Category: HST271

This week, we looked at ways to make our Show and Tell projects look more engaging and professional with new tools, such as timelines or videos. I was particularly interested by the ability to embed videos, since it is entirely possible that I will find a video that I want to incorporate into a future…

At the outset of the Taiping rebellion, the Qing government was in a dire position. Its once strong banner armies had melted from the inside, as had the green banner armies of Han troops who had been meant to shore the banner armies up. Therefore, much of the fighting fell to the local militias, which…

The primary readings for this week were for Friday, and much of the focus ,for the basic set at least, was on the Chinese-European interactions of the early nineteenth century, especially over opium. One of the most rewarding things about reading the primary sources, coming from both the Chinese and British perspectives, is the different…

In class, we briefly touched upon the late Ming peasant rebellions as a distraction for the Ming court in fighting the Manchus. We also touched briefly on the exploits of Li Zicheng in ending the Ming dynasty by capturing Beijing and giving the Manchus an easier time in pacifying the north of China. However, the…

For Monday’s class, we read an article on the Opium Wars. These wars came about as the result of British attempts to find a way to create interest in China in trade, a problem that they solved by importing highly addictive opium into the country. The Chinese in return had to respond to the rampant…

This week, we followed the collapse of the Ming, looking first at the general readings for Wednesday and then the conquest exploration pack. Probably the most extensive reading from this week was the Lovell reading, which went into some detail about the situation on the northern frontier at the time of the Manchu conquest. One…

The first reading of the semester was an overview of Ming China leading up to its collapse. It began with a discussion of the apparent might of the Ming, with focus on the artistic accomplishments of the Ming. Chief among these were the four great novels of the Ming. The reading and class discussion both…