Xiaofei Gao

This dissertation project undertakes a historical examination of maritime Manchuria, in order to explore role of seaborne interactions in shaping historical processes of social, commercial, and cultural exchange that transcend the boundaries of nation-states across the long twentieth century. The project probes the ways that seaborne activities intensified processes of integration in East Asia, while introducing differentiation within coastal communities and promoting degradation of the marine environment and violence. The underlying argument of this work is that much nation building, region making, as well as marine environmental transformation, was dependent on the seas and those who made their living from them along the Manchurian coast and what I am calling the "Bohai/Yellow Sea Rim."