In recent years, cultural archaeology has broadened its scope to include churches and seminaries, leading to groundbreaking discoveries in North China that uncover evidence of missionary activities and Christian communities. Church records — comprising extensive land and property deeds, along with economic and business documents — serve as invaluable primary sources, challenging traditional narratives and offering new insights into China’s social and economic history. Additionally, recent scholarship has increasingly focused on the Cold War era, exploring the complex relationship between Christianity, the state, and political ideologies. The evolving dynamics between church and state during this period are central to understanding the role of religious institutions amid political upheaval in 20th-century China. This talk will discuss these recent developments, which open new avenues for interdisciplinary research, enabling scholars to craft a more nuanced history of Christianity — highlighting its enduring significance in shaping modern Chinese society and ideological trajectories.
Ji Li is an Associate Professor of History at the Department of History and Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Hong Kong. Her research areas center on the social and religious history of late imperial and modern China, particularly the history of Christianity, religion and local society, women and gender, and cross-cultural studies. She has published books and articles in both English and Chinese. She is the author of God’s Little Daughters: Catholic Women in Nineteenth-Century Manchuria (Washington 2015), Missions Étrangères de Paris (MEP) and Chinese Society from the Seventeenth Century to the Present (Brill 2021), and At the Frontier of God’s Empire: A Missionary Odyssey in Modern China (Oxford 2023).
This series aims to introduce a wide range of cutting-edge research in various disciplines and areas. If you have any questions about the Interdisciplinary Research Seminar or would like to be removed from this mailing list, please contact Professor Ghassan Moazzin (gmoazzin@hku.hk).
Light refreshments will be served for registered participants attending the seminar in person.
