Among the prizes and awards announced at the recent meeting of the American Historical Association was the John K. Fairbank Prize in East Asian History ("offered annually for an outstanding book in the history of China proper, Vietnam, Chinese Central Asia, Mongolia, Manchuria, Korea, or Japan, substantially after 1800"). This year's award went to legal historian Matthew H. Sommer (Stanford University) for The Fox Spirit, the Stone Maiden, and Other Transgender Histories from Late Imperial China (Columbia Univ. Press, 2024). The citation:
Matthew H. Sommer’s The Fox Spirit, the Stone Maiden, and Other Transgender Histories from Late Imperial China is a landmark study that recovers the hidden lives of gender-nonconforming individuals through meticulous archival research. By combining legal, medical, and literary sources with a nuanced transgender framework, Sommer broadens the field of modern East Asian history, illuminating how embodiment, identity, and social practice shaped Qing society and redefining global conversations about gender and modernity.
Congratulations to Professor Sommer!
-- Karen Tani
