Stanford Humanities Center
Jeffery Chen is a PhD candidate in History at Stanford University. His work shows how illustrated press coverage of the Opium War inspired the steam age, ignited the modern era of globalization, and distorted public memory of the foundational conflict behind US-China rivalry today. He researches the intersection between technology, culture, and empire using qualitative methods from art history and international history alongside empirical data from engineering manuals and military reports. Chen’s writing has been published in The Washington Post, The Diplomat, and The Globe and Mail.
SHC Project
The First Pacific War: How Britain's Invasion of China Changed the World, 1837–1846
Chen’s project shows how iron steamships were embraced as the future of imperial warfare and global navigation only after they were marketed in illustrated news of the First Opium War as weapons of mass destruction. In the 1840s steamships were a poorly armed trial technology that did little to help a British invasion crippled throughout by natural forces. Coinciding with a disaster in Afghanistan, and responding to European fascination with the East, British press myths about an overwhelming, steam-powered victory in China gave birth to the visual news cycle and sustained experiments in long-distance postal services. Visuals of steam power at war convinced Britons and Americans that the Pacific was now a vital commercial and imperial battleground. As the culmination of European war plans going back to the 1520s, the forgotten spark of modern globalization, the years 1837-1846 are more appropriately described as the First Pacific War in history.
