Mariana Zorkina is a PhD candidate at the Asien-Orient-Institut, Zurich University (Switzerland). She received her MA in Asian and African Cultures at the St. Petersburg State University (Russian Federation) with a project on reflection of Daoism in literature of Imperial China. Currently, she studies Tang 唐 (618–907）poetry with a special interest in: 1. the poetic usage of objects in shi 詩 poetry and the boundary between ‘poetic’ and ‘profane’ objects, 2. the notion of ‘things’ wu 物 and its development in Early and Medieval China, its interconnection with compilation of topical encyclopaedias leishu 類書 and the genre of ‘poems on things’ yongwushi 詠物詩, 3. computational analysis of language patterns in Tang dynasty Chinese poetry. She is also the founder of the Methods in Sinology project and serves as a board member and editor in Digital Orientalist.
Research Project: The imagery of Tang ‘poems on things’ (yongwushi 詠物詩)
Dates of Affiliation: Aug. 1, 2023 to Jan. 31, 2024; May. 1, 2024 to Oct. 31, 2024
Tang poetry, history of leishu encyclopaedias, digital humanities
