Lughnasa                                               Moon of the First Harvests

Two weeks ago I began a MOOC (massive open online course) from Hong Kong University called New History for a New China*.  This is a quicky, a four week dip into a data driven approach to near history in China, near history in China’s case going back to the latter Song Dynasty (1000-1100) with some sources.  The work they are doing is similar to Big History and history from the longue duree (the long term) perspective most often encountered in French historiography.

Using records of students taking the national examinations for positions in the bureaucracy, a practice begun in the Sui Dynasty (605) replacing preferment from the ranks of the nobility, the practice since the origin of the bureaucracy in the Han Dynasty, the scholars at Hong Kong University look at demographic details such as age, parent’s occupation and education, place of residence, age at taking the first exam and age when the exams were passed or failed and positions achieved.

An advantage to using these records is that they are relatively consistent over a long period of time allowing a longitudinal examination of mobility in Chinese society, at least as education influenced it.

So far I find the data produced fascinating and its revelations about the workings of Chinese society often brand new though I’m not so sure about the comparative method that the scholars say lie at the heart of their work.  They contend that this work can make neutral or objective comparisons between east and west, countering and sometimes correcting the Eurocentric nature of much social science research.

I’m hopeful that this work will get there though what I’ve seen so far is only a beginning and has some weaknesses that beginnings tackling a problem of this magnitude might be expected to have.  Still, it’s proven an interesting ride so far.

*A New History for a New China, 1700-2000: New Data and New Methods, Part 1

James Z. Lee and Byung-Ho Lee

The purpose of this course is to summarize some of the new directions in Chinese history and Chinese social science produced by the discovery and analysis of new historical data, in particular archival documents and datasets, and to organize this knowledge in a framework that encourages learning about China in comparative perspective.