Joseph F. Fletcher, Jr., usually referred to as Joseph Fletcher (1934–1984), was an American historian of China and Central Asia and a professor in the

East Asian Languages and Civilizations Department East Asian studies is a distinct multidisciplinary field of scholarly enquiry and education that promotes a broad humanistic understanding of East Asia past and present. The field includes the study of the region's culture, written language, histo ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

. His main areas of research included interaction between the Islamic and Chinese worlds, Manchu and Mongol studies.

Biography

Fletcher graduated from

in 1957. He received his PhD from Harvard's Department of Far Eastern Languages in 1965, and became an assistant professor within the department a year later. In 1972, he was appointed professor of Chinese and Central Asian History. Fletcher died on June 14, 1984, at the age of 49. He died from complications due to cancer.

Personal life

Fletcher was the son of

Joseph Fletcher Joseph Francis Fletcher (April 10, 1905 in Newark, New Jersey - October 28, 1991 in Charlottesville, Virginia) was an American professor who founded the theory of situational ethics in the 1960s, and was a pioneer in the field of bioethics. Flet ...

, an ethicist. Fletcher had two children. His son i
Edward Fletcher
who played Sixth Officer

James Paul Moody James Paul Moody (21 August 1887 – 15 April 1912) was the sixth officer of the and the only junior officer to die when the ship sank on her maiden voyage. Early life James Paul Moody was born in Scarborough, England, on 21 August 1887, t ...

Titanic (1997 film) ''Titanic'' is a 1997 American epic film, epic romance film, romance and disaster film directed, written, produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. Incorporating both historical and fictionalized aspects, it is based on accounts of the Sinking ...

Notable works

Joseph Fletcher contributed several chapters (" Ch'ing Inner Asia, c. 1800", and others) to vol. 10 of

The Cambridge History of China ''The Cambridge History of China'' is a series of books published by the Cambridge University Press (CUP) covering the history of China from the founding of the Qin dynasty in 221 BC to 1982 AD. The series was conceived by British historian Den ...

: * Joseph Fletcher's posthumously published work, ''The Naqshbandiyya in Northwest China'' (Variorum, 1995), remains one of the main English-languages sources on the introduction of

Sufism Sufism ( ar, ''aṣ-ṣūfiyya''), also known as Tasawwuf ( ''at-taṣawwuf''), is a mystic body of religious practice, found mainly within Sunni Islam but also within Shia Islam, which is characterized by a focus on Islamic spirituality, r ...

into China, and is extensively cited by practically all books in English on

Islam in China Islam has been practiced in China since the 7th century CE.. Muslims are a minority group in China, representing 1.6-2 percent of the total population (21,667,000- 28,210,795) according to various estimates. Though Hui people, Hui Muslims are the ...

published since then.

References

External links

The Joseph Fletcher Memorial Lecture
biography and bibliography.

American sinologists Historians of Islam Harvard University faculty 1934 births 1984 deaths 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers Mongolists Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni Historians of Central Asia 20th-century American male writers {{Islamic-scholar-stub