
University of California students and faculty sue the Trump administration
White House using civil rights laws to wage campaign against school system to undermine free speech, says suit
www.theguardian.com
September 17, 2025 at 1:50 PM
I love the idea of a (better) bot getting all the big-picture data so I can focus on close reading and the real work of literary studies, but I loathe the fact that a dean will think that because a bot can accurately describe a printed text it can *analyze* it too.
Sometimes I am impressed by what OCR can do for recognizing digital texts. But then sometimes I come across things like this. (from ctext: ctext.org/library.pl?i...)
September 12, 2025 at 5:41 AM
Sometimes I am impressed by what OCR can do for recognizing digital texts. But then sometimes I come across things like this. (from ctext: ctext.org/library.pl?i...)
September 11, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Here is the East Asia content, which I edited:
Xiaofei Tian, "The Turning Point: A Model of Becoming in Early Medieval Chinese Autobiographical Writings."
Zhaokun Xin, "Diagnosing, Misdiagnosing, and Rediagnosing Women’s Anger in the Jin Ping Mei."
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August 26, 2025 at 5:26 PM
Reposted by Tom Mazanec
August 26, 2025 at 4:03 PM
For my China studies friends here: new Wilkinson just dropped. 7th edition, huge news. On Pleco, too.

If you don’t know what that means, do you even sinologize, bro?

@pleco.com
#Sinology🀄️📚
August 19, 2025 at 7:15 AM
New translation tool for the languages of Buddhism—Pāli, Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Chinese.
dharmamitra.org

Still makes mistakes (I just tested it on the 宋高僧傳 biography of the poet-monk Guanxiu 貫休 and noticed a few errors), but 1000x more accurate than anything I've seen before.
Dharmamitra · a toolkit for the languages of the Dharma
A toolkit for the languages of the Dharma
dharmamitra.org
July 29, 2025 at 4:41 PM
I picked the wrong year to start really following baseball again.* I'll keep on watching the Guardians and look for nice individual performances to enjoy as they slide toward non-competitiveness. That part will be fun. 1/5
a baseball with wings and a letter g on a blue background
ALT: a baseball with wings and a letter g on a blue background
media.tenor.com
July 29, 2025 at 7:05 AM
It’s finally happened: a reader’s report on an article manuscript faults me for not sufficiently engaging with the scholarship of Thomas Mazanec. Achievement unlocked!
July 16, 2025 at 7:22 PM
One for the ages. The only anthology of High Tang poetry that was actually compiled during the High Tang, now translated into English by Paul Kroll.
July 13, 2025 at 5:18 AM
Position: Tenure-Track Assistant Professor of Chinese, Williams College, applications due 9/30/25. Language teaching + open specialization. apply.interfolio.com/169464

Glad to see at least one TT job out there for our students!
Apply - Interfolio {{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio
apply.interfolio.com
July 2, 2025 at 4:37 PM
I currently teach 4 courses per year on the quarter system. If we switched to semesters, they would have to reduce my load if they wanted me to continue the same research output (and that’s not happening). Don’t expect a book from me for 10 more years in this case.
My job would go from kill me with burnout to normal.
My impression is that librarians for the UC system do 1/3 more work on the quarter system. Because of it I do 60+ classes a year, rather than about 40. I have no time to breathe during the academic year.

www.latimes.com/california/s...
UC considers adopting semester system at all schools
Most UC campuses are among a minority in the country in having academic quarters. Now the schools are studying the costs and benefits of switching to semesters.
www.latimes.com
July 2, 2025 at 5:10 AM
Reposted by Tom Mazanec
My personal 5-min. video: vimeo.com/84252711 on why humanities matter. I can’t improve on the message. But my passion now is the Center for Humanities Communication, which I cofounded to assist the humanities in methods, resources, tools for telling its _why_, center-humanities-communication.org
Why the Humanities Matter -- A Story About Borders
A story and statement about the importance of the humanities in today's world by Alan Liu, an English professor who started out a chemistry major. Video created…
vimeo.com
June 28, 2025 at 8:06 AM
Reposted by Tom Mazanec
Author copy fresh out of the box! I'm shaking!

@uofmpress.bsky.social made the publication process so smooth! And huge thanks for hosting an open access version, which will be available on my official publication date: August 5.

But if you'd rather buy a hard copy, use code UMWEB30 for 30% off!
June 25, 2025 at 5:28 PM
This sale starts today
June 23, 2025 at 1:08 PM
Cornell University Press is having a 50% off sale next week (6/23-27). So if you want a physical copy of my book, it would be a good time to get one (the paperback would be about $17). Use the code 095000 at checkout.
www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501...
Poet-Monks by Thomas J. Mazanec | Paperback | Cornell University Press
Poet-Monks focuses on the literary and religious practices of Buddhist poet-monks in Tang-dynasty China to propose an alternative historical arc of medieval Chinese poetry. Combining large-scale quant...
www.cornellpress.cornell.edu
June 18, 2025 at 2:34 PM
Genuine question: when does anyone find time to iron their clothes? Between coffee, exercise, shower, and getting kids ready for school, I don’t have a spare second before 8am. In evenings after kids are in bed, I want to relax, not iron clothes.

Sorry (not sorry) for my wrinkly khakis.
June 12, 2025 at 6:14 PM
Hosting another big event for Translation Studies, a talk by renowned translation theorist Lawrence Venuti titled "The Translator's Dilemma: Thinking vs. Doing?"

If you're in the UCSB area and interested in translation, please join us!

Thursday, May 1, 5pm
Annenberg Conference Room (SSMS 4315)
May 1, 2025 at 4:19 AM
Just spent 90 minutes editing a manuscript for JAOS that I apparently had already edited back in February. Now I have to go through and try to make sure the today-edits are incorporated into the February-edits.

*bangs head on table*
April 15, 2025 at 5:31 PM