Speaker: Prof. Jenny Huangfu Day, Skidmore College

Moderator: Prof. David Cheng Chang, HKUST

Abstract

Historians construct narratives from fragmented and often contradictory sources — but in an era of digital archives, online databases, and growing restriction on archival access, the process of research and writing history can look and feel quite different from just a decade or two ago. In this session, Professor Jenny Huangfu Day reflects on the intellectual and practical challenges and opportunities of archival research, especially at the intersection of diplomatic and legal history. Drawing from case studies in her forthcoming book, she shares how research questions take shape in response to conflicting sources, and how archival work, particularly in diplomatic and legal contexts, demands both interpretive rigor and interdisciplinary methodology. 

Bio

Jenny Huangfu Day is Professor History and the Francis Tang ‘61 Chair of China Studies at Skidmore College. She is the author of Qing Travelers to the Far West: Diplomacy and the Information Order in Late Imperial China and Transborder Fugitives, Extradition, and Political Crimes in Modern China.