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This Month in Mongolian Studies is a monthly listing of selected academic activities, resources and other material related to Mongolia. This list is based on information the ACMS has received and is presented as a service to its members. If you would like to submit information to be included in next month's issue please contact the ACMS at info@mongoliacenter.org This publication is supported in part by memberships. Please consider becoming a member of the ACMS, or renewing your membership by visiting our website at mongoliacenter.org/join.
Thank you!
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ACMS Announcements, News and Media References
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Mongolia Field School 2022 Comes to a Successful Completion
Session 2 "Environment, Humans, and Mining in Northern Mongolia," began on July 25 with 14 participants hailing from the U.S., Mongolia and Russia. They traveled to Darkhan and Erdenet, where they visited local environmental agencies and the state owned enterprise Erdenet Mining Corporation. There the participants had in-person discussions about the impact mining has had on the environment and people with the professionals involved in mining and environmental compliance.
The session ended on August 13. With several participants having already decided, what they wanted to research and whether and when they would be coming back to Mongolia to pursue their research interests. A couple wanted to study Mongolian language to help reach their goals.
The second course was led by Dr. Gantulga Bayasgalan, lecturer at the School of Geology and Mining Engineering at Mongolian University of Science and Technology (MUST) and Dr. Annika Ericksen, anthropologist and ACMS Field School Coordinator.
Figure 1. Overall Stats about Mongolia Field School 2022 |
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Topics for Mongolia Field School 2023 have already been determined, which you can see by clicking on the button below.
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| | New ACMS Library Website
We informed you in our previous newsletters, social media handles, as well as in print about our new ACMS Library. ACMS Media Coordinator T. Gantungalag and ACMS Library Fellow Liz Gartley have been working tirelessly to provide you with a new and improved library experience. The new library website has a simplified user interface with curated research guides. The principal work was done by Liz and Ganaa provided her with excellent support.
Ganaa and Liz have done a webinar about the new library website. Watch the Facebook livestream here.
If you have any feedback, comment, questions or any thoughts please write to Ganaa at gantungalag@mongoliacenter.org.
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ACMS Sponsored Programs and Events
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August VSS was held in Mongolian. As our guest speaker, we had Assistant Professor Batsuren Barangas from the National University of Mongolia. Batsuren Barangas gave a presentation on a topic rarely seen covered in English literature, that is the "Military operations of Mongolia from 1913-1914". His presentation will be made available on YouTube with English subtitles. In the meantime you can watch the Facebook livestream in Mongolian.
Please click the button below to watch the livestream
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| | Past episodes of VSS uploaded to ACMS YouTube Channel:
March VSS guest Dr. Paul Shore presented on The report of a Silesian Jesuit’s sojourn among the Kalmyks in 1700. Jan Milan a Silesian missionary traveled to Kalmykia and lived among them. There he recorded Kalmyk culture and religion. Jan Milan also took careful note of the Kalmyk alphabet. |
| | | April VSS guest Dr. Hurcbaatar Solonggod presented on the Brahmi Script. Nicknamed the HT Script, it refers to the earliest known form of Mongolian writing ever found. It was discovered at Huis Tolgoi. The writing was in Brahmi script and dates back to the times of the Turkic Empire pushing back the emergence of Mongolian literacy by nearly 600 years. The video was edited and uploaded to our YouTube. English subtitles for the video are in progress.
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| | Field Research Fellow Interview
In August we interviewed our Field Research Fellow Byron Miller, a Sociology PhD candidate from the Western Michigan University. Byron's research topic is "Rural to Urban Migration and Adaptation of Former Herders in the capital". The video is up on YouTube. To watch his interview, click the button below. |
| | | Special Interview with Fulbright FLTA Azjargal
ACMS Language Program Manager Dr. Tsermaa sat down with English teacher Azjargal Amarsanaa to talk about how she taught Mongolian language to American students in the University of Washington. Azjargal was a Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant program participant. During her program in the U.S. she taught Mongolian language using ACMS' Mongolian Language Curriculum successfully. Her interview is up on our YouTube channel. To see her teaching experience click the button below.
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Visit our YouTube channel to see more series of the Virtual Speaker and Virtual Panel Series, as well as our videos on Cultural Heritage Project, interviews with our Field Research Fellows and more.
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| Upcoming ACMS events
- Language Teaching Methodology Seminar September 22
- VSS September episode September 23
- Cultural Heritage Colloquium Workshop September 30
- VPS September episode September 30 (tentative)
*Note that the dates are set in Mongolian time. Stay tuned to our social media for details of our events and latest on Mongolian Studies:
Visit our website: www.mongoliacenter.org
Facebook: fb.me/AmericanCenterforMongolianStudies Youtube: youtube.com/c/ACMSMongolia Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/ACMSMongolia
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/acmsfieldschool/
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Vacancies, Scholarship, and Fellowships
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| Asia Foundation Development Fellowship
The application for the 2023 Asia Foundation Development Fellows program is open from August 3rd to September 16th, 2022.
The Asia Foundation Development Fellows program is a dynamic and multifaceted learning program designed for highly talented Asian individuals, under age 40, to enhance their leadership skills, Asian development knowledge, professional networks, and international exposure. The program reflects the Foundation’s six-decade tradition of investing in the region’s most promising future leaders.
Eligibility and Selection Criteria
Asia Foundation Development Fellows must:
- Have a demonstrable record of experience and accomplishment related to The Asia Foundation’s fields of expertise: governance and law, economic development, women’s empowerment and gender equality, environment, and regional cooperation;
- Be thoughtful, committed, respected and inspirational leaders within their professional fields and within their larger community;
- Be under 40 years of age by January 1, 2023;
- Be conversant in English (TOEFL exam results are not required);
- Be available and able to participate in all program components on the program dates specified; and
- Be resident nationals or citizens of the following countries and region where The Asia Foundation has programs: Afghanistan; Bangladesh; Bhutan; Cambodia; China; India; Indonesia; Japan; Korea; Laos; Malaysia; Mongolia; Myanmar; Nepal; Pacific Islands; Pakistan; Philippines; Singapore; Sri Lanka; Thailand; Timor-Leste; and, Vietnam.
Selection Process
The program is highly competitive. Staff from The Asia Foundation will evaluate each application thoroughly and narrow down the pool of applicants. Final selections will be conducted by a distinguished committee with expertise on Asia’s needs and development conditions. Fellows will be chosen without regard to gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnic background, marital status, or financial need. All submitted application information will be treated as confidential unless stated otherwise in the application. The identities of nominees will also remain confidential throughout the final selection process.
Please direct any inquiries to the Asia Foundation Development Fellows staff at development.fellows@asiafoundation.org
Apply
STEP 1) CHECK YOUR ELIGIBILITY
Please carefully read the Eligibility and Selection criteria above, and read the Application Instructions.
STEP 2) PREPARE FOR THE APPLICATION PROCESS
Review the Application Guidelines and Instructions and complete each component of the application:
Personal information
Written submission
CV
Short video submission
Letters of recommendation (handled online)
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| | | Chevening Scholarship 2023-2024 for Mongolians
Online applications are invited from Mongolian nationals who wish to study in the United Kingdom at postgraduate (Master) level for the next academic year, which starts in September/October 2023.
Through the Chevening/MES Partnership Scholarships Scheme, the British and Mongolian Governments jointly invest in talented individuals with focused career plans, the potential to become influential leaders in their field and the desire to contribute to Mongolia's future. The scholarships cover tuition fees, travel costs and living expenses.
The Chevening/MES Partnership Scholarships Scheme offers:
- access to high quality British education.
- an opportunity to obtain a postgraduate Master’s qualification (MSc, MA, LLM, MBA).
- the stimulating experience of being part of a dynamic international community of Chevening scholars.
Priority will be given to applicants who want to pursue studies in fields that support the following objectives:
a. International relations.
b. Environment and Climate change.
c. Business, economics and innovation.
d. Good governance, human rights and democracy.
A successful candidate should:
- be a Mongolian citizen at the time of applying for the award and intend to return to Mongolia at the end of the period of study;
- already hold a degree that is equivalent to at least a UK second-class honours degree;
- have completed at least two years work or equivalent experience by the end of September in the year prior to the academic year for which the scholarship applies;
- have good English language skills (a minimum IELTS score of 6.5. Some courses, eg law, also require a higher IELTS score)
- have not already received or be receiving financial benefit from a British Government funded scholarship;
- have a track of record of excellence and achievement in their field;
- have a clear idea about how their scholarship will benefit Mongolia on their return;
- be able to demonstrate that they have leadership potential;
- employees, employees’ relatives (or former employees who have left employment less than two years before) of the British Government and or any of its wholly-owned subsidiaries will not be eligible to apply for the Award.
If you are interested in becoming a Chevening/MES Partnership Scholar in 2023/24 please apply from 2 August to 1 November 2022 online at www.chevening.org/apply
More information about the Scholarships can be found at https://www.chevening.org/mongolia and www.mecss.gov.mn
The closing date for applications is 01 November 2022 (Midday GMT) |
| | Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program Competition now open
The Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program offers over 400 awards for U.S. citizens to teach, research, and conduct professional projects in more than 130 countries. In the current competition, there are 41 awards in East Asia and the Pacific. To see what's available in your field, explore our Catalog of Awards. You can join the more than 400,000 Fulbrighters who have come away with enhanced skills, new connections and greater mutual understanding.
Interested faculty and professionals are encouraged to visit our website where you will find program details, application guidance and other resources. We also invite you to view current opportunities in the Catalog of Awards, join a webinar or attend an office hour for live application assistance.
The application deadline is September 15, 2022. Applicants must be U.S. citizens.
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Grants and Calls for Paper
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Call for Papers: IMC Leeds, 3-6 July 2023
Chinggisid Ripples: Networks and Entanglements and the Mongol Impact
Organisers: Dr Geoff Humble (University of Leeds) Dr Márton Vér (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen)
The Mongol imperial project has recently received a relatively sympathetic characterisation, reflecting an optimistic view of proto-globalising linkages and cultures in contact. This may obscure the extractive lineage-based aristocratic frameworks of Chinggisid rule, and the massive disruption of such large-scale warfare. It nonetheless remains clear that the impact of the ‘Mongol moment’ was felt right across and well beyond the territories held by the Great Khans.
These sessions will draw out the broad range of new lineages and linkages disrupted by or emerging from the convulsions of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, aiming to explore the degree to which Chinggisid expansion marked a departure from, or evolution of, previous ways of life across and beyond the conquest space. We would welcome papers addressing themes such as:
● Lineage construction and recording ● Ranges, limits, stability, and fragility of networks ● Network constraints, rules, and social roles ● Prosopographical techniques and limitations ● Connective infrastructure, such as the jam postal system ● Permissions and paizas ● The Pax Mongolica, intra-ulus conflict ● Entangled and overlapping structures, from the Central Secretariat to the darughachi ● Religious networks; orders, pilgrims, advisers ● Envoys, agents, ortoqs and traders ● Nökör, anda, atabeg and other formalised relationships ● Qatuns, wives and gendered reading ● Böge ‘shamans’ and ritual status groups ● Material forms (ceramics, textiles) ● Settlement patterns ● Technological spread and change ● Other exciting topics!
Please email humblegeoff@gmail.com with enquiries or proposals. Abstracts should be around 200 words and sent by 15 August 2022.
Coronavirus restrictions permitting, the IMC organisers are planning to host an in-person gathering in Leeds, with virtual involvement possible for those who are unable to attend in person.
https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/imc-2023/ |
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| Call for Papers: Religion and Society Special Issue Proposal
Editors:Simon Coleman, University of Toronto, Sondra L. Hausner, University of Oxford
Religion and Society has been receiving increasing numbers of excellent suggestions for special issues. We have therefore decided to invite proposals to be sent to us by a given deadline each year, in order to select the most appropriate special section for the journal. The pool of proposals will be considered by our editorial board, and decisions sent back to proposers as swiftly as possible. This arrangement will apply for the first time for our 2025 issue. Our timetable for proposals is as follows:
• May 1, 2024: submission of proposal to Religion and Society editors (no fixed number of papers, but maximum 50,000 words)
• June 1, 2024: decisions sent out, including choice of the proposal to be published
• June-December 2024: external refereeing and redrafting process, with submission of final proofreading by January 2025
The format of the proposal sent to Religion and Society should be as follows:
• Description of the special issue, including summary of its fit with Religion and Society, and assurance that all papers exist in draft form, fully ready to be send to reviewers (max. 500 words)
• Abstracts of all papers (max. 400 words each)
• Bios of special issue editors and all other contributors (max. 100 words each)
• List of potential reviewers for each paper, and assurance that special issue editors will work to obtain external reviews to fit with deadlines
Submission
The Religion and Society style guide is based on The Chicago Manual of Style (CMS). Please note that the journal uses US punctuation and spelling, following Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary.
Please refer to the Style Guide online:
https://journals.berghahnbooks.com/_uploads/air-rs/religion-and-society_style_guide.pdf
Please submit articles, reviews, and other contributions as Microsoft Word or Rich Text Format (rtf) files by e-mail to the editors:
Simon Coleman at simon.coleman@utoronto.ca and Sondra Hausner at sondra.hausner@theology.ox.ac.uk
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Interesting digital resource we discovered in August, 2022:Member contribution publications:
Selected scholarly articles published in August, 2022:
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| | FEATURE ARTICLES AND EVENTS ON MONGOLIAN STUDIES |
| | CAORC Fellowship Alumni Panel
September 14, 2022 at 7:00pm – 8:30pm ET
Join the Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC) for a webinar showcasing the research of former CAORC Multi-Country Research Fellows and CAORC-NEH Research Fellows, who were affiliated with Overseas Research Centers (ORCs) across Asia. The panel will give brief presentations on their research tenures, project methodology, and outcomes, with an emphasis on cross-border and cross-disciplinary research.
The objectives of the session are (1) for alumni to share strategies and experiences with field-bound researchers; (2) to provide an opportunity for fellows to highlight work transecting regional boundaries/national borders and transcending disciplinary boundaries; (3) to share strategies on conducting fieldwork in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. This event expands on a recent panel at the Association of Asian Studies Annual Meeting, which featured current and former CAORC fellows.
You can join the panel using this link. |
| | Film Screening & Discussion. BATU: Historical Detective
A documentary about Batu Khan and the Golden Horde by Kazakh director Rachid Nougmanov will be shown at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University on September 27. This will be a hybrid (virtual/in-person) event. Viewers can reserve a seat or register for a Zoom webinar to see the screening of the documentary. In addition, there will be a post screening discussion of the documentary.
Use this link to reserve a seat or register for the Zoom webinar |
| | Summer School for Young Mongolists
/Montsame/ July 26. Summer School for Young Mongolists organized by the National Council for Mongolian Studies, under the Mongolian Ministry of Education and Science, is running through July 24 to August 6. The SSYM is an annual program aimed at giving young Mongolists the opportunity to get acquainted with Mongolian culture and language by live interaction with herders and scholars, who are doing research in Mongolian Studies. This serves the purpose of promoting Mongolia and Mongolian studies internationally, and contribute to the careers of the next generation of Mongolists. In 2022 there are 30 young Mongolists participating from 17 universities from across Russia, USA, Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, China, Turkey, Japan, Laos, Mozambique and Taiwan. Read more in Mongolian...
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| | Mongolian Studies Summer School
/IMS Facebook Handle/ August 3. The NUM’s Institute for Mongolian Studies is hosting an annual Mongolian Studies Summer School. This year the MSSS is going through August 3 to 18. The participants, coming from Tokyo University School of Foreign Studies and Hankook University Foreign Studies, are going to learn Mongolian language, visit museums in Ulaanbaatar, as well as travel to the countryside to learn about pastoral nomadic lifestyle. See More
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| | Mongolia’s paradoxical education problem/National University of Mongolia/ September 2. The 8th Arjia Rinpoche Lobsang Tubten Jigme Gyatso was awarded honorary doctorate of the Institute for Mongolian Studies of the National University of Mongolia. Read more in Mongolian... |
| | Stele dedicated to Ilterish Qaghan found in Arkhangai
/Ergelt.mn and Arkeolojik Haber/ August 24. A joint team of archaeologists and other experts from the Institute of Archaeology of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences and the International Academy of Turkic Studies from Turkey found a monument complex near Khushuu Tsaidam (where the Stele of Bilge Qaghan is located), though Ergelt.mn failed to mention the involvement of the Turkish party. The complex contained a stele that mentions the name of Ilterish Qaghan, the founder of the Second Turkic Empire from VII century CE. Ilterish rebelled against the Tang Dynasty and went on to unite disparate Turkic and Mongolic tribes including the Oghuz, from whom the Seljuk separated from later on. Read more about the discovery in Mongolian in Turkish |
| | Palace of Toghrul Khan of the Khereid found /Zindaa.mn/ August 19. The Institute of Archeology of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences (ШУА-ийн Археологийн хүрээлэн) is working on excavations at what is known as the palace of Toghrul Khan of the Khereid (Keraites) on the banks of Tuul River. The Palace ruins are known as Ruins of Turgen and "Khar Tune Ord". These new excavations are part of a wider initiative to create tourist sightseeing locations based on ruins and monuments laying scattered around Ulaanbaatar.
These ruins were first discovered in 1966 by Mongolian academic and historian Perlee Kh.'s team and further studied in 1979. It was concluded that the fortifications (wall) date back to Khitan period and named Ruins of Turgen. And in 2005-2006 a joint team of archaeologists from the National University of Mongolia and Chinggis Khaan University lead by archaeologist Navaan D. unearthed some 400 square meters of area inside the walls. This team proposed, based on the discovered items and the location of the ruins, that the ruins are indeed Khar Tune Ord or the residence of the leader of the Khereids, Wang Khan. However most recent excavations that occurred in 2021 led by the Institute of Archaeology, concluded that there may have been a Buddhist monastery, due to items found that resembled Buddhist elements. These latest excavations aim to discover other possible cultural layers from the ruin grounds. Read more in Mongolian |
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| Hungary celebrates the Kurultaj nomadic festival /Wionews and Montsame/ August 17. Thousands gather for the three-day ‘Kurultaj Festival’ in the village of Bugac. The ‘Kurultaj’ is traditionally held in Hungary to celebrate the culture and history of the Hun-Turkic-Hungarian peoples. The festival attracted attendants from neighboring countries as well as Turkic and Mongol people. Watch in English in Mongolian
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| | Successful Excavation at Karabalgasun /German Institute of Archaeology/ September 1. The Ulaanbaatar Research Center of the German Institute of Archaeology carried out a Successful excavation in Karabalgasun. After a two-year break due to the pandemic, The Institute was finally able to continue the excavation at the so-called 'Stupa' in the palace district of Karabalgasun. At around 13 metres, this highest elevation in the area of the city is still unknown in terms of its function. Read more... |
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| "A Dynastic History of Iran: From the Qajars to the Pahlavis" by Mehran Kamrava
Price: $18.49 (Ebook) and $29.99 (Hardcopy)
This rich dynastic study examines the political histories of Iran's last two monarchical dynasties, the Qajars and the Pahlavis. Tracing the rise and fall of both dynasties, Mehran Kamrava addresses essential questions about how and why they rose to power; what domestic and international forces impacted them; how they ruled; and how they met their end. Exploring over two hundred years of political history, Kamrava's comprehensive yet concise account places developments within relevant frameworks in an accessible manner. With detailed examinations of Iran's history, politics, and economics, he interrogates the complexities of dynastic rule in Iran and considers its enduring legacy. Developing innovative interpretations and utilizing original primary sources, this book illuminates the impact of the monarchy's rule and ultimate collapse on Iranian history, as well as Iran's subsequent politics and revolution.
Mehran Kamrava is a Professor of Government at Georgetown University Qatar. He is the author of a number of journal articles and books.
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| | "The Rise of the Mongols: Five Chinese Sources" by Christopher Atwood
Price: $16.00 (Paperback)
Rise of the Mongols offers readers a selection of five important works that detail the rise of the Mongol Empire through Chinese eyes. Three of these works were written by officials of South China's Southern Song dynasty and two are from officials from North China writing in the service of the Mongol rulers. Together, these accounts offer a view of the early Mongol Empire very different not just from those of Muslim and Christian travelers and chroniclers, but also from the Mongol tradition embodied in The Secret History of Mongols.
The five Chinese source texts (in English translation, each with their own preface):
Selections from Random Notes from Court and Country since the Jianyan Years, vol.2, by Li Xinchuan
"A Memorandum on the Mong-Tatars," by Zhao Gong
"A Sketch of the Black Tatars," by Peng Daya and Xu Ting
"Spirit-Path Stele for His Honor Yelü, Director of the Secretariat," by Song Zizhen
"Notes on a Journey," by Zhang Dehui
Also included are an introduction, index, bibliography, and appendices covering notes on the texts, tables and charts, and a glossary of Chinese and transcribed terms.
Christopher P. Atwood is Department Chair and Professor of Mongolian and Chinese Frontier & Ethnic History at University of Pennsylvania Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations. He received his Ph.D. from Indiana University’s Central Eurasian Studies Department, where he taught for two decades and served as department chair and interim director of the Center for Languages of the Central Asian Region. |
| | "Knowing Manchuria" by Ruth Rogaski
Price: $44.99 (Ebook)
According to Chinese government reports, hundreds of plague-infected rodents fell from the skies over Gannan county on an April night in 1952. Chinese scientists determined that these flying voles were not native to the region, but were vectors of germ warfare, dispatched over the border by agents of imperialism. Mastery of biology had become a way to claim political mastery over a remote frontier. Beginning with this bizarre incident from the Korean War, Knowing Manchuria places the creation of knowledge about nature at the center of our understanding of a little-known but historically important Asian landscape.
At the intersection of China, Russia, Korea, and Mongolia, Manchuria is known as a site of war and environmental extremes, where projects of political control intersected with projects designed to make sense of Manchuria’s multiple environments. Covering more than 500,000 square miles, Manchuria’s landscapes include temperate rainforests, deserts, prairies, cultivated plains, wetlands, and Siberian taiga. With analysis spanning the seventeenth century to the present day, Ruth Rogaski reveals how an array of historical actors—Chinese poets, Manchu shamans, Russian botanists, Korean mathematicians, Japanese bacteriologists, American paleontologists, and indigenous hunters—made sense of the Manchurian frontier. She uncovers how natural knowledge, and thus the nature of Manchuria itself, changed over time, from a sacred “land where the dragon arose” to a global epicenter of contagious disease; from a tragic “wasteland” to an abundant granary that nurtured the hope of a nation.
Munkhjargal Uuganzaya received a Master degree of Science in Glacial Geomorphology under supervisor A. Orkhonselenge in 2015. She is now assistant researcher of Geomorphology at the Laboratory of Geochemistry and Geomorphology (LGG), National University of Mongolia (NUM). Her research focuses on alpine glaciations and lake area changes in Mongolia. She specializes in GIS and remote sensing techniques. She has participated in research projects at the LGG and published over ten scientific articles related to paleo- and modern-glaciers in the Mongolian Altai, Khuvsgul and Khentii Mountain Ranges and lake sedimentations in Lake Ulaan in national and international peer-reviewed journals.
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| | "Fish Shoes: A Palace Drama" by Dianne Wolff
Price: Available online for free this semester
What happens when the Princess Supreme, the favorite daughter of Emperor Khubilai Khan of China must convince her father, the richest and most powerful man in the world, to listen to her husband, the King of Korea, and not invade Japan by sea?
Diane Wolff is the author of the Silk Road Series, about five major characters, the heirs of Chinggis Khan (Genghis Khan). Because the Supreme Khan was considered a "barbarian", these stories have been lost to the West. The series is original and is the product of twenty-five years of research based on the work of her mentor Morris Rossabi, the biographer of Khubilai Khan. Diane is an independent scholar, and a widely published journalist. book reviewer and blogger on her author website. She recently delivered talks at the Mongolian Cultural Center in Washington, D. C., introducing the first book in the series, for their annual conference. She gave a virtual talk for the American Center for Mongolian Studies on the occasion of the book launch for the second book in the Silk Road Series, Batu, Khan of the Golden Horde: The Mongol Khans Conquer Russia.
*This book has been nominated for the Freeman Book Award of the National Consortium
of Teachers about Asia.
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| | "Carbon Technocracy Energy Regimes in Modern East Asia" by Victor Seow
Price: $39.99 (Ebook)
The coal-mining town of Fushun in China’s Northeast is home to a monstrous open pit. First excavated in the early twentieth century, this pit grew like a widening maw over the ensuing decades, as various Chinese and Japanese states endeavored to unearth Fushun’s purportedly “inexhaustible” carbon resources. Today, the depleted mine that remains is a wondrous and terrifying monument to fantasies of a fossil-fueled future and the technologies mobilized in attempts to turn those developmentalist dreams into reality.
In Carbon Technocracy, Victor Seow uses the remarkable story of the Fushun colliery to chart how the fossil fuel economy emerged in tandem with the rise of the modern technocratic state. Taking coal as an essential feedstock of national wealth and power, Chinese and Japanese bureaucrats, engineers, and industrialists deployed new technologies like open-pit mining and hydraulic stowage in pursuit of intensive energy extraction. But as much as these mine operators idealized the might of fossil fuel–driven machines, their extractive efforts nevertheless relied heavily on the human labor that those devices were expected to displace. Under the carbon energy regime, countless workers here and elsewhere would be subjected to invasive techniques of labor control, ever-escalating output targets, and the dangers of an increasingly exploited earth.
Victor Seow is assistant professor of the history of science at Harvard University. A historian of technology, science, and industry, he specializes in China and Japan and in histories of energy and work.
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