Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society
print


Breadcrumb Navigation


Content

RCC Strengthens Ties With Renmin University in Beijing

Delegation Visits Center for Ecological History and Conducts Field Trip

01.07.2014

The Center for Ecological History (CEH) at Renmin University, Beijing, China was founded in 2012. From the beginning there were close links between the CEH and the RCC.

The Honorary Director of the Center, Donald Worster, was a fellow of the RCC, and so was Prof. Hou Shen, the Deputy Director. RCC Director Chistof Mauch gave a speech at the opening of the Center. Since then the relationship between the two centers has deepened: Mauch was made an Honorary Professor at Renmin University and an Honorary Fellow of the Center in 2013, and Dr. Agnes Kneitz, graduate of the Carson Center’s Doctoral Program, was named an Assistant Professor in World History in the same year. In addition, the Director of the CEH, Prof. Xia Mingfang, has just joined the Carson Center as a fellow.

The two centers organize annual worshops with participants from all over the world and with a strong contingent of Chinese fellows. Last year’s workshop was dedicated to the topic “Disasters Wet and Dry” and a workshop in June 2014 dealt with the topic of “The City and the Country”.

china1

(Participants in the 2014 Workshop The Country and the City. Front Row Center: Renmin University’s President Chen Yulu; right, Christof Mauch; left, William Cronon, Dean Huang Xingtao, Center Director Mingfang Xia.)

As part of the workshop "The Country and the City", all participants visited a village three hours from Beijing. It was impossible to get to the village by bus, and the village had likely seen very few international visitors. 

china2

(Village of the Wangs, Yangyuan county, Zhangjiakou City, Hebei province.)

china3

(Inhabitants of the village.)

After the trip, Bill Cronon, Don Worster, and Christof Mauch were invited by the President of Jiangxi University for Finance and Economics (JUFE) in Nanchang on a field trip through Jiangxi Province, southwest of Beijing.
They visited Jiujiang city, Xunyang pagoda, Hukou county, the Poyang Lake, the Yangzi River, Wuyuan, the county of ancient villages, Sanqingshan Mountain, and Yingtan City.

china5

(Don Worster, Christof Mauch, and William Cronon reenacting an ancient Chinese play in the Sanqingshan mountains.)

In addition, three leading environmental historians from Beijing are currently in residence at the Rachel Carson Center:

Finally, as a result of these collaborations, Christof Mauch has been named to the International Academic Advisory Board of the New Center for International Environmental History at Peking Universty.

The RCC would like to thank the CEH at Renmin University and the President of JUFE. We look forward to many more collaborations.