Reception from 3:30pm to 4:00pm; talk from 4:00pm to 5:15pm
The International History Seminar invites you to a presentation by Odd Arne Westad, Elihu Professor of History at Yale University and a renowned scholar of modern international and global history.
Prof. Westad will present his new book project in progress, The Hinge: James Bruce and the Remaking of Empire, on the Caribbean, settler colonialism in Canada, ‘gunboat diplomacy’ in East Asia, and the restructuring of empire in India after the revolt of 1857 through a life of James Bruce, Eighth Earl of Elgin (b. 1811-d. 1863; Governor of Jamaica, Governor General of Canada, High Commissioner in China and Japan. and Vice-Roy of India). Following the presentation, IHS co-convenor Lydia Walker will offer brief comments.
Due to space limitations and our goal of keeping sessions like this smaller and more interactive, please RSVP as soon as possible; only the first 30 respondents will be able to attend, and will have their participation confirmed when they are sent Prof. Westad’s paper by via email by Hayes Chair Graduate Associate Cam Givens.
BIO
Odd Arne Westad is a scholar of modern international and global history, with a specialization in the history of eastern Asia since the 18th century. He studied history, philosophy, and modern languages at the University of Oslo before doing a graduate degree in US/international history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he primarily worked with Michael H. Hunt. Westad has published sixteen books, most of which deal with twentieth century Asian and global history. In the first part of his career, he was mainly focused on the history of the Cold War, China-Russia relations, and the history of the Chinese civil war and the Chinese Communist Party. Since the mid-2000s, he has been concerned with more general aspects of post-colonial and global history, as well as the modern history of China. Key works from this period are The Global Cold War, which argues for ways of understanding the Soviet-American conflict in light of late- and post-colonial change in Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean; Restless Empire, which discusses broad trends in China’s international history since 1750; and The Cold War: A World History, which summarizes the origins, conduct, and results of the conflict on a global scale. Today, Westad is mainly interested in researching histories of empire and imperialism, first and foremost in Asia, but also world-wide. He joined the faculty at Yale where he is Elihu Professor of History after teaching at the London School of Economics and at Harvard University. He is a fellow of the British Academy and of several other national academies.
This is an International History Seminar Event.
If you are interested in attending this semester’s events and joining the International History Seminar, please send an email confirming your interest to the Hayes Chair Graduate Research Associate, Cam Givens at hayeschairgra@osu.edu, and you will be included on the mailing list going forward. Select materials can only be pre-circulated to those who have signed up.
