About
The Ricci Insitute for Chinese-Western Cultural History at Boston College is an internationally renowned research center for the study of Chinese-Western cultural exchange.
What We Do
With a focus on the Jesuit missions of the 16th–19th centuries and the history of Christianity in China and East Asia, the Institute supports research on a diverse range of interests:
- Chinese and East Asian history and relations with Europe
- the influences of China and Europe on each other
- Eastern and Western religion, culture, and philosophy
- science and technology, including astronomy, cartography, and medicine
Visiting scholars from around the world meet here to examine these and many other topics in languages ranging fromLatin, Portuguese, Italian, French, and Spanish to Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Manchu. We regularly host meetings, symposia, conferences, and workshops, and every summer our visiting scholars and research fellows-in-residence speak at our weekly seminars on their topic of study.
We provide scholars with timely and high-quality service for their research and academic collaborations with other colleagues and institutions. Whether you're a graduate student or a faculty member continuing your research, we offer our entire library and scholarly network to you.
People
M. Antoni J. Ucerler, S.J., D.Phil., Oxon
Director & Provost's Fellow
Fr. M. Antoni J. Ucerler, S.J. received his doctorate from the University of Oxford and his Bachelor of Sacred Theology from the Gregorian University in Rome. His academic focus is on the relationship between Europe and East Asia in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries with an emphasis on Christianity in Japan and comparative studies of the Jesuit mission in Japan and China. He has authored and edited multiple works, including Christianity and Cultures: Japan & China in Comparison, 1543–1644 (2009) and The Samurai and the Cross: The Jesuit Enterprise in Premodern Japan (2022).
Xiaoxin Wu 吳小新, Ed.D.
Director of Research
Dr. Xiaoxin Wu received his Ed.D. in International and Multicultural Education from the University of San Francisco. His research focus is on the history of Christianity and Christian education in China, as well as archival resource development for the study of these topics. His recent publications include: Encounters and Dialogues: Changing Perspectives on Chinese-Western Exchanges from the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries (Institut Monumenta Serica, 2004), Christianity in China: A Scholar's Guide to Resources in the Libraries and Archives of the United States, 2nd ed. (M.E. Sharpe, 2009), and 中國基督宗教史料叢刊 (Collections of Historical Sources on Christianity in China, 2011–2014).
Mårten Söderblom Saarela
Special Collections Librarian
Dr. Mårten Söderblom Saarela is a historian of early modern and modern China. His research sofar has focused on language in history, especially the Manchu language in the Qing empire butmore recently also Chinese missionary linguistics in the twentieth century. His books include The Early Modern Travels of Manchu: A Script and Its Study in East Asia and Europe (2020), The Manchu Language at Court and in the Bureaucracy under the Qianlong Emperor (2024), and, with He Bian, The Manchu Mirrors and the Knowledge of Plants and Animals in High Qing China (2025).
Ginny Greeley
Editorial and Academic Program Administrator
Virginia (Ginny) Greeley is the Editorial and Academic Program Administrator. Previously, she worked at Boston College's Institute for Advanced Jesuit Studies and the Institute of Jesuit Sources as its Fiscal and Operations Administrator. There, she assisted in the publication of fifteen monographs, two symposia, six academic programs, and fifteen online academic presentations, which hosted over 6,450 participants. She is also the Editor and Secretary of the Benedict XVI Institute for Africa, where she assisted in the publication of two books and three conference proceedings. Ginny earned a Master's Degree in English from Boston College and her research interest is in theology in literature.
Frederik Vermote, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of History at California State University, Fresno, and Affiliated Research Fellow of the Ricci Institute. He received his BA and MA from KU Leuven and his Ph.D. from the University of British Columbia in 2013.
Prof. Vermote studies European relations with Ming-Qing China, Jesuit history, and economic and cultural networks between China, Europe, and the Americas of the early modern period. His current focus is on Jesuit financial networks between China and Europe during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His recent publications include London: The Selden Map and the Making of a Global City, 1549–1689 and “The Qing Empire and the Excluded Middle: The Role of the Jesuit Intermediaries during the Treaty of Nerchinsk” in the text From Chinggisid to Qing: Empire in Asia: A New Global History, Vol. 1 (2016).
Lauren Arnold
An independent scholar with degrees in history and art history from the University of Michigan, she has taught and lectured widely on East-West artistic contact and influences. Her works include Princely Gifts and Papal Treasures: the Franciscan Mission to China and its Influence on the Art of the West, 1250–1350 (San Francisco: Desiderata Press, 1999).
Dr. Arnold has also explored the world of carpets, rugs, and the symbolism found upon them in lectures from London to Armenia.
Her latest work is a chapter entitled "Christianity in China: Yuan to Qing Dynasties, 13th-20th Centuries" which appears in a new publication, Christianity in Asia: Sacred Art and Visual Splendour, a beautifully illustrated catalog of an exhibition mounted by the Asian Civilisations Museum in Singapore.
Fr. Robert Carbonneau, C.P.
Former Executive Director of the U.S. Catholic China Bureau (USCCB) and an Affiliated Research Fellow of the Ricci Institute, Fr. Carbonneau is a Passionist priest and serves as the Archivist for the Passionist China Collection (PCC), an archive of over 100,000 documents, photographs, reports, films, and correspondence.
Fr. Robert Carbonneau received his Ph.D. in American and East Asian History from Georgetown University and has taught U.S., Chinese, Japanese, world, and Catholic mission history, and frequently gives classes and lectures on the Catholic Church in China and on the use of missionary archives as untapped sources for research. He currently teaches at the University of Scranton. From 2007 to 2008 he taught in Chongqing, China. An expert on the Passionist China mission to twentieth century Hunan, Fr. Robert continues to hold the position of Passionist Historian and Archivist.
Joseph Tsang 曾永燊
Associate Researcher at the Ricci Institute, an Affiliated Research Fellow and Independent Scholar at the Ricci Institute. Mr. Tsang’s research topics include the inculturation of Catholic doctrine in a Chinese environment and the history of ritual and custom in traditional Chinese religious practice.
Mr. Tsang has presented his studies of traditional Chinese funerary and memorial practices of worship and respect from a Catholic perspective at the Ricci Institute Summer Research Seminar, including examples found in various Chinese communities, and raised questions of terminology and development that are of particular interest to younger generations of Chinese Christians. He is currently studying Chinese doctrinal texts written by European Jesuits during the Ming and Qing periods and analyzing their relationship to traditional local practices.
Current Visitors
MA Nan 馬楠
MA Nan 馬楠 (Joint Visiting Fellow 2025-2026, Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History, Boston College, and Harvard-Yenching Institute; Postdoctoral Researcher, Jinan University)
Dr. Ma Nan’s research focuses on religious encounters and cultural translationbetween Christianity and East Asian traditions. Her current work examines theMarian–Guanyin nexus in China, Japan, and the Philippines, exploring how visualforms, devotional practices, and everyday religious experiences enabled processes ofcross-reading across cultural and doctrinal boundaries. By analyzing images, rituals,and local devotional settings, her research highlights how believers renderedunfamiliar sacred figures emotionally and functionally intelligible while maintainingtheological distinctions. More broadly, her work investigates mechanisms of religiousadaptation, circulation, and mutual interpretation in the history of Sino-Westernexchange.
Former Visitors
Shu Wei-Ping 許維萍, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Chinese Classics and Literature at Tamkang University in Taipei and a Ricci Institute Visiting Research Fellow. Prof. Shu’s study of the Chinese text Yijing 易經 (or Classic of Changes) led to her studies in Manchu and the Jesuit interpreters of this text for the Kangxi emperor.
Prof. Shu recently presented her research on the French Jesuit Joachim Bouvet’s lessons at a lecture at Fudan University in Shanghai. Prof. Shu was the lead scholar for a 2017 joint research project between the Ricci Institute and Tankang University, which includes an analysis of Malatesta-Robinson papers, a unique collection of Chinese manuscripts that once belonged to the famous British collector, Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872) concerning the Jesuit China mission and the Rites controversy.
Dong Shaoxin 董少新, Ph.D.
Professor of History and Associate Director of the National Institute for Advanced Humanistic Studies at Fudan University, Shanghai, and was Fulbright Scholar-in-residence at the Ricci Institute for the 2015-2016 academic year.
Prof. Dong Shaoxin is a leading scholar in Chinese-Western cultural history. His publication Between Body and Soul: A History of Western Medicine in China during the 16th -18th Centuries 行神之间: 早期西洋医学入华史稿 (2008) was recognized by China's Ministry of Education in 2013. His wide-ranging research includes the 17th century Portuguese Jesuit António de Gouvea, the influence of Western medical missions between 1807 and 1911, and traditional medicine and modernization in China.
In November 2016 he presented a paper on Western documents concerning the Ming-Qing dynastic change at the conference “Encounter and Communication: East-West Cultural Exchange since Matteo Ricci.”
Peter Park, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of History at the University of Texas-Dallas and a Ricci Institute Visiting Scholar, his research at the Ricci Institute related to his study of German Orientalism, comparative linguistics, and German and French Enlightenment thinkers’ views on China.
Dr. Park’s presentation at the Ricci Institute Summer Research Seminar was entitled "Cornelius de Pauw’s Natural History of the Chinese, or How a Minor 'Philosophe' Shattered the Image of China”; in it, he contrasted positive European images of China as illustrated in Jesuit reports with the highly negative impressions of Cornelius de Pauw (1739-1799), a controversial Dutch philosopher and ethnologist.
Dr. Park is the author of Africa, Asia, and the History of Philosophy: Racism in the Formation of the Philosophical Canon, 1780-1830, winner of the 2016 Frantz Fanon Prize for Outstanding Book in Caribbean Thought.
Cai Yongliang 蔡永良, Ph.D.
Professor of Linguistics at the Shanghai Maritime University 上海海事大學 and Research Fellow at the Ricci Institute. Prof. Cai’s research concerns methods of language learning and adaptation with a focus on mission schools in late Imperial and early Republican China. His presentation during the 2015 Summer Seminar “Language Politics in Missionary Higher Education in China" compared language teaching policies adopted by St. John's University in Shanghai and contrasted them with Cheeloo University in Shandong Province during the Republican Era in early 20th century China.
Prof. Cai’s research on language and linguistics is now reaching farther back into historical sources documenting Jesuit and other missionary attempts at Chinese language acquisition during the late Ming and early Qing period, their awareness of local dialect and writing practices, and the overriding importance of learning Chinese for the mission enterprise.
2019 Ricci Doctoral Fellows
LIU Yifu 刘奕夫
LIU Yifu 刘奕夫 (2019 Ricci Doctoral Fellow, Ph.D. candidate,
Princeton University).
Mr. Liu’s research examines the motives and
methods of the French Jesuits revealed in the “Essai sur l'Architecture
Chinoise,” perhaps the first theoretical treatise on Chinese architecture in a Western language. The text reveals the unique role of the Jesuits as agents of cultural exchange between East and West and their accurate accounts of Chinese civilization through architectural designs. Mr. Liu explores the Jesuit vision of China in 18th-century France through the visual production of art, architecture, and technology.
LEE Songhee 이송희 (李松熙)
LEE Songhee 이송희 (李松熙) (2019 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,
Ph.D. candidate, Korea University, Seoul).
Ms. Songhee Lee’s research examines different editions of Ricci's essential text, Tianzhu shiyi 天主實義 (True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven) and competing aims of MEP and Jesuit missionaries in mid-late 19th-century China and Korea. Ms. Songhee Lee analyzes the influential role of Jesuit books, such as Ricci’s Tianzhushiyi, in China and Korea, as well as their effect on Christian thought, language, and interpretation in late Joseon culture.
LEE Jae-shin 이재신 (李在信)
LEE Jae-shin 이재신 (李在信) (2019 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,
Ph.D. candidate, Fudan University).
Mr. Jae-Shin Lee’s research analyzes Francisco Furtado 傅汎際 (1578-1653) and Li Zhizao's 李之藻 (1565-1630) Huanyouquan 寰有诠, a Chinese translation of Aristotle’s De Caelo. His research explores the reasons and consequences of Furtado’s inserting Huanyouquan Volume 1, which discusses theological topics such as the demonstration of the divine existence, omnipotence of God, and creation of the world in the Bible. He tries to investigate the transformation of “Location of faith” and “Faith time” in the Christianity tradition from a post-missionary perspective.
2019 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellows
Daniel Phillip CANARIS, Ph.D
Daniel Phillip CANARIS, Ph.D. (2019 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow,Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou).
Dr. Canaris’ research analyzes thehistory of accommodation of Christianity with Confucian doctrines andrituals through the pioneering work of Michele Ruggieri 羅明堅, S.J.(1543–1607). Dr. Canaris delves deeper into the inception of the Chinamission by examining the first European work printed in Chinese,Ruggieri’s Tianzhu shilu 天主實錄 (True Record of the Lord of Heaven).He explores how Ruggieri appealed to shared ethical perspectives that inhis view were not culturally contingent but universally valid and portrayedhis missionary activity as the fulfillment of Confucian norms.
WU Hsin-Fang 吳欣芳, Ph.D.
WU Hsin-Fang 吳欣芳, Ph.D. (2019 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow, Institute ofHistory and Philology, Academia Sinica, Taiwan).
Dr. Wu Hsin-fang’s researchexamines a ten-year debate over the authorship of a two-volume book, Histoire dela mission de Pékin, published in 1923 and 1925. Dr. Wu explores the decadelong debate over the authorship of this notoriously anti-Jesuit text and therevelation that the author was the Lazarist China missioner, Jean-Marie VincentPlanchet 包士傑, C.M. Her research looks into the details of the investigationssurrounding this book in the 1920s, and how it dragged the missionaries in China,Chinese Christians, and the Vatican into a revival of intra-order conflicts overtheir interpretations of the past.
WANG Xueying 王雪迎, Ph.D.
WANG Xueying 王雪迎, Ph.D. (2019 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow,Loyola University Chicago).
Dr. Wang Xueying’s research explores thewritings of the 17th-century convert Yan Mo 嚴謨, among the mostprolific Chinese writers of the Chinese Rites Controversy. Yan Mo wroteseveral treatises to defend Chinese ancestral rites and observation of theprotocols of filial piety, at the request of Jesuit missionaries. Dr. WangXueying argues that Yan makes special contributions to the debate bydrawing attention to filial piety as the underpinning principle of ancestralrites. Her research focuses on the Chinese Rites Controversy through aconcentration of works by the Chinese Christian literati and the theologyof inculturation as conceived through the use of Chinese classicaltraditions.
2018 Ricci Doctoral Fellows
LUO Fusheng 羅福生
LUO Fusheng 羅福生 (2018 Ricci Doctoral Fellows, Ph.D. candidate,University of Michigan–Ann Arbor).
Mr. Luo Fusheng’s researchexamines the treaty-port property regime that emerged in Guangzhou andShanghai in the second half of the nineteenth century. As part of hisdissertation topic “Land Markets, Semi-Colonial Law, and ChineseIndustrialization in Shanghai and Guangzhou, 1830-1950” Mr. LuoFusheng uses archival materials, including land deeds, from the CantonDiocese housed at the Ricci Institute in order to detail the hybridcontractual form of property acquisition used by the Paris ForeignMissions Society (MEP) during the Republican period.
Anna STROB
Anna STROB (2018 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, Ph.D. candidate,Universität Tübingen, Germany).
Ms. Anna Strob’s research analyzes theintroduction of Aristotelian terminology by Alfonso Vagnone’s Kongji gezhi空際格致, written in 1633, to Late Ming China. Her research exploresVagnone's rendering of Aristotelian terminology expressing concepts rootedin late Renaissance thought and how it resonated with the philosophicalconcepts of Chinese readers of the period. Ms. Anna Strob’s findingspropose a more nuanced evaluation of Jesuit translation strategy and theirapproach to the cultural and intellectual atmosphere of late Ming China.
JIANG Qingfan 蔣晴梵
JIANG Qingfan 蔣晴梵 (2018 Ricci Doctoral Fellows, Ph.D. candidate,Columbia University, NYC).
Ms. Jiang Qingfan’s research is an analysisof the reception and response to Western music and music theory atKangxi’s court during the 18th century. As part of her dissertation topic“Missionaries, Musical Knowledge, and the Making of Encyclopedias inEighteenth-Century China and Europe” Ms. Jiang Qingfan focuses onThomas Pereira's Lülü Zuanyao 律呂纂要 in order to synchronize musicalform to the broader context of the Chinese origin of Western learning inthe early Qing dynasty.
YIN Peng 尹鵬
YIN Peng 尹鵬 (2018 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,Harvard University).
Mr. Yin Peng’s research provides an in-depthanalysis that combines Ricci's linguistic sensitivity and textualsophistication alongside his bold theological innovations. Mr. Yin Pengdiscusses how Ricci's deft translations provide a complex reworking of theThomist account of the interlocking of intellect and will and creatively redescribed the chief theological and cardinal virtues of "caritas" and"iustitia" in terms of 仁 (ren) and 義 (yi). His research positions MatteoRicci as a model for comparative religious ethics.
2018 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellows
YU Yating 余雅婷, Ph.D.
YU Yating 余雅婷, Ph.D. (2018 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow,Kansai University, Osaka).
Dr. Yu Yating’s research provides a detailedanalysis on the Dicionário Português-Chinês 葡漢辭典 by Matteo Ricci andMichele Ruggieri. Dr. Yu Yating examines the fundamental role thatlanguage, lexicography, and semantics played in cultural encountersbetween Jesuits and Ming and Qing China. Her research provides analysisinto the Jesuit China mission, East-West exchange, and the foundations ofSinology.
SOH JeanHyoung 소진형 (蘇眞瑩), Ph.D.
SOH JeanHyoung 소진형 (蘇眞瑩), Ph.D. (2018 Luce Post-DoctoralFellow, Seoul National University).
Dr. Soh JeanHyoung’s researchexamines Matteo Ricci’s Jihe yuanben 幾何原本(1607) and FranciscoFurtado’s Minglitan 名理探 (1631), which are derived from theCommentaria in Euclidis elementa Geometrica and the CommentariiCollegii Conimbricensis Societate Jesu in Universam Dialecticamrespectively. Dr. Soh JeanHyoung explores the influence of these texts inChina and Korea, as well as the transmission and reception of Aristotle’slogic in East Asia. Her research takes note of the differing conceptualapproaches in establishing Aristotelian logic in the Chinese intellectualsphere, offering further insights into the Jesuit struggle to adjust toChinese linguistic and cultural conventions.
CHEN Yanrong 陳妍蓉, Ph.D.
CHEN Yanrong 陳妍蓉, Ph.D. (2018 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow,Katolieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL), Belgium).
Dr. Chen Yanrong’sresearch analyzes the indigenous term Shengjing 聖經 and its evolvingreferents from the sixteenth century until its current understanding as aChristian term. Dr. Chen Yanrong examines the reception of the Bible andits role in building a Christian textual community in late imperial China.Her research provides a nuanced rethinking of the role of the Bible inChina.
Steve PIERAGASTINI
Steve PIERAGASTINI (2018 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow, BrandeisUniversity/post Ph.D. Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles).
Dr. Steve Pieragastini’s research examines the competing aims and interestsof the French Jesuits in Shanghai. Pieragastini evaluates the greater impactsfrom issues of religion, property, and governance on Jesuit Chinese relationsduring the turbulent period of 1842-1957. His research positions the FrenchJesuits experience in Shanghai as representative of the larger role of theCatholic Church in modern Chinese and global history.
2017 Ricci Doctoral Fellows
Heeyoung CHUNG
Heeyoung CHUNG (2017 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, Ph.D. candidate,Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley).
Ms. Heeyoung Chung’s researchexplores the early Korean contacts with the Catholic Church and thedevelopment of women’s consciousness in late Joseon Korea. Ms. HeeyoungChung discusses the impact of the yangban 양반 class, the influence of bookswritten in Chinese by Jesuit missionaries, and the Silhak 실학 (實學) movementon women scholars. Her research focuses on women scholars such as ImYunjidang 任允摯堂 (1721-1793) to highlight the influences stemming fromKorea’s contact with the Catholic Church.
GUO Sheng-ping 郭勝平
GUO Sheng-ping 郭勝平 (2017 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, Ph.D. candidate, Emmanuel College, University of Toronto).
Mr. Guo Sheng-ping’s researchdiscusses the historical issues of Christianity and the Catholic Church as theyinteracted with Confucianism in the late Ming dynasty. Mr. Guo Sheng-pingexamines accommodations by Matteo Ricci and his colleagues regarding lineagepatterns of conversion, ancestral worship rituals, and the religiosity ofConfucianism. His research analyzes the complex relationship of Christianity andthe Catholic Church with Confucianism, and the differing lineages thatcontinue from the 16th century to the present.
Florin-Stefan MORAR, Ph.D.
Florin-Stefan MORAR, Ph.D. (2017 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,Ph.D. candidate, Harvard University/Assist. Prof. post Ph.D. 2019City University of Hong Kong).
Florin-Stefan Morar’s researchexamines the history and meaning of "The Map of Observing theMysteries of the Heaven and Earth," a 1603 world map in eight panels bythe Ming dynasty military official Li Yingshi 李應試 based on MatteoRicci's 1602 version. His research observes the map’s inclusion of OldManchu text added to several key segments as illustration of the process ofknowledge circulating between China and early modern Europe. Mr.Florin-Stefan Morar’s research analyzes cartographic works made throughcollaboration between European Jesuit Savants and Chinese scholarsthrough the lens of the global history of science.
WANG Xiliang 王喜亮
WANG Xiliang 王喜亮 (2017 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow Ph.D.candidate, Fudan University).
Mr. Wang Xiliang’s research focuses on thereciprocal effects of books between Christian missionaries and Chineseliterati in Ming China. He examines the adapted art, imagery, andterminologies of the Jesuit Missions of the late Ming and early Qingdynasties found in the illustrated works of Dias and Aleni. Mr. WangXiliang further explores the negative use of these images and the Chinesereaction against Christianity in the texts Poxie ji 破邪集 and Budeyi 不得已.
2017 Malatesta Research Fellowship
MO Wei 莫為
MO Wei 莫為 (2017 Malatesta Research Fellow, Ph.D. candidate,Shanghai Normal University).
Ms. Mo Wei’s research is titled “TheDisappeared and Never Disappearing T'ou-Sè-Wè: Historical Remains fromMemory of T'ou-Sè-Wè Orphanage.” Her research examines the history,foundation, and contributions of the Jesuit workshops to Shanghai culture.Ms. Mo Wei traces the careers of several of the most illustrious of graduatesfrom the orphanage and the lasting influence they had on Chinese art.
2017 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellows
Joseph HO, Ph.D.
Joseph HO, Ph.D. (2017 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow, Albion College).
Dr.Joseph Ho’s research explores the vernacular visual practices of AmericanChristian missionaries in modern China and Taiwan. Dr. Joseph Ho observes thephotographic technology and visual practices of the 20th century to draw outconcepts of American missionary conceptualizations of China and Taiwan. Hisresearch takes an in-depth examination of the complex contexts and relationshipsbetween camera, subject, and culture.
CHEN Xinyu 陳欣雨
CHEN Xinyu 陳欣雨 (2017 Luce Post-Doctoral Fellow,Beijing Administrative College, China).
Dr. Chen Xinyu’s researchfocuses on the relationship between Christianity and Yijing during the QingDynasty. Dr. Chen Xinyu provides details into the history of the Zhalancemetery, established in honor of Matteo Ricci in 1614, and continued up tothe present day. Her research closely examines the Chinese and Latin textson the 63 surviving cenotaphs and provides an overview of the considerablevariation in their contents and details.
2016 Ricci Doctoral Fellows
Giuseppe MARINO, Ph.D.
Giuseppe MARINO, Ph.D. (2016 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain/University of Tokyo/postPh.D.–Fudan University).
Dr. Giuseppe Marino’s research analyzes a1588 fifteen-page list of items designed to function in complex and evencontradictory ways to be acquired in Europe and presented to the emperorof China. The 1588 handwritten note was signed by Alessandro Valignanoand delivered by Michele Ruggieri. This largely forgotten manuscriptmarks a crucial point in the China mission. Dr. Marino’s research analyzesthe symbolic purpose of these selected items and provides evidenceseveral of the objects were in fact presented to the Court, as revealed in amemorial by Matteo Ricci.
XIE Mingguang 謝明光, Ph.D.
XIE Mingguang 謝明光, Ph.D. (2016 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,Beijing Foreign Studies University).
Dr. Xie Mingguang’s researchexamines the textual history of Della entrata della compagnia di Giesù eChristianità nella Cina to De Christiana Expeditione apud Sinas susceptaab Societate Iesu. Dr. Xie Mingguang explores this famous work based onthe Italian manuscript of Mattteo Ricci, its compilation and publication inLatin by Nicholas Trigault, and the role of Niccolò Longobardi’s differingopinions on the Jesuit China mission.
Daniel CANARIS, Ph.D.
Daniel CANARIS, Ph.D. (2016 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, Ph.Dcandidate, University of Sydney/post Ph.D. – Sun Yat-sen University,Guangzhou).
Mr. Daniel Canaris’ research discusses the theologicalsignificance of Vico’s discussion of Confucianism in the 1725, 1730 and1744 editions of the Principi di Scienza Nuova. Mr. Daniel Canarisexamines the imagined role of the Scythians as ancestors of the Chinese,and broader influence such interpretations had on the Chinese Ritescontroversy, and Jesuit accommodations.
2015 Ricci Doctoral Fellows
John A. Lindblom
John A. Lindblom (2015 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, University ofNotre Dame).
Mr. John Lindblom’s research focuses on the religiouswritings of Wu Jingxiong 吳經熊 (John C.H. Wu, 1899-1986). Mr. JohnLindblom introduces the life of John Wu (Wu Jingxiong 吳經熊), afamous jurist and writer of the early 20th century China. His researchexamines Wu Jingxiong’s translation of the Bible into classical Chinese ascommissioned by Chiang Kai-shek. Mr. John Lindblom particularlyanalyzes the uniqueness of Wu Jingxiong’s Chinese translation of thePsalms and New Testament.
CHEN Yufang 陈玉芳, Ph.D.
CHEN Yufang 陈玉芳, Ph.D. (2015 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow,University of Macau).
Dr. Chen Yufang’s research examines the ChinaJesuits’ strategy of pursuing imperial toleration during the late Ming andearly Qing period. Her research analyzes the assorted methods used byimperial court Jesuits to secure the acceptance of the Catholic Church inChina during the late Ming and early Qing periods.
Giulia Falato, Ph.D.
Giulia Falato, Ph.D. (2015 Ricci Doctoral Research Fellow, Ph.D.candidate, University of Rome “La Sapienza”/post Ph.D. University ofOxford). Dr. Giulia Falato’s research analyzes in-depth the Italian JesuitAlfonso Vagnone’s S.J. (1566 –1640) Tongyou Jiaoyu 童幼教育 (On theEducation of Children).
Ms. Giulia Falato examines the sources whichinfluenced Vagnone’s work to highlight the connection between late Mingeducation and Western Renaissance chreia and pedagogy from the late16th to the early 17th centuries.
Donald L. Baker, Ph.D.
Fall 2018 EDS-Stewart Chair
Professor in Korean History and Civilization, Dr. Baker’s research focuses on classical Joseon dynasty history, with a special focus on philosophical, religious, and scientific change since 1700. He also studies contemporary Korean history, including memory and trauma with regard to the Kwangju Resistance in May 1980 in South Korea. He is also one of the most eminent specialists on the history of Korean Christianity. Co-editor of the Sourcebook of Korean Civilization and editor of Critical Readings on Korean Christianity, he is also the author of Chosŏn hugi yugyo wa ch’ǒnjugyo ŭi taerip [The Confucian confrontation with Catholicism in the latter half of the Joseon dynasty] (1997), Korean Spirituality (2008), and Catholics and Anti-Catholicism in Chosŏn Korea (2017). Dr. Baker helped the Ricci Institute to organize an international symposium in Canada on “Life & Death in the Missions of New France and East Asia: Narratives of Faith & Martyrdom” (2018).
Laura Hostetler, Ph.D.
Fall 2016 EDS-Stewart Chair
Professor of History at the University of Illinois, Chicago, Dr. Hostetler's research deals with imperial encounters and ethnography in modern Chinese history. Her publications include: Qing Colonial Enterprise: Ethnography and Cartography in Early Modern China (University of Chicago Press, 2001) and The Art of Ethnography: A Miao Album of Guizhou Province (University of Washington Press, 2005). In addition to her own research, Dr. Hostetler co-chaired an international symposium on cartography and cultural exchange at the Ricci Institute in April 2016. The EDS-Stewart Chair is awarded to distinguished scholars of cross-cultural encounters between China and the West.
Fr. Edward J. Malatesta, S.J.
Sr. Mary Celeste Rouleau, R.S.M.
Theodore N. Foss, Ph.D.
The Ricci Institute was founded at the University of San Francisco in 1984 by Fr. Edward J. Malatesta, S.J. (1932-1998), Theodore N. Foss, Ph.D. (born 1950), and Sr. Mary Celeste Rouleau, R.S.M. (1926-2008).
The Institute traces its origins to Fr. Francis Rouleau, S.J. (1901-1984), who taught at the Jesuit Theologate in Shanghai and lived in China from 1929 until 1952. Fr. Rouleau, along with Fr. Thomas Carroll, S.J., had for many years collected and studied materials on early Sino-Western cultural contacts at the Sacred Heart Center in Los Gatos and originally called their endeavor the Sino-Jesuit History Project, with a focus on the Chinese Rites Controversy. After the untimely death of Fr. Carroll, Fr. Edward Malatesta joined Fr. Rouleau to continue the project. Fr. Rouleau’s niece, Sr. Mary Celeste Rouleau, also joined the project as archivist.
In 1982 Fr. Malatesta secured offices at the University of San Francisco’s Lone Mountain Campus and the project archives were moved to the new location. Dr. Theodore N. Foss, Ph.D, joined the team and brought his personal archives to enhance the collection.
The day after Fr. Rouleau's death in 1984, Fr. Malatesta, Dr. Foss, and Sr. Celeste founded the Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History (ICWCH) with the intention of continuing and broadening the long Jesuit tradition of Sinological research. This aim was greatly facilitated by the arrival of the Chinese Library of the Society of Jesus (Bibliotheca Sinensis Societatis Iesu) in 1985, which had been compiled in Hong Kong over many years by the Chinese-Peruvian Jesuit, Fr. Albert Chan, S.J., a Harvard-trained historian of China’s Ming dynasty.
As the Institute grew and worldwide scholarly interest in the field dramatically increased, in 1990 the name was officially changed to the Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History, better reflecting our approach to research and our international connections with students, scholars, and academic institutions.
The Ricci Institute relocated to Boston College in the fall of 2021, with a view to expanding its outreach to graduate students and senior researchers.
Visit
The Ricci Institute is located on Boston College’s Brighton Campus (2125 Commonwealth Avenue), where we moved in 2022. Researchers who want to make use of our collections are invited to consult our library catalog and make an appointment.
Boston College faculty are very welcome to bring their students to us for a class visit. We kindly ask you to fill out this form, and we will be in contact shortly.