Prof. Joshua Fogel will hold chair worth $1.4 million
TORONTO, April 22, 2005 -- Joshua Fogel, one of the world’s leading scholars of modern Asian studies, has been awarded a Canada Research Chair worth $1.4 million and will begin his work at York in July. The announcement was made today in Winnipeg by the Honourable David Emerson, Minister of Industry, responsible for the Canada Research Chairs Program.
“The creation of this new Chair builds on York’s renowned research strength in international studies, and our specific regional strength in Asia-Pacific,” said Stan Shapson, Vice-President Research & Innovation at York University. “The federal government’s investments into university research are crucial to sustaining York’s globally competitive research programs and to attracting the world’s best researchers and students.”
Right: Joshua Fogel on the Great Wall of China
Fogel’s research focuses on the importance of Japan in China’s modern development. As Canadian Research Chair in the History of Modern China at York, Fogel will continue to advance the study of modern China through a pan-Asian lens. His research will be enhanced by the York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR), which provides an interdisciplinary focus for the study of Asia.
A specialist in Chinese-Japanese cross cultural connections, Fogel has translated a number of important texts from Chinese and Japanese into English, which reveal changing Chinese attitudes towards Japan (and vice versa) from the fourteenth through to the 19th century. The history of modern China cannot be fully or properly understood, Fogel maintains, without examining the dynamic cultural, political, and economic interactions between the countries over the last two centuries.
Fogel, who received his PhD in history from Columbia University, comes to York from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he has taught since 1989. Fogel was also visiting professor at the Institute for Research in the Humanities, Kyoto University, from 1996 to 1997 and visiting Mellon Professor in East Asian Studies at the School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Studies, in Princeton, New Jersey, from 2001 to 2003.
York University’s current relationship with China is built has upon a long history of close academic ties at both the institutional and individual levels. The Chair will advance the University’s objective to fortify and expand these international partnerships. Professor Fogel’s links with institutions in China and Asia can be expected to lead to opportunities for further development of partnerships and collaborations for York and for Canada.
York University is the leading interdisciplinary research and teaching university in Canada. York offers a modern, academic experience at the undergraduate and graduate level in Toronto, Canada’s most international city. The third largest university in the country, York is host to a dynamic academic community of 50,000 students and 7,000 faculty and staff, as well as 180,000 alumni worldwide. York’s 10 faculties and 21 research centres conduct ambitious, groundbreaking research that is interdisciplinary, cutting across traditional academic boundaries. This distinctive and collaborative approach is preparing students for the future and bringing fresh insights and solutions to real-world challenges.
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Melissa Hughes, Media Relations, York University, 416-736-2100 x 22097 / mehughes@yorku.ca
