Date：2025 / 3 / 13（Thu.）14:00-16:00
Speaker: Prof. Mark C. Elliott | Harvard University
Abstract:
Much recent debate around the nature of the Qing state has focused on the interconnected questions of political legitimacy, imperial unity, and ethnic identity. The second lecture explores these issues, beginning with the problem of Sinification, where arguments about legitimacy and identity come together. Manchu tactics to persuade Han skeptics varied, but thinking on both sides was largely framed within the received discourses of “civilization and barbarity,” “Heaven’s mandate,” or “unifying the realm.” Whether modern scholars should take those arguments at face value, and whether this strategy should count as Sinification, are among the questions examined in this lecture.