Category: Uncategorized
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Weekly Wanderings: April 13, 2025
Good morning and happy Sunday from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where I’ve spent the last few days. The centerpiece of my trip was yesterday’s Milwaukee Half Marathon, but I seized the opportunity to work in some extra time in another new-to-me city. I’ve eaten some really good food (though no cheese curds; not yet, at least), toured…
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Weekly Wanderings: March 30, 2025
Baseball is back! Amid a constant deluge of news about the Trump Administration’s infuriating decisions, anxiety-producing moves, and ridiculous justifications for both (see links below for all of the above), I’m making space in my schedule for Phillies games and holding on to the hope that this is the year they manage a World Series…
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Weekly Wanderings: February 16, 2025
No links or recommendations from me this week, for two reasons: BUT, today is the 20-year anniversary of my first arrival in China so I’ve decided to re-share an essay I wrote in 2015 about that initial trip. Thanks for joining me this week. Ten Years Ago In China I landed in Beijing on February 16,…
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Weekly Wanderings: December 15, 2024
Syria, Korea, China, pandas, pizza, museums, hockey, Rancho Gordo beans—this reading round-up is jam-packed and truly has something for just about everyone. It’s also my final reading round-up of 2024, as I’m going to publish some holiday-themed posts next week and the following. Thanks for joining me this week! Recommendations Events in Syria Rania Abouzeid,…
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Weekly Wanderings: May 12, 2024
New this week: my review for the China Quarterly journal of Shanghai Tai Chi: The Art of Being Ruled in Mao’s China, by historian Hanchao Lu. Lu’s first book, Beyond the Neon Lights, was one of the works that set me off on the path of studying Shanghai’s history, so it was exciting to read…
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Weekly Wanderings: In Like a Lion Edition
• I’m spending the first few days of March visiting my family in Philadelphia, which means I got to experience a wild winter storm on Friday. Forecasts predicted high winds and lots of rain, with a bit of snow at the tail end. Instead, heavy, wet flakes began coming down around 11am and continued until…
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LA Review of Books China Blog: Documenting Public Space in China
I haven’t been blogging much lately—life, work, and longer-term projects need to come first right now—but finally got a chance a few weeks ago to sit down and write a post for the LA Review of Books China Blog. This is one that I’d been meaning to write for months, ever since seeing two excellent…
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So, What’s Next?
“How’s your dissertation going?” and “So, what’s next?” are the two questions I’ve been asked the most over the past year. Now that I’m very nearly free of the first (I spent much of today dealing with paperwork to file the dissertation so my PhD can be conferred next month), here are my many responses…
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Time for a New Look
Scroll down for photos of my new purple hair, nose piercing, and panda tattoo! Just kidding. I’m not the one with a new look—though I could probably use a haircut—this website is. I decided to take some time today and finally make a few changes I’d been planning for a while. Major aspects of this…
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The Circle of Mercy Is Timeless
I have not worn my high-school ring in close to fourteen years. There was a time when I never took it off: from the day I received it in March 1999, through the summer after graduation the following year, I wore it every single day, the thick gold band on my finger a weighty, comforting…
Maura Elizabeth Cunningham 