Frederic Evans Wakeman Jr. ( zh, c=魏斐德, p=Wèi Fěidé; December 12, 1937 – September 14, 2006) was an American scholar of

East Asia East Asia is a geocultural region of Asia. It includes China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan, plus two special administrative regions of China, Hong Kong and Macau. The economies of Economy of China, China, Economy of Ja ...

n history and Professor of History at

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. He served as president of the

American Historical Association The American Historical Association (AHA) is the oldest professional association of historians in the United States and the largest such organization in the world, claiming over 10,000 members. Founded in 1884, AHA works to protect academic free ...

and of the

Social Science Research Council The Social Science Research Council (SSRC) is a US-based, independent, international nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing research in the social sciences and related disciplines. Established in Manhattan in 1923, it maintains a headqua ...

. Jonathan D. Spence said of Wakeman that he was an evocative writer who chose, "like the novelist he really wanted to be, stories that split into different currents and swept the reader along", adding that he was "quite simply the best modern Chinese historian of the last 30 years".

Biography

Wakeman was born in

Kansas City, Kansas Kansas City (commonly known as KCK) is the third-most populous city in the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Wyandotte County. It is an inner suburb of the older and more populous Kansas City, Missouri, after which it is named. As ...

, the son of best-selling novelist Frederic E. Wakeman Sr. (publishing as "Frederic Wakeman"), who often moved the family to live abroad in places like Bermuda, France, and Cuba. In the 1940s and 1950s, the family lived at 433 Isle of Palms in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He graduated from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

in 1959, where he majored in

European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD 500), the Middle Ages (AD 500–1500), and the modern era (since AD 1500). The first early Eu ...

and

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

. After Harvard, he went on to earn master's degrees from the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

and at the Institut d'études politiques in Paris. While studying at the Institut d'études politiques, he switched to Chinese studies. In 1962 he published a novel, ''Seventeen Royal Palms Drive'', under the name "Evans Wakeman". Wakeman received his Ph.D. in Far Eastern history at

, in 1965, under the supervision of Professor Joseph Levenson. That year he began teaching at Berkeley, where he remained his entire career and retired as the Walter and Elise Haas Professor of Asian Studies. Wakeman served as the director of the Institute of East Asian Studies at Berkeley from 1990 to 2001. Upon his retirement from Berkeley in May 2006, he received the "Berkeley Citation", the highest honor given at the university. His step-mother was Greek actress Ellie Lambeti, who married Wakeman Sr. in 1959.

Academic career

Starting in the early 1970s, Wakeman chaired academic committees formed to expand cultural and scholastic relations with China. In 1987, he helped draft an appeal signed by 160 American scholars calling on the Chinese government to stop oppressing intellectuals. Wakeman served as president of

in 1992 and the president of the

from 1986 to 1989. He was a member of both the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

and the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

. He was the author of ten books, seven published by the

University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...

. His first monograph, published in 1966 and based on his doctoral dissertation, was ''Strangers at the Gate: Social Disorder in South China, 1839–1861''. ''Strangers at the Gate'' focused on social disorder in the

Pearl River Delta The Pearl River Delta Metropolitan Region is the low-lying area surrounding the Pearl River estuary, where the Pearl River flows into the South China Sea. Referred to as the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area in official documents, ...

in the aftermath of the

First Opium War The First Opium War ( zh, t=第一次鴉片戰爭, p=Dìyīcì yāpiàn zhànzhēng), also known as the Anglo-Chinese War, was a series of military engagements fought between the British Empire and the Chinese Qing dynasty between 1839 and 1 ...

and extensively utilized documents seized by the British from the Guangdong-Guangxi Governor-General's office. He contributed the essay "High Ch'ing: 1683–1839" to the anthology edited by James B. Crowley, ''Modern East Asia: Essays in Interpretation'' (New York: Harcourt: 1970). With ''History and Will: Philosophical Perspectives of Mao Tse-Tung's Thought'' in 1973 he turned to philosophical and contemporary themes, and in 1975 returned to

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

China in ''The Fall of Imperial China.'' The most extensive and voluminous of Wakeman's works on the Qing is the two volume ''The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in the 17th Century'' (1985), which won the

Joseph Levenson Book Prize Joseph Levenson Book Prize is awarded each year in memory of Joseph R. Levenson by the Association for Asian Studies to two English-language books, one whose main focus is on China before 1900 and the other for works on post-1900 China. According to ...

for 1987. Organizing conferences and publishing conference volumes was also a major activity, for instance: ''Conflict and Control in Late Imperial China'' (1975), ''Shanghai Sojourners.'' (1992), and ''Reappraising Republican China'' (2000). In the mid-1970s Wakeman began to focus on the

history of Shanghai The history of Shanghai spans over a thousand years and closely parallels the development of modern China. Originally a small agricultural village, Shanghai developed during the late Qing dynasty (1644–1912) as one of China's principal tra ...

. Best known of these works are the ''Spymaster: Dai Li and the Chinese Secret Service'', and his "Shanghai Trilogy": ''Policing Shanghai, 1927–1937''; ''Shanghai Badlands, 1937–1942'', and ''The Red Star Over Shanghai, 1942–1952'' (posthumously published in Chinese). These works encompassed the city's history under the various regimes since the formation of the city, that is, the Nationalist government, Wang Jingwei's puppet regime, and the communist takeover. Wakeman retired from teaching in May 2006. He died later that year in

Lake Oswego, Oregon Lake Oswego ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Oregon, primarily in Clackamas County, with small portions extending into neighboring Multnomah and Washington counties. Population in 2020 was 40,731, an 11.2% increase since 2010, making it the ...

, of

liver cancer Liver cancer, also known as hepatic cancer, primary hepatic cancer, or primary hepatic malignancy, is cancer that starts in the liver. Liver cancer can be primary in which the cancer starts in the liver, or it can be liver metastasis, or secondar ...

at the age of 68.

References

Selected major publications

*
Strangers at the Gate; Social Disorder in South China, 1839–1861.
' (Berkeley,: University of California Press, 1966). * ed., ''"Nothing Concealed": Essays in Honor of Liu Yü-Yün'' (Taipei: Ch'engwen ch'u pan she: distributed by Chinese Materials and Research Aids Service Center, 1970). * ''History and Will; Philosophical Perspective of Mao Tse-Tung's Thought.'' (Berkeley,: University of California Press, 1973). . *
The Fall of Imperial China
'' (New York: Free Press, The Transformation of Modern China Series, 1975). . * with Carolyn Grant, eds., ''Conflict and Control in Late Imperial China.'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975). . * with U.S. Delegation of Ming and Qing Historians, ''Ming and Qing Historical Studies in the People's Republic of China.'' (Berkeley, CA: Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley, Center for Chinese Studies, China Research, 1980). . * ''The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China.'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985). 2 vols. (set). * with Wen-Hsin Yeh, eds., ''Shanghai Sojourners.'' (Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies Center for Chinese Studies, China Research Monograph, 1992). . *
Policing Shanghai, 1927–1937
'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995). . *
The Shanghai Badlands: Wartime Terrorism and Urban Crime, 1937–1941
'' (Cambridge England; New York: Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Studies in Chinese History, Literature, and Institutions, 1996).
Sample Pages
* ''Strangers at the Gate: Social Disorder in South China, 1839–1861.'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2nd paperback printing, 1997). . * with Suzhen Chen. ''Hong Ye: Qing Chao Kai Guo Shi.'' (Nanjing: Jiangsu ren min chu ban she, "Hai Wai Zhongguo Yan Jiu" Cong Shu Di 1 ban., 1998). . * with Sh Sandag, Harry H. Kendall. ''Poisoned Arrows: The Stalin-Choibalsan Mongolian Massacres, 1921–1941.'' (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000). . * with Richard L. Edmonds, ed., ''Reappraising Republican China.'' (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, Studies on Contemporary China, 2000). . * ''Spymaster : Dai Li and the Chinese Secret Service.'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003). . * ; translated as 讲述中国历史 ((Jiǎngshù Zhōngguó lìshǐ) Beijing 2008), translated by 梁禾 (Liang He).

External links

UC Berkeley Media Relations obituary
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wakeman Junior, Frederic 1937 births 2006 deaths People from Kansas City, Kansas Deaths from liver cancer in the United States 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers American sinologists Harvard College alumni Presidents of the American Historical Association Deaths from cancer in Oregon University of California, Berkeley faculty Social Science Research Council 20th-century American male writers Members of the American Philosophical Society

Biography

Academic career

References

Further reading

Selected major publications

External links