This week on Sinica, Kaiser chats with Villanova University historian Andrew Liu. Andy published an excellent essay in n+1 magazine in April that captured how the eclipse of the "wet-market" theory of COVID origins and its replacement by the "lab-leak" theory illustrates how an old racial form — "Orientalism," which sees countries of Asia as backward, dirty, and barbarous — gave way to what's been termed an "Asiatic" racial form, which reflects anxiety over Asians as hyperproductive, robotic, and technologically advanced.

3:05 – Andy's n+1 essay on the lab leak theory and the two racial forms

6:26 – A primer on Edward Said's Orientalism and why it's a poor fit for Asia today

10:41 – The "Asiatic racial form" and the notionally "positive" Asian stereotypes

13:58 – How Orientalism and the Asiatic racial form interact today and historically

23:50 – Conspiracies on China, and what's wrong with the Asiatic form

27:51 – Japan's rise as a parallel

30:57 – How to talk about Chinese attitudes toward tech without invoking Asiatic stereotypes

37:27 – Race, culture, and global capitalism

A full transcript of this podcast is available on SupChina.com.

Recommendations:

Andy: Stay True: a memoir by the New Yorker writer Hua Hsu and donating to abortion providers in states affected by the end of Roe v. Wade:, like Abortion Care for Tennessee, abortioncaretn.org

Kaiser: The Danish political drama Borgen on Netflix




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Historian Andrew Liu on COVID origins: Orientalism and the "Asiatic racial form"

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This week on the Sinica Podcast, Kaiser is joined by old friend Ed Lanfranco, who lived in Beijing from 1988 to 2009. An inveterate packrat, Ed managed to accumulate an incredible trove of documents, maps, photos, and ephemera from his years there and from the decades and even centuries before his arrival. Ed talks about his collection, and invites scholars interested in his material to get in touch!

2:46 – Ed’s time in China and saving ephemera 

11:47 – Ed’s favorite old Chinese brands 

14:41 – Ed’s map collection 

19:34 – The Tiananmen incident of 1976, Ed’s collection of unpublished photographs from the Panjiayuan Antique Market, and a leaflet from April 7th, 1976 

30:40 – Ed’s patriotic music record collection 

33:28 – Ed’s U.S.-China collection 

38:00 – The story behind Ed’s U.S.-China panda button from 2002 

43:18 – Ed’s Tiananmen ’89 story and collection of leaflets and files 

50:56 – The Underground City of Beijing tour 

53:50 – Ed’s SARS 2003 epidemic experience and artifacts

Recommendations:

Ed: Roger Garside’s Coming Alive: China After Mao; Lin Yutang’s works, especially My Country and My People and The Importance of Living

Kaiser: The Rochester-based progressive metal trio Haishen’s new album, Awaken the Endless Deep 

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Ed Lanfranco: from Hoarder to Historian

This week on Sinica, I'm delighted to welcome — my brother! Jay Kuo is a Broadway writer & producer, and the man behind the terrific U.S. politics-focused Substack newsletter The Status Kuo. In a previous life, from 1996 to 2000, he was also really active in Beijing's gay community, just at the time when homosexuality was being decriminalized and was stepping out of the shadows. We talk about how it all took off. Jay also puts on his other hat to talk about how China figures into American politics with the election less than five months away, and about the legal standing of the TikTok divest-or-ban law.

4:54 – The gay community in Beijing in the ‘90s, and the Half-and-Half bar in Sanlitun 

16:06 – How the gay community in Beijing changed after two major rulings 

27:33 – The end of the “golden era” for the gay community in China

36:26 – Progress and its drivers and obstacles

42:28 – Jay’s “China priors”

50:41 – The issue of China in the upcoming U.S. presidential election 

 57:08 – The TikTok ban bill 

Recommendations: 

Jay: The TV series Manhunt (2024), available on Apple TV

Kaiser: The TV series The Sympathizer (2024), available on HBO; the audiobook of The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen, narrated by François Chau 

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Jay Kuo on Beijing's Gay 90s

This week on Sinica, I chat with Sulmaan Wasif Khan, professor of history and international relations at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, about his book The Struggle for Taiwan: A History of America, China, and the Island Caught Between, which comes on May 14.

4:28 — The Cairo Agreement

6:59 — General George Marshall, George Kennan, and the change in the idea of American trusteeship of Taiwan?

17:08 — The debate over the offshore islands of Kinmen and Matsu

23:55 — Mao’s evolving interest in Taiwan

27:49 — The averted crisis of 1962

32:06 — Peng Ming-min and the Taiwan independence movement

37:14 — What changed in 1971?

42:51 — The legacy of Chiang Ching-kuo

45:14 — The story of Lee Teng-hui

52:37 — The change within the Kuomintang

1:00:11 — Why Taiwan has become “sacred” for China

1:10:26 — Sulmaan’s own narrative shift

1:13:26 — Chen Shui-bian and the threat of independence referendums

1:17:53 — The Sunflower Movement

1:25:21 — The causal direction of Taiwan’s importance in the U.S.-China relationship

1:28:32 — Why the status quo shifted

1:30:51 — Drawing parallels between Taiwan and Ukraine

1:33:26 — Sulmaan’s sources for his book

1:35:38 — Agency versus structure

1:39:29 — Feedback (so far) on the new book and what’s next for Sulmaan




Recommendations:

Sulmaan: Emily Wilson’s translation of The Iliad 

Kaiser: The “My China Priors” series (and other essays), available on the Sinica Substack; Angus Stewart’s essay, “Alien Bless You: A Review of Netflix’s 3 Body Problem” 




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The Struggle for Taiwan: Sulmaan Wasif Khan of Tufts University on his new book

This week on Sinica, veteran reporter Jane Perlez, who served as bureau chief for the New York Times in Beijing until 2019, joins to discuss her new podcast series Face-Off, which explores different facets of the U.S.-China relationship. We also talk about the state of Western journalism in China in the wake of tit-for-tat expulsions of reporters from the U.S. and China that took place during the Trump administration, and the challenges of covering China well without people on the ground in country.

5:16 – How Jane Perlez got into podcasting

7:59 – The challenge of understanding Xi Jinping

12:44 – The Face-Off podcast and appealing to a general audience

19:00 – Face-Off’s interview with Zhao Tong on the nuclear issue; the importance of quality diplomacy; and debating the efficacy of the S&ED 

30:48 – The pleasure of meeting Yo-Yo Ma 

36:52 – The state of Western journalists in China, and how the situation may eventually play out 

48:44 – The difficulty of covering China from the outside 

53:52 – What’s next for Jane Perlez and the Face-Off podcast

Recommendations:

Jane: Judgment at Tokyo: World War II on Trial and the Making of Modern Asia by Gary Bass

Kaiser: The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History by Serhii Plokhy 

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Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jane Perlez on her new podcast series, Face-Off

This week on Sinica, Iza Ding, associate professor of political science at Northwestern University and author of The Performative State: Public Scrutiny and Environmental Governance in China, joins to share her ideas on how American academia has framed and problematized authoritarianism, especially when it comes to China. A deep and subtle thinker, she offers thought-provoking critiques of some of the assumptions that have become nearly axiomatic in political science and other social sciences in their approach to understanding politics in China.

3:13 – Iza Ding’s concept of “authoritarian teleology”

15:31 – The concept of authoritarian resilience 

19:58 – The question of regime legitimacy 

24:09 – The question of whether authoritarianism is an ideology 

26:24 – The China model? 

30:58 – Finding a balance between generalizability and the sui generis, and striving toward cognitive empathy and “Verstehen” 

42:04 – The state of area studies and avoiding essentialism 

49:32 – Iza Ding’s advice on how to become a better writer 

Recommendations:

Iza: The Wife of Bath: A Biography by Marion Turner — the story of Alison, the Wife of Bath in Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales 

Kaiser: the guitarist Kent Nishimura, especially his recordings of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears, “Sir Duke” by Stevie Wonder, “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic” by The Police, and “Hey Nineteen” by Steely Dan 




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Historian Andrew Liu on COVID origins: Orientalism and the "Asiatic racial form"

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