Martin Gimm, Der Fall Prinz Rong im Prozeß gegen den Jesuitenpater Adam Schall in den Jahren 1664/65 in China. Sinologica Coloniensia, 36. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2018. 126 S. Abbildungen, Quellen- und Literaturverzeichnis, Index. € 38 (HB). ISBN 978-3-447-10985-7

Abstract

histories in favor of defining that elusive and unifying – if now unnamed – “Chineseness.” In the next layer up, we encounter, among other thorny interpretive questions, Smith’s embrace of China anthropologist James Watson’s notion of orthopraxy from circa 1985 (and still much debated in the subfield of Chinese religion), which was grounded in the structural anthropology of the 1980s. Juxtaposed to that on the topmost layer is Smith’s newer definition of culture as varied and dynamic, if constrained by past patterns and precedent. And thus, debates in the field dating back to the mid-1980s nestle alongside the newest research, including Smith’s own on encyclopedias for daily use (riyong leishu), as well as synopses of the work of many others, generating at times a mild cognitive dissonance. The most jarring “fossil” from this evolving survey of the Qing, though, is Smith’s invocation of traditional China in contrast to the modern, which intriguingly was not part of the title in the first two editions, even though the rubric of the tradition/modern dichotomy was. To be sure, the field has not come to consensus on a suitable alternative to “traditional” China. Some historians use late imperial China, others early modern; and Smith’s insights on the continuing traces of Qing (and Chinese) rhetoric and practice in the modern era are well taken. That label of traditional, however, still has the tendency to render static everything before China’s encounter with the West. At the very least, a more robust discussion of his choice to use such a fraught label in the China context, as well as the scholarship on the ways in which the concept of tradition is invented in tandem with the advent of the modern, might have been warranted. Smith’s Qing Dynasty and Traditional Chinese Culture nevertheless represents an incredible repository of knowledge about Qing China. He has woven together for the field multiple generations of history and scholarship. The encyclopedic scope (and readability) of the volume makes it an eminently valuable sourcebook for specialists and general audiences; I imagine it might be especially useful to the new assistant professor first preparing lectures for a survey course.