The East Asian Context of Lý Dynasty Buddhism
I recently read a chapter by the late historian John K. Whitmore entitled “Building a Buddhist Monarchy in Đai Viêt: Temples and Texts under Lý Nhân-tông (r. 1072–1127)” and it…
Tianxia/Thiên Hạ in Nineteenth-Century Vietnam
A few years ago, I was invited to write a paper on the concept of “Tianxia” (Thiên Hạ) in nineteenth-century Vietnam, and that paper has now been published.The paper is…
The Confucian Brain Drain in Ming Occupied Vietnam
I have been writing about the established narrative in English-language scholarship on premodern Vietnam which sees the Lý and Trần dynasty periods as a time when Confucianism played a limited…
Hồ Quý Ly’s Confucianism from an East Asian Perspective
If you read the extant scholarship on premodern Vietnam, you will discover that historians have presented a story about the past which argues that there is very little evidence of…