recent-phds

Filed Under: recent-phds

Dongming Wu

Dongming Wu

Field: Chinese History
Advisor: Li Feng
Email: dw2595@columbia.edu

Dongming Wu is from China and received his B.A. and M.A. degrees from Sichuan University in China majoring in Chinese Literature. He started his PhD study at Columbia University since 2015. His area of concentration focuses on reconstructing the social lives in the Zhou dynasty (1045-256 B.C.E) by combining archaeological, paleographical, and textual data. His dissertation examines the southern frontier of the Zhou dynasty from the perspective of metal economy to see how economic activities contributed to social interaction and transformation on the southern frontier in Zhou China. By examining the economic activities of metal in the whole spectrum of society, he hopes to demonstrate how metal industry was organized and performed in different social levels and how it was integrated in the state policies in the Zhou dynasty.

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Filed Under: recent-phds

John Thompson

johnthompsonJohn Thompson

Field: Chinese History
Advisor: Eugenia Lean
Email: jbt2112@columbia.edu

John’s dissertation, “Air Defense and the Bombing War in China, 1932–1945,” examines the history of bombing and politics in China during the War of Resistance against Japan and the Second World War. Combining insights from political theory, the history of technology, and critical war studies, it examines how China’s Nationalist Party used air defense to build a fascist political community united in life and death, and how air defense developed into a government logic with legacies inherited by the present day. Before coming to Columbia, John received a BA in East Asian Languages and Civilizations from the University of Chicago and a MA in Regional Studies – East Asia from Harvard University.

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Filed Under: recent-phds

Tristan Revells

revells

Tristan Revells

Field: Chinese History
Advisors: Madeleine Zelin and Eugenia Lean
Email: ter2121@columbia.edu

Tristan works on the history of the renewable energy industry in China. His dissertation focuses on the dongli jiujing  biofuel program of the late 1930s and 40s, an alternative fuel program which emerged from the research of Chinese and Japanese biochemists and microbiologists in the late Qing and early Republican era. His most recent work is a digital humanities project initiated at the Science History Institute which uses 3D modeling software to rebuild China’s first large-scale ethanol plant from archival blueprints and photographs. Tristan received his BA from the University of Chicago in 2008 and studied at National Taiwan University prior to the start of his PhD.

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