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Anne A. Csete
I love studying history because learning about the past teaches me more about how to understand the serious issues facing us – especially environmental degradation, military conflicts, injustice and poverty. Studying history also helps me to understand where I come from as an individual (I did one history project on my own Hungarian immigrant family) and how we as a nation and global community have ended up where we are now. But the bottom line is, I find the study of history enjoyable. I love the stories in history—I come from a long line of story-tellers, and history is full of great stories. Luckily, I chose to concentrate on China, with a recorded history of over 5,000 years, so I am sure I will be able to spend a lifetime studying it without running out of good stories!
Here at St. Lawrence I teach survey courses in Early and Modern East Asia (Japan, China, Korea, and Southeast Asia), Modern Japan, Early and Modern China, Asian women's history, and a course on Japan and the U.S. during World War II. Since 2004 I have also been teaching in the Modern Languages and Literatures department as their elementary mandarin Chinese instructor. I have always loved libraries and lecture halls, reading, studying and learning. I love how many opportunities there are at a university to explore. For example, I sing in the Early Music Ensemble in our Music Department, and have just started taking clarinet lessons here also. I studied Russian for a year in the Modern Languages Department. Someday I’d like to take a course in Astronomy… When I am not working, I am usually home with my two horses, Sally and Casey, or in my flower garden, where my three cats are good at lazing around in the catnip patch showing me the virtues of not working too hard!
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I am from the Finger Lakes Region of New York State. I graduated from the State University of New York at Oswego with a B.A. in Non-Western History. My PhD is from the University of Buffalo in Chinese History, and my specialization is Early Modern China. I was lucky enough as a graduate student to spend three years as an exchange student in China, where I studied the language, did my dissertation research, and traveled to various places from Kashgar to Hainan to Manchuria. My dissertation was on the history of the Li people of Hainan Island, one of China’s ethnic minorities. All of my research still focuses on the history of this beautiful island. During my sabbatical in 2003 I spent a semester in Kong Kong teaching and studying. There I had time to read and translate Tang and Song poetry, which has developed into a hobby of mine. 
