Brian Lander, Assistant Professor of History and Environment and Society at Brown, will be launching his book The King’s Harvest on Dec. 9 at 4:00 PM in the Pavilion Room at Peter Green House. The conversation will feature professors Tamara Chin, Bathsheba Demuth, and Graham Oliver, and light refreshments will be served from 5:00 to 5:30.

Yale University Press description of The King’s Harvest:

“This book is a multidisciplinary study of the ecology of China’s early political systems up to the fall of the first empire in 207 BCE. Brian Lander traces the formation of lowland North China’s agricultural systems and the transformation of its plains from diverse forestland and steppes to farmland. He argues that the growth of states in ancient China, and elsewhere, was based on their ability to exploit the labor and resources of those who harnessed photosynthetic energy from domesticated plants and animals. Focusing on the state of Qin, Lander amalgamates abundant new scientific, archaeological, and excavated documentary sources to argue that the human domination of the central Yellow River region, and the rest of the planet, was made possible by the development of complex political structures that managed and expanded agroecosystems.”