BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Sabre//Sabre VObject 4.5.8//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Zurich X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/Zurich TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/Zurich BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 TZNAME:CEST DTSTART:19810329T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0200 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:CET DTSTART:19961027T030000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT UID:news2242@dg.philhist.unibas.ch DTSTAMP;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20250226T090935 DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20250327T161500 SUMMARY:Why did Macartney fail? The historiography of Britain’s 1793 emba ssy to China DESCRIPTION:The Macartney Embassy of 1793 is famous as the start of Anglo-C hinese diplomatic relations. Lord Macartney failed to achieve any of his n egotiating aims\, and a long tradition of historians have used it to illus trate the failures of the Qing dynasty to acknowledge the rising power of the West: Demanding that Lord Macartney kowtow to the emperor and rejectin g the gifts that would have demonstrated the importance of the European sc ientific revolution. In this lecture Henrietta Harrison will look at how t his interpretation came into being and why it has been so popular\, showin g that it reflects both British justifications for imperial expansion in C hina in the nineteenth century and early twentiethcentury Chinese revoluti onary critiques of Confucianism.\\r\\nHenrietta Harrison is Professor of C hinese History at the University of Oxford. Her research uses micro-histor y and oral history approaches to explore the lives of ordinary people in C hina from the Qing dynasty until today. Her most recent book is the award- winning monograph “The Perils of Interpreting: The Extraordinary Lives o f Two Translators between Qing China and the British Empire” [https://p ress.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691225456/the-perils-of-interpretin g?srsltid=AfmBOoppt75v5rHmoX5ZhlXcBc58L92V5JWUIQWMs1FbzANOsISQjxFG](Prince ton University Press\, 2021).\\r\\nOrganisation: Prof. Dr. Nadine Amsler\, Department of History\, University of Basel\\r\\nContact: fnz-sekretariat -geschichte@unibas.ch [mailto:fnz-sekretariat-geschichte@unibas.ch] X-ALT-DESC:

The Macartney Embassy of 1793 is famous as the start of Anglo -Chinese diplomatic relations. Lord Macartney failed to achieve any of his negotiating aims\, and a long tradition of historians have used it to ill ustrate the failures of the Qing dynasty to acknowledge the rising power o f the West: Demanding that Lord Macartney kowtow to the emperor and reject ing the gifts that would have demonstrated the importance of the European scientific revolution. In this lecture Henrietta Harrison will look at how this interpretation came into being and why it has been so popular\, show ing that it reflects both British justifications for imperial expansion in China in the nineteenth century and early twentiethcentury Chinese revolu tionary critiques of Confucianism.

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Henrietta Harrison is Professor of Chinese History at the University of Oxford. Her research uses micro-h istory and oral history approaches to explore the lives of ordinary people in China from the Qing dynasty until today. Her most recent book is the a ward-winning monograph “The Perils of Interpreting: The Extr aordinary Lives of Two Translators between Qing China and the British Empi re” (Princeton University Press\, 2021).

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Organisation: Prof. Dr. Nadine Amsler\, Department of History\, University of Basel

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C ontact: fnz-sekretar iat-geschichte@unibas.ch

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