Frederic Evans Wakeman, Jr. (; December 12, 1937 – September 14, 2006) was an American scholar of

East Asia East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both geographical and ethno-cultural terms. The modern states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. China, North Korea, South Korea ...

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 land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

. 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. Founded in 1884, the AHA works to protect academic freedom, develop professional s ...

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 today maintains ...

Jonathan D. Spence Jonathan Dermot Spence (11 August 1936 – 25 December 2021) was an English-born American historian, sinologist, and writer who specialized in Chinese history. He was Sterling Professor of History at Yale University from 1993 to 2008. His mo ...

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, abbreviated as "KCK", is the third-largest 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 of ...

, 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 Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

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 to AD 1500), and the modern era (since AD 1500). The first early ...

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 prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to ...

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

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

and at the

Institut d'études politiques An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations ( research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes can ...

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 "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 (abbreviation: AAA&S) 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, a ...

and the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

. 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 facul ...

. 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 (PRD; ; pt, Delta do Rio das Pérolas (DRP)) 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-Ma ...

in the aftermath of the

First Opium War The First Opium War (), also known as the Opium War or the Anglo-Sino War was a series of military engagements fought between Britain and the Qing dynasty of China between 1839 and 1842. The immediate issue was the Chinese enforcement of the ...

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 imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...

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 t ...

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 tr ...

. 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 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 (starts in liver) or secondary (meaning cancer which has spread from elsewhere to th ...

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 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