Books by Hilde De Weerdt

By the late eleventh century the Song court no longer dominated production of information about itself. Hilde De Weert demonstrates how the growing involvement of the literati in publishing such information altered the relationship between court and literati in political communication for the remainder of the Chinese imperial period.

De Weerdt examines how occupational, political, and intellectual groups shaped curricular standards and examination criteria during the Southern Song dynasty (1127-1279), and how these standards in turn shaped political and intellectual agendas. This book reframes the debate over the civil service examinations and their place in the imperial order.