Seal element of the university of freiburg in the shape of a clover

Prof. Dr. Daniel Leese

Portrait of Daniel Leese

University of Freiburg
Chinese History

Internal Senior Fellow
October 2018 – July 2019

E-Mail: daniel.leese@sinologie.uni-freiburg.de

Last Update: 31.08.2019

Curriculum Vitae

I am a historian working on modern China with a special emphasis on the history of the 20th century. I received my MA from the University of Munich in 2003, after having previously studied history, sinology, and economics at the Universities of Marburg and Peking. My PhD thesis on the Cultural Revolutionary cult of Mao Zedong was completed in 2006 at International University Bremen. I spent extended periods of time in the People’s Republic of China and in Hong Kong to gather the relevant source materials from archives and flea markets. Between 2006 and 2012, I taught Chinese history and politics, as well as Chinese and Manchu language, at the University of Munich with brief stints as visiting professor at the University of Freiburg. Since April 2012, I have been professor of Chinese history and politics at the University of Freiburg. My current research interests are devoted to questions of historical justice in the immediate post-Mao period, which is also the focus of my current ERC-funded project on “The Maoist Legacy: Party Dictatorship, Transitional Justice, and the Politics of Truth”. Other research interests include information flows within the party state, digital humanities approaches, and the history of Manchuria.

Selected Publications

FRIAS Project