Hello Folks!
Since Yun has recently mentioned Joseph Needham, one of the greatest Sinologists of the 20th century, I would like to open a list that introduce most prominent Sinologists and Chinese Historians as well as Schollars who worked or are currently working on Chinese history.
If you are even more interested, you may also provide the name of their works and even how to buy them. I appreciate very much!
I, of course, notice some of these schollars, but I would like to leave their name to you.

Thank you

Sima Qian, known as the Grand Historian, would be something very good to read. His written Histories of China, from what I have learned, are read often even today in China just for the pleasure of how he writes and not solely for it's Historical content. Sima Qian went to great lengths to record the histories of China and even after he had angered the Emperor and received the punishment of castration, he felt it was his duty to see it through. I am waiting for my copy to arrive so I will review on it later. There is more to his story beside the very small portion I put.

I hope you read about him.

Another family of historians was the Ban Family.

Ban Biao (3-54 CE) was an official and had very well educated children. Two boys ( twins possibly) and a daughter named Ban Zhao. Ban Zhao would make her mark in history as well. ( you may not find much online as far as buying a book but if you google or yahoo search the names you will find some interesting reading regarding them. i would advise reading more than one source for information as one site might have something that another does not. You could also try the History Channel website and see if they have an Ancient China Documentary.)

Here are the links and I hope you enjoy them.

Sima Qian Book 1
Sima Qian Book 2
Barnes and Noble with other books regarding Sima Qian

All the links I give are for Barnes and Noble. Of course you can choose your book dealer of choice. I choose them because they usually have what I need at a reasonable price and deliver ON TIME, EVERYTIME and I live in Beirut which is so essential while taking my online courses through my stateside University. I don't get paid from them so this is just my personal preference. No pressure.

I think this is my fault for not making clear the content of the thread, sorry Aaliyah.
I mean 20th century Sinologists, such as J.J Duyvendak.

For early Sinologist, I think the French should pioneer studies in Far East and South East Asia. For one, they established l'École française d'Extrême-Orient. They could be Edouard Chavannes, Henry Maspero.

It'sok. Maybe you need to change the title to reflect 20th Century Historians and the like.

E. Bruce Brooks of the Warring States project has written a series of short (and rather idiosyncratic and opinionated) biographies of prominent or promising (but died before achieving prominence) 20th-century European Sinologists, and I will provide links to them here.

Henri Maspero (1882-1945): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/maspero.html

Paul Pelliot (1878-1945): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/pelliot.html

Derk Bodde (1909-2003): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/bodde.html

J.L.L. Duyvendak (1889-1954): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/duyvendak.html

Otto Franke (1863-1946): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/franke.html

Erich Haenisch (1880-1966): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/haenisch.html

Erwin von Zach (1872-1942): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/zach.html#pelliot

Erwin Reifler (1903-1965): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/reifler.html

Arthur Waley (1889-1966): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/waley.html

Helmut Wilhelm (1905-1990): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/wilhelmh.html

Vasili M. Alexeev (1881-1951): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/alexeev.html

Wolfram Eberhard (1909-1988): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/eberhard.html

Iulian Shchutski (1897-1938): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/shchutskii.html

Timoteus Pokora (1928-1985): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/pokora.html

And an earlier generation from the mid-19th century:

Georg von der Gabelentz (1840-1893): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/gabelentz.html

J.J.M. de Groot (1854-1921): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/degroot.html

Albert T. de Lacouperie (1845-1894): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/lacouperie.html

Gustaaf Schlegel (1840-1903): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/schlegel.html

August Pfizmaier (1808-1887): http://www.umass.edu/wsp/sinology/persons/pfizmaier.html

Let us focus this thread on European (including British) sinologists, lest the coverage become too broad and superficial. I will change the thread title accordingly.

Great links! Yun, would you mind adding in these scholars' first names (Henri Maspero, Paul Pelliot, Derk Bodde, etc.)? I think this simple addition would make the list even more readable.


Someone could also start a new thread on American sinologists and historians of China...

OK, I've added some of them. Will add in the others (which I can't remember) when I have time later.

A few references to works by Henri Maspéro, who has a Wikipedia page here.

Many of Maspéro's classic studies (all in French) are available on this site:

http://classiques.uqac.ca/classiques/maspe...pero_henri.html

Taoism and Chinese Religions, Maspero's most famous book, is a collection of articles he wrote in French over several decades. The used copies available online are very expensive. French editions (Le taoïsme et les religions chinoises) are cheaper, but many of the articles in there can be downloaded for free on the site I just mentioned.

At least one more of Maspéro's works is available in English: China in Antiquity, a translation of La Chine antique (1927). Some used copies cost around $15, plus delivery fees.

The links I inserted are to search results from a site called Bookfinder.com. It finds all new and used copies available in online bookstores, including Amazon and Barnes&Noble, but also Abebooks, Alibris, etc. The prices are indicated in US dollars and include shipping fees to the US, but the search parameters can be set for other countries and other currencies. You can also search for books in French, Italian, and German.

I think the topics is referring to European or western Sinologist. "Sinologists" are title given to professional academics who are not from China, but who specialize in the study of chinese history/culture. The chinese term for sinologist is called "hanxuejia 汉学家“ or "zhongguo tong 中国通"

Professional academics from China who are experts in the study of chinese history/culture are usually referred to as "Guoxue Dashi 国学大师" instead of sinologist.

You make me remember Will Durant. This particular schollar did not so much concentrate upon Chinese civilisation alone, didn't it? However, his respect to Chinese culture and his efforts as well as his wife's are all admirable.


Don't worry, after finishing this list, I will try to create a list of famous Chinese schollars on Chinese History. It would be A LOT, I assume. From Liang Qichao to schollars today is already roughly 1 century. The fact is Westerners who could not penetrate into the barrier of language will seemingly have no chance to read their works. In this case, Western schollars serve, of course, as a medium to transfer them to Western readers.

Actually, one of my friends have made a suggestion, I don't know but it sounds rather crazy: If you (me, Tadeusz) have already made acquaintance to and known well Vietnamese, you can learn Chinese via this language.

However, back to the topic, how about Rafe De Crespigny?

BTW, I would like to ask a question, what are differences between a Sinologist and a Chinese Historians?

A chinese historian specialises in an area of chinese history. A Sinologist can also be a historian, but he can also specialise in other areas of chinese culture (instead of chinese history), including chinese language (linguistics), literature, arts, philosophy etc.

However, a sinologist would probably have a good knowledge on confucianism, daoism or other schools of thoughts that influenced China, as well as basic chinese history. Some Sinologists specialised in the study of linguistic re-construction of ancient chinese language, while some specalised in the study of ancient chinese classical literature or classics. Most of the western Sinologists have good literacy in classical chinese language.

He was trained by members of the last generation of great sinologists, but I would consider him more of a historian since his interests have been more narrowly focused on Han and Three Kingdoms history. He has no strong research interests in literature, philosophy, or language, unlike most earlier sinologists.

Since the 1950s, academic specialization has been increasingly emphasized in both the US and China, leading to more functional separation between historians, art historians, philosophers, linguists, and literature experts. It is now relatively rare to find either an interdisciplinary Sinologist or a 国学大师, except in Europe where the field of sinology remains small but basically unchanged. Whereas European and Japanese sinology once played leading roles in deepening the world's understanding of Chinese history and culture, they have since been overtaken by History departments and East Asian Languages/Studies departments in the US and, to a lesser extent, Canada. Funding has something to do with this change, but it is also very much a result of the dominance of the English language internationally.

The term 'sinology' has apparently gone out of fashion outside Europe for various reasons, probably including the perception that the body of past scholarship on Chinese history and culture that is available to non-Chinese scholars is now too large to be encompassed within a single term (unlike, say, Egyptology or Tibetology). However 'Chinese studies', which is essentially a de-latinized version of 'sinology', is still widely used. Geremie Barmé of ANU has also recently made an effort to put Australia back on the world map of Chinese studies by proposing the rather fluid and all-embracing concept New Sinology, a major characteristic of which is the study of contemporary Chinese culture in the light of Chinese history and traditional culture: http://rspas.anu.edu.au/pah/chinaheritageproject/newsinology

One passage from Barmé's essay that may be of particular interest goes as follows:

Thank you. The original title of the topic was different than it is now but I had no clue about what a Sinologist was, now I do. I saw Chinese Historian after the word Sinologist and put the only Chinese Historian I knew about. I guess it was easier to understand if you know about the Sinology word but for some of us, we are just mere beginners. So today, I am more educated than I was yesterday.