History Professor and Chair Gail Hershatter has been busy.
After becoming Chair of the UC Santa Cruz History department last year, she was then elected President of the Association for Asian Studies, a scholarly, non-political, non-profit professional association for all persons interested in Asia and the study of Asia.
With approximately 8,000 members worldwide, representing all the regions and countries of Asia and all academic disciplines, the AAS is the largest organization of its kind. Through its publications, online resources, regional conferences, and annual conference, the AAS provides its members with a unique and invaluable professional network. As President of the Board, Hershatter will be upholding the mission of the AAS for the 2011-2012 academic year.
In addition, Hershatter's new book, The Gender of Memory: Rural Women and China's Collective Past, was published this summer by the University of California Press. It has been warmly received by critics and colleagues. Amy Tan says, "I was swept into the world of Hershatter's Gender of Memory. Each of these oral histories is riveting and astonishing, giving a human -- and often, heartbreaking -- dimension to history. As this book shows, history is not simply recorded facts, but what is remembered by those who were once silent."Read an exerpt of The Gender of Memory on the UC Press website.
