Kyoungjin Bae

My dissertation examines cultural and epistemic exchanges between Europeans and Chinese in the material culture of the Sino-European furniture trade between 1730-1830. Focusing on three major participants in the trade - British, Dutch, and Cantonese - I examine plural forms of transmission, adaptation, and resilience in the cultural, technical, and botanical knowledge that traveled with the furniture across Eurasia. By showing how Europeans and Chinese co-produced and co-domesticated the arboreal and craft knowledge, object designs, and concepts of bodily comfort that surrounded the manufacture, shipping, and consumption of furniture, my dissertation will unveil the multilayered identities of objects situated at the juncture of the global trade and its local markets.