Joseph Esherick (historian)

Joseph W. Esherick (Chinese name: simplified Chinese: 周锡瑞; traditional Chinese: 周錫瑞; pinyin: Zhōu Xīruì, born 1942) is an emeritus professor of modern Chinese history at University of California, San Diego. He is the holder of the Hwei-chih and Julia Hsiu Chair in Chinese Studies. Esherick is a graduate of Harvard College (1964, summa cum laude). He received his Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley (1971), under the supervision of Joseph R. Levenson and Frederic Wakeman.

In addition to publishing research monographs, Esherick published a series of essays on historiography and reviews of the large questions in modern Chinese history. As a member of the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars, for instance, Esherick in 1972 published a critique of the field and of his undergraduate professor, John K. Fairbank, "Harvard on Imperialism." Later such essays dealt with the Revolution of 1911, Chiang Kai-shek, and the Revolution of 1949.

Esherick taught at the University of Oregon before coming to UCSD in 1990. At UCSD he taught modern Chinese history, specializing in the intersection of social developments and political movements in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Esherick has chaired the program in Chinese Studies, served as chair of the Advisory Committee of the Institute for International, Comparative and Area Studies (IICAS) and received (together with Paul Pickowicz) the 2003 Chancellor's Associates Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching. Beyond UCSD, he serves on the editorial boards of the China Quarterly, Modern China, Asia Major, and China Review International.

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