This collection of essays is the first English-language study to present the latest research on Italy’s cultural relationships with China and Japan across the centuries. It explores topics ranging from travel writing to creative arts, from translation to religious accommodation, and from Cold War politics to Chinese American cuisine. The volume draws on the expertise of an interdisciplinary group of scholars trained and working in Europe, East Asia, and North America who re-assess research foci and frames, showcase transcultural and theoretically-informed research, and help to strengthen this field of study.

This book offers a critical analysis of global mobilities across China and Italy in history. In three periods in the twentieth century, new patterns of physical mobilities and cultural contact were established between the two countries which were either novel at the time of their emergence or impactful on subsequent periods. The first two chapters provide overviews of writings by Italians in China and by Chinese in Italy in the twentieth century. The remaining chapters cover: Republican China’s relationships with Italy and Italian Fascist colonialism in China during the 1920s–1930s; Italian travelers to China during the Cold War from the 1950s to the 1970s; migrations between China and Italy during the 2000s–2010s. In analyzing these cultural mobilities, this book opens a new line of inquiry in Chinese-Italian Cultural Studies, which has been dominated by historical study, and contributes a significant case study to the scholarship on global cultural mobilities.

Following the pages of Guo Liancheng's journal, the author tries to shed light on its contents and features and to analyze the image of Italy described in the pages of Brief account of the Journey to the West, the earliest firsthand account on the Bel Paese ever published in China.Miriam Castorina received her Ph.D. in History and Civilization of East Asia in 2008 at University of Rome La Sapienza. She studied Mandarin Chinese in Tianjin Nankai University and Beijing Foreign Studies University and spent a year as a visiting scholar at Peking University. Her research focuses on Chinese travel literature, on cultural contacts between Italy and China and on the history of Chinese teaching in Italy, topics on which she has published several articles and books. [Publisher's text].

The purpose of this book is to read Han Feizi (c.280 – 233 BC) in the light of Western thought, especially, Machiavelli. Han Feizi is one of the most important philosophical thinkers in ancient China and is still widely read by politicians and business leaders in East Asia. His ideas are often compared with those in Machiavelli's The Prince. Han Feizi argues that political institutions must change with changing circumstances. His work can also be compared with that of Adam Smith, but differs in consideration of economic system and moral sentiments. Han Feizi highly values action, practical skills, useful knowledge (not formal education like Confucianism), absolute obedience, loyalty (based on self-interests), and duty. The key tool to operate the system is objective law (and its effective practice) with fair rewards and punishments. As mainland China, and overseas Chinese-influenced and Confucian societies including Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, North Korea, and Vietnam are rapidly modernized, this classic work, created in the golden period of Chinese thought, carries ongoing relevance and gives deep insights. This is an important resource for people with intellectual, business or politics interests in East Asia, to help to interpret, understand, and predict political and business decisions in the Confucian regions.

Examining the stories of diverse Christians in Shanghai, this book uses the city as a model to highlight how a minority religion in a city has interacted with other religions as well as social, cultural, political, and economic changes. Susangeline Y. Patrick illustrates how the history of Shanghai Christians sheds light on why and how Christians have accommodated social and political changes, and gives valuable insights into multiculturalism, globalization, sinicization, and ecclesiology. The interreligious dialogues between Shanghai Christians and other traditions such as Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, Islam, and Judaism throughout history provide worthy reflections on the roles of Christians in a multi-religious space.

Over the past few decades, East Asia developments in terms of production, population and trade have shown remarkable dynamics. Ensuing changes in these regions of non-Western civilization are commonly interpreted in terms of a successful adaptation of modernity. However, experiences such as the regional crisis in 1997 and the tragic incident of September 2001 more than ever ask for more intensive civilizational dialogues, and urge us to carefully consider the implications of capitalist development in the East Asian context(s). This book deals with the issues of Asian values, civilizational encounters between East and West, and the development of capitalism and its culture in East Asian countries. Its focus on inter-civilizational exchanges and the intricate interplays between civilizational and capitalist dynamics helps us to better understand our human story and history.

Developed by an international team of historians, sociologists, political scientists and economists, this collection is the most comprehensive reader of the history of Sino-Italian relations currently available in the English language.