American Philosophical Society
Member History

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Residency
Resident (1)
Class
Subdivision
402b (1)
1Name:  Dr. Victor H. Mair
 Institution:  University of Pennsylvania; Hangzhou University
 Year Elected:  2007
 Class:  4. Humanities
 Subdivision:  402b
 Residency:  Resident
 Living? :   Living
 Birth Date:  1943
   
 
Victor H. Mair, Professor of Chinese Language and Literature in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1976. He also holds an M.Phil. degree from the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London). He has been teaching at the University of Pennsylvania since 1979. Professor Mair specializes in Buddhist popular literature as well as the vernacular tradition of Chinese fiction and the performing arts. Among his chief works in these fields are Tun-huang Popular Narratives (1983), Painting and Performance: Chinese Picture Recitation and Its Indian Genesis (1988), and T'ang Transformation Texts: A Study of the Buddhist Contribution to the Rise of Vernacular Fiction and Drama in China (1989). He is also the author, editor, or translator of numerous other books and articles on Chinese language, literature, and culture. Throughout the 1990s, Professor Mair organized an interdisciplinary research project on the Bronze Age and Iron Age mummies of Eastern Central Asia. Among other results of his efforts during this period were three documentaries for television (Scientific American, NOVA, and Discovery channel), a major international conference, numerous articles, and The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West (2000, with J.P. Mallory). Professor Mair is the founder and editor of Sino-Platonic Papers, General Editor of the ABC Chinese Dictionary Series at the University of Hawaii Press, and series editor for Encounters with Asia at the University of Pennsylvania Press. He has been a fellow or visiting professor at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study (2004, 2008), the University of Hong Kong (2002-2003), the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton, 1998-1999), the Institute for Research in Humanities (Kyoto University, 1995), Duke University (1993-1994), and the National Humanities Center (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, 1991-1992).
 
Election Year
2007 (1)