Books by Naomi Standen

Investigates how frontiers worked before the modern nation-state was invented. This work offers ways of thinking about borders, loyalty, and identity in premodern China. It takes as a starting point the recognition that ""China"" did not exist as a coherent entity, neither politically nor geographically, neither ethnically nor ideologically.

We are used to the idea that each state has clearly defined borders, which cleanly separate different nationalities from one another. What, though, were frontiers like before the evolution of the modern nation state? The nine essays in this book seek to answer this question across a thousand years of Eurasian history.