Public Lecture

Many Words for Tea and One Very Special Bowl for Tea

by Victor H. Mair

Thursday 19 February 2009 at 7.00 p.m.

@

The Lecture Room, The Peranakan Museum, 
39 Armenian Street, Singapore

Through study of the words for Camellia sinensis in various languages, it is possible to trace the history of tea as it spread across the globe from its homeland in Asia. A brief inscription on a bowl from the Belitung Shipwreck found off the coast of Indonesia will be elucidated for its importance in the cultural history of tea.

Speaker’s profile

Victor H. Mair, Professor of Chinese Language and Literature
Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations
University of Pennslyvannia, Philadelphia, USA.

Together with Erling Hoh, a Swedish journalist, Professor Victor has spent the last three years researching and writing a book on the true history of tea. Although this is a subject that he has been interested in for the last 25 years and more, he has been collecting materials on it all along. His interest in tea bowls is part of his larger interest in the history of tea.