Thomas S. Mullaney's Books

The Chinese Computer

A Global History of the Information Age

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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The Chinese Computer

A Global History of the Information Age

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

The fascinating, untold story of how the Chinese language overcame unparalleled challenges and revolutionized the world of computing. A standard QWERTY keyboard has a few dozen keys. How can Chinese—a language with tens of thousands of characters and no alphabet—be input on such a device? In The Chinese Computer, Thomas S. Mullaney sets out to resolve this paradox, and in doing so, discovers that the key to this seemingly impossible riddle has given rise to a new epoch in the history of writing—a form of writing he calls “hypography.” Based on fifteen years of research, this pathbreaking history of the Chinese language charts the beginnings of electronic Chinese technology in the wake of World War II up through to its many iterations in the present day. Mullaney takes the reader back through the history and evolution of Chinese language computing technology, showing the development of electronic Chinese input methods—software programs that enable Chinese characters to be produced using alphanumeric symbols—and the profound impact they have had on the way Chinese is written. Along the way, Mullaney introduces a cast of brilliant and eccentric personalities drawn from the ranks of IBM, MIT, the CIA, the Pentagon, the Taiwanese military, and the highest rungs of mainland Chinese establishment, to name a few, and the unexpected roles they played in developing Chinese language computing. Finally, he shows how China and the non-Western world—because of the hypographic technologies they had to invent in order to join the personal computing revolution—“saved” the Western computer from its deep biases, enabling it to achieve a meaningful presence in markets outside of the Americas and Europe. An eminently engaging and artfully told history, The Chinese Computer is a must-read for anyone interested in how culture informs computing and how computing, in turn, shapes culture.

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Page Count

372

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262047519

ISBN 13

9780262047517

The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

How Chinese characters triumphed over the QWERTY keyboard and laid the foundation for China's information technology successes today. Chinese writing is character based, the one major world script that is neither alphabetic nor syllabic. Through the years, the Chinese written language encountered presumed alphabetic universalism in the form of Morse Code, Braille, stenography, Linotype, punch cards, word processing, and other systems developed with the Latin alphabet in mind. This book is about those encounters—in particular thousands of Chinese characters versus the typewriter and its QWERTY keyboard. Thomas Mullaney describes a fascinating series of experiments, prototypes, failures, and successes in the century-long quest for a workable Chinese typewriter. The earliest Chinese typewriters, Mullaney tells us, were figments of popular imagination, sensational accounts of twelve-foot keyboards with 5,000 keys. One of the first Chinese typewriters actually constructed was invented by a Christian missionary, who organized characters by common usage (but promoted the less-common characters for “Jesus" to the common usage level). Later came typewriters manufactured for use in Chinese offices, and typewriting schools that turned out trained “typewriter girls” and “typewriter boys.” Still later was the “Double Pigeon” typewriter produced by the Shanghai Calculator and Typewriter Factory, the typewriter of choice under Mao. Clerks and secretaries in this era experimented with alternative ways of organizing characters on their tray beds, inventing an input method that was the first instance of “predictive text.” Today, after more than a century of resistance against the alphabetic, not only have Chinese characters prevailed, they form the linguistic substrate of the vibrant world of Chinese information technology. The Chinese Typewriter, not just an “object history” but grappling with broad questions of technological change and global communication, shows how this happened. A Study of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute Columbia University

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Page Count

501

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262536102

ISBN 13

9780262536103

Where Research Begins

Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You (and the World)

By: Thomas S. Mullaney,Christopher Rea

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Where Research Begins

Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You (and the World)

By: Thomas S. Mullaney,Christopher Rea

Plenty of books tell you how to do research. This book helps you figure out WHAT to research in the first place, and why it matters. The hardest part of research isn't answering a question. It's knowing what to do before you know what your question is. Where Research Begins tackles the two challenges every researcher faces with every new project: How do I find a compelling problem to investigate—one that truly matters to me, deeply and personally? How do I then design my research project so that the results will matter to anyone else? This book will help you start your new research project the right way for you with a series of simple yet ingenious exercises. Written in a conversational style and packed with real-world examples, this easy-to-follow workbook offers an engaging guide to finding research inspiration within yourself, and in the broader world of ideas. Read this book if you (or your students): have difficulty choosing a research topic know your topic, but are unsure how to turn it into a research project feel intimidated by or unqualified to do research worry that you’re asking the wrong questions about your research topic have plenty of good ideas, but aren’t sure which one to commit to feel like your research topic was imposed by someone else want to learn new ways to think about how to do research. Under the expert guidance of award-winning researchers Thomas S. Mullaney and Christopher Rea, you will find yourself on the path to a compelling and meaningful research project, one that matters to you—and the world.

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Page Count

219

Publisher

University of Chicago Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0226817350

ISBN 13

9780226817354

Coming to Terms with the Nation

Ethnic Classification in Modern China

By: Thomas Mullaney

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Coming to Terms with the Nation

Ethnic Classification in Modern China

By: Thomas Mullaney

Studies China's "Ethnic classification project" (minzu shibie) of 1954, conducted in Yunnan province.

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256

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520262786

ISBN 13

9780520262782

Coming to Terms with the Nation

Ethnic Classification in Modern China

By: Thomas Mullaney

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Coming to Terms with the Nation

Ethnic Classification in Modern China

By: Thomas Mullaney

Studies China's "Ethnic classification project" (minzu shibie) of 1954, conducted in Yunnan province.

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256

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520262786

ISBN 13

9780520262782

The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas Shawn Mullaney

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The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas Shawn Mullaney

How Chinese characters triumphed over the QWERTY keyboard and laid the foundation for China's information technology successes today.

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501

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262340771

ISBN 13

9780262340779

The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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The Chinese Typewriter

A History

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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501

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262536102

ISBN 13

9780262536103

The Chinese Computer

A Global History of the Information Age

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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The Chinese Computer

A Global History of the Information Age

By: Thomas S. Mullaney

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Page Count

372

Publisher

MIT Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0262047519

ISBN 13

9780262047517

Where Research Begins

Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You (and the World)

By: Thomas S. Mullaney,Christopher Rea

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Where Research Begins

Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You (and the World)

By: Thomas S. Mullaney,Christopher Rea

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Page Count

216

Publisher

University of Chicago Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

022680111X

ISBN 13

9780226801117

Letters of Thomas E. Thomas

By: Thomas E. Thomas

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Letters of Thomas E. Thomas

By: Thomas E. Thomas

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

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Page Count

172

Publisher

Wentworth Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0526974427

ISBN 13

9780526974429

Journals of Thomas H. Hobbs

By: Thomas Hobbs

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Journals of Thomas H. Hobbs

By: Thomas Hobbs

A valuable account of life in the South Written between 1840, when the diarist was fourteen years old, and 1862, when he died serving the Confederate States of America.

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Page Count

288

Publisher

University Alabama Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0817312897

ISBN 13

9780817312893

Book's by Thomas S. Mullaney

The Chinese Computer

The Chinese Computer

The Chinese Typewriter

The Chinese Typewriter

Where Research Begins

Where Research Begins

Coming to Terms with the Nation

Coming to Terms with the Nation

Coming to Terms with the Nation

Coming to Terms with the Nation

The Chinese Typewriter

The Chinese Typewriter

The Chinese Typewriter

The Chinese Typewriter

The Chinese Computer

The Chinese Computer

Where Research Begins

Where Research Begins

Letters of Thomas E. Thomas

Letters of Thomas E. Thomas

Journals of Thomas H. Hobbs

Journals of Thomas H. Hobbs

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