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Alumni

Tristan G. Brown

Visiting Postdoctoral Fellow (2022–2023)

Dr.

Tristan G. Brown is a social and cultural historian of late imperial and modern China. His research focuses on the ways in which law, science, environment, and religion interacted in China from the seventeenth to early twentieth centuries. His first book, Laws of the Land: Fengshui and the State in Qing Dynasty China (forthcoming), examines the roles fengshui played in the Qing's administration, particularly its legal system. During this visit at the MPIWG, he collaborated with the “Local Gazetteers” Working Group on fenye (correlative astrology) in Chinese local gazetteers.

Projects

Fenye in Local Gazetteers

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Empire of the Night Sky: The Politics of Astrological Knowledge in Qing China

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Selected Publications

Brown, Tristan Gerard (2024). “Introduction: Empire Under the Night Sky: Recording Astral-Cosmography in Qing Dynasty China, 17th–19th Centuries.” HoST — Journal of History of Science and Technology 18 (1): 1–5. https://doi.org/10.2478/host-2024…

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Brown, Tristan Gerard (2024). “From Fenye to Fengshui: Applying Correlative Cosmography in Late Imperial China.” HoST — Journal of History of Science and Technology 18 (1): 61–85. https://doi.org/10.2478/host-2024-0004.

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Brown, Tristan Gerard, ed. (2024). Empire Under the Night Sky: Recording Astral-Cosmography in Qing Dynasty China, 17th–19th Centuries. Special issue, HoST — Journal of History of Science and Technology 18 (1). https://sciendo.com/issue/HOST/18/1.

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Brown, Tristan Gerard (2023). Laws of the Land: Fengshui and the State in Qing Dynasty China. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

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Past Events

Workshop

Empire under the Night Sky: The Role of Fenye (Astrological Contents) in Late Imperial China

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Colloquium

Empire under the Night Sky: Recording Field Allocation in Chinese Local Gazetteers

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News & Press

Tristan Brown receives John K. Fairbank Prize in East Asian History for his book Laws of the Land

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