Donald Harper

Donald Harper is Centennial Professor in Chinese Studies in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations. He is also Director of Center for East Asian Studies at the University of Chicago and a member of the Creel Center for Chinese Paleography. In 1998, he published the first Western language translation of the corpus of ancient medical manuscripts from Mawangdui tomb 3, Hunan (burial dated 168 B.C.): Early Chinese Medical Literature: The Mawangdui Medical Manuscripts (London: Kegan Paul International). His research continues to focus on ancient and medieval Chinese manuscripts. Currently he is collaborating with Professor Marc Kalinowski of the Sorbonne, Paris, on the project “Books of Fate and Popular Culture in Early China,” which is a comprehensive survey of popular almanacs and their place in everyday life in China between the fourth century B.C. and second century A.D.