Review: The Borders of Chinese Architecture

Book Review| June 01 2024 Review: The Borders of Chinese Architecture Nancy Shatzman Steinhardt. The Borders of Chinese Architecture. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2022, 448 pp. , 158 b/w illus. 57 (cloth), ISBN 9780674241015 Wei-Cheng Lin Wei-Cheng Lin University of Chicago Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians (2024) 83 (2): 237–238. https: //doi. org/10. 1525/jsah. 2024. 83. 2. 237 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures Review: The Borders of Chinese Architecture. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 1 June 2024; 83 (2): 237–238. doi: https: //doi. org/10. 1525/jsah. 2024. 83. 2. 237 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentJournal of the Society of Architectural Historians Search A leading scholar in her field, Nancy Shatzman Steinhardt continues to enrich our understanding of China's long-standing building tradition by expanding the spectrum and scope of the discipline. Over the past ten years, she has employed different perspectives across her many publications, but taken together, these works all address a fundamental issue: how Chinese architecture endured through millennia without significant change. Or, as Steinhardt states in her most recent book, The Borders of Chinese Architecture, Chinese architecture's "adherence to an ancient building system into the nineteenth century had to have an explanation" (22). In this volume, Steinhardt looks beyond China's borders to offer a refreshing repositioning of the question. In her introduction, the author first asks her readers to look closely at eight photographs juxtaposed on four consecutive pages; each photo shows the façade of a wooden building. All of the buildings pictured have features of traditional Chinese architecture,. . . You do not currently have access to this content.