Dr. Thorben Pelzer is Assistant Professor of Digital Humanities at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. His research and teaching explore the intersection of computational humanities and the history of science and technology, focusing on spatial, network, and data-driven approaches to modern Chinese history. Before joining HKUST, he coordinated the restructuring of the China Centre at Kiel University and served as Senior Researcher at the Research Centre Global Dynamics at Leipzig University.
Pelzer received his PhD in Chinese History from Leipzig University. His work includes the monograph Engineering Trouble: U.S.–Chinese Experiences of Professional Discontent, a landmark study of transnational professional cooperation in Republican China. He is also co-author of 100 Karten über China [100 Maps about China], a widely circulated volume with over 10,000 copies printed. Pelzer held a JSPS postdoctoral research fellowship at Keio University in Tokyo and undertook invited research stays at MIT, Renmin University, and Aix-Marseille University.
An active figure in both research and academic administration, Pelzer serves as board member and treasurer of the German China Studies Association (DVCS) and is co-editor of its annual yearbook. His digital scholarship includes open-access infrastructures such as the "Chinese Engineers Relational Database" and "PASTWAY," a simulation platform for historical transport and mobility. His publications have appeared, for example, in Twentieth-Century China, in East Asian Science, Technology and Society, and in peer-reviewed volumes with De Gruyter on elites, infrastructures, and technocracy in modern China.
Research Interests
Republican China; global/transnational history; social history; history of science and technology; mobility studies; digital humanities; network analysis; spatial analysis; historical GIS
Representative Publications
Selected monographs
Engineering Trouble. U.S.–Chinese Experiences of Professional Discontent, 1905–1945. China Studies 52, ed. Rana Mitter. Boston, Leiden: Brill, 2023. doi: 10.1163/9789004549555.
100 Karten über China [100 Maps about China]. Greifswald: Katapult, 2022. w/ Merle Schatz.
Selected articles
“Bridging the Gap: Hijacking the British Boxer Indemnity Fund to Complete the Guangzhou–Hankou Railway.” Twentieth-century China 51, no.1 (2026).
“Engineering Societies in Republican China, 1912–1949. Spaces of Professionalisation and Participation.” East Asian Science, Technology and Society 19, no. 3 (2025). doi: 10.1080/18752160.2025.2546742.
“Engineers on the Move. Geographic Mobility in Republican China.” Twentieth-century China 50, no. 1 (2025), 25–55. doi: 10.1353/tcc.2025.a950426.
“Technocracy and Technostructure in Nationalist China—Expert Rule or Rule over Experts?” In Modern China in Flux. Networks, Mobility, and Transformation, ed. Christian Henriot, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2024: 99–133. doi: 10.1515/9783111374437-004.
“Enter the Pragmatic Engineer. Ling Hongxun at Jiaotong University, 1920–1927.” History of Education 53, no. 2 (2024), 256–280. doi: 10.1080/0046760X.2023.2220287.