Bio

Dr Esther Sunkyung Klein (PhD Princeton, East Asian Studies) researches pre-modern Chinese historiography, philosophy, and literature. Her monograph Reading Sima Qian from Han to Song: the Father of History in Pre-modern China was published in 2019. She has also published on the authorship of the Zhuangzi, Wang Chong’s epistemology, and other issues relating to the history and transmission of ideas. Her current project focuses on approaches to truth and evidence in premodern China, including both the philosophical and historiographical traditions. Issues include methods for critical evaluation of evidence, approaches to contradiction and disagreement, and issues of bias and subjectivity in the representation of ‘truths’.