National climate

Zhu Kezhen and the framing of the atmosphere in modern China

Bibliographic Data

ID7798160
AuthorsMaria Esposito Frank (0000-0001-8333-2040, Fulbright University Vietnam, Vietnam, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume62
Issue4
Pages562-590
Publication date2024-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory of Science (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0073-2753 • E-ISSN: 1753-8564
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/00732753231157453
PMID36988139
OpenAlexW4361290397
LanguageEN
Citations received1

Can climate be Chinese, and if so, then how? Drawing on personal writings, popular discourse, and scientific reports, this essay considers the work of early Chinese meteorologists in relation to the revolutionary national politics of the early twentieth century. Historians of China have established that nationalism motivated the pursuit of meteorology and other natural sciences, but I advance the more radical position that there was no clear distinction between the practice of climate science and the political ideology that motivated it. With special attention to the career and legacy of Zhu Kezhen from the Xinhai Revolution through World War II, I test this thesis in two arenas: Chinese meteorologists’ production of spatial knowledge, and their production of cultural knowledge. The nation was integral to the questions, methods, and analyses of atmospheric science, which helped to reify the Chinese nation-state

Archaeology · China · Environmental ethics · Framing (construction) · Ideology · Nationalism · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · Chinese history and philosophy · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · History · Law · Philosophy

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