About

Welcome to my outboard brain.

My name is Kate Lingley and I’m Associate Professor of Chinese Art History in the Department of Art & Art History at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.

I work on Buddhist votive art from the Northern Dynasties period (c. 386-589, depending on how you slice it) in China, with a particular interest in the social history of religious art. I am currently working on a book manuscript on the lives of Buddhist women in medieval China, as seen through the votive monuments they dedicated. 

As a result, I do a lot of microhistory – looking closely at the monuments sponsored by ordinary people and groups of people, and learning whatever I can about their lives and intentions. More than anything, I love to unearth the stories of these people, who would otherwise be lost to history. Not all of these stories belong in my book; many of the rest of them end up here.