History or mythology first?
Hello Lazlo, My method of study is usually to start at the beginning of beginnings. To build a basic mythological knowledge of a culture, and then move onto the earliest recorded history. As with most cultures I've studied, one usually precedes and anticipates the other. I.e. reading Mesopotamian archeology or history prior to diving into the biblical stories. Having recently read Chinese Mythology: An Introduction by Anne Burrills, I see now that Chinese history and mythology are not so linear. As you speak about in your first podcast on the Three Soveriegns and Five Emporers, the origin story of Pangu 盘古 was written down fairly recently and as with other chinese myths, is not the only creation myth and may have come from one of the many peoples that made up China's early cultural geography. This question is very subjective I'm sure, but could you be so kind as to recommend a direction or method of study that you have found useful to gain a "from the ground up" perspective of Chinese History and Mythology. My undergraduate was in 20th century Chinese history. As such I'm looking to fill the holes in an efficient manner. Thank you Paul
Do you listen to other podcasts while you work on the CHP.
I find that podcasts are great for passing the time while driving, exercising, etc, but I'm a little bit torn on listening to podcasts while studying/researching. I find it hard to concentrate when I'm hearing words from the podcast, as I'm also trying to read words for my studies. I'm curious to know if you have a similar feeling!
Hi Laszlo, what places in China haven’t you been to yet that you’d like to visit?
Hi Laszlo, what places in China haven’t you been to yet that you’d like to visit? I've always thought about going traveling to that part of the world, but obviously the pandemic has made that difficult to do, but once everything is safer, I definitely am planning on making that trip. I'm sure you've been all over China, but I have to imagine there's some places that even you haven't been to yet?