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The chapter presents a biography of the Silk Road concept. Starting with the discoveries made in Central Asia in the late nineteenth century, it traces the development of the Silk Road idea through the twentieth century in relation to the politics of nation building, empires, international conflicts, and shifting East West relations. The Silk Road is thus presented as an emergent geocultural imaginary, one that has been imbued with particular values and ideals in different parts of the world. This biographical approach offers a more critical reading of what is at stake in the “revival” of the Silk Roads for the twenty-first century.

Belt and Road has emerged as one of the most significant geo-strategic initiatives of the 21st century. The opening chapter introduces its various elements and how the consequences of BRI are being interpreted across multiple sectors. The analytical framework of heritage diplomacy is introduced for examining the appropriation of the Silk Roads as a regional history for trade and diplomatic purposes.

Here the analysis steps back to consider how a renewed interest in the Silk Roads raises important questions about world history and the identities of nations and cities. It is argued that Belt and Road represents an elastic and expansive international political economy that shines a light on previously ignored histories. Recent research on Central Asia and the Indian Ocean reveals the importance of these regions to our understanding of world history. Potential exists for new stories to be told through academia, museums, and historical sites, and through the media. The chapter also reflects on how forms of scholarly knowledge that feed into public discourses on Silk Road history are being rearranged and reassembled in an era of Belt and Road.

This lecture discusses some preliminary observations on the early cultural relationship between China and Central Asia in the light of the most recent archaeological discoveries from Northwest China. It considers three main issues: the role of outside influences in the beginnings and early development of bronze metallurgy in China, the shift to the ‘Steppe Road’, and the two-way traffic of cultural influence along the prehistoric ‘Silk Road’. The lecture also tries to show that early cultural interaction between China and Central Asia was the crucial drive for the growth of civilisations in both regions.

The introduction first explains the relationship of the book to the discourse of the ‘Silk Road’, the western half of which is discussed here. It is differently related to Europe than the eastern one. The ‘music road’ metaphor emphasizes the historical and geographical flux of cultures across this region, justifying the keywords of diversity and yet, coherence in musical developments. The topics covered in the book are then gathered under three cultural paradigms: mobility, transmission in time, East–West imagination. The last-named is proposed as a more sensitive term for attitudes formerly subsumed under ‘orientalism’. An extended survey of the topic of all individual chapters reveals many different forms of transfers, connections, bridges and also disruptions in the musics of this special world region.

The author describes the curator’s role in developing and navigating relationships and representation with nation/state partners in the context of serious political differences and violent histories which include the legacy of U.S. engagements with Asian countries. Ranging across the experience of collaborative research and curation of ten international programs at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival—chiefly involving Asian countries, including the Silk Road Festival and the Mekong River Festival Program, over a twenty year period (1988 – 2008)—the chapter chronicles the changing attitudes of both organizers and audiences and traces changing attitudes to ideas about the nature of “tradition” over these decades.

This chapter analyzes the influence of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), as the Chinese government’s strategy on the “idea of the university” in China, with special attention to governance, mission, and role in society, as well as the values underpinning the model of the university. Results from this work imply that Chinese universities have not been changing dramatically through the BRI strategy as such. They have rather been on a pathway of transformation to which the BRI is adding opportunities, the extent to which seems to be mostly bound to disciplinary fields. STEM has already been a prominent global player for a while. Business schools that have been internationalizing for many years are now taking further entrepreneurial steps, and also specific areas in the humanities are exploring new international initiatives. While those trends show striking similarities regarding internationalization strategies in the West, some notable differences relate to China’s particular approach.

This Chapter discusses the impact of Sa’di’s travels in shaping his cosmopolitan and inclusive perspective. It moves on the significance of Persian poetry as line of cultural communication among the Persian speakers across the globe. Persian poets and travel, as well as Sa’di’s own travel are among the other topics in the chapter.

The maps of the Book of Curiosities demonstrate the strategic importance of the Indian Ocean, and of the tenth-century Ismaʿili emirates in Sind, to the global ambitions of the Fatimid empire. The maps also contribute to the history of global communications at the turn of the previous millennium, as they highlight a route to China that passed through northern India and Tibet. This chapter examines three separate maps of East and Central Asia: a map of the Indian Ocean, a map of the River Oxus, and a map of the Indus, which also shows localities along the Ganges. This third map of the Indian river systems uniquely depicts an overland itinerary from Muslim Sind, then under Fatimid control, through northern India and then probably through Tibet, to China. Other routes, either the sea route to China through the Straits of Malacca, or the Central Asian Silk Road, are not depicted in such detail, suggesting that by the time the Book of Curiosities was composed the Tibetan route eclipsed its more famous alternatives.

Chapter 16 provides first an overview of international projects in the humanities launched in the context of the New Silk Road Initiative, including a discussion of key examples; it also touches upon other relevant developments within the Chinese humanities. The second part deals with the question of whether Chinese universities will likely emerge as leading institutions in the humanities globally. The chapter argues that particularly in the humanities, global hierarchies of knowledge remain firmly in place. While many branches of the humanities have grown decidedly critical of Eurocentric viewpoints, older patterns privileging Western universities still persist, perhaps more than in other academic disciplines. For example, in the humanities international citation and academic interaction patterns are almost as Western-centric as they were a century ago. In a final step, the chapter offers some reflections on the question of whether the global standing of the Chinese humanities will eventually change.

International collaborations among higher education institutions have existed along the Silk Road for a long time. With the initiative of the Belt and Road, it is believed that cooperation among universities and colleges may be influenced in various respects. In this study, seventeen university consortia that have been formed in the last thirty years along the Silk Road were investigated, including the membership structure, their starting point, goals and developments of these consortia, and the roles of world-class universities. The findings showed: 1) these consortia share the similar goals of multinational collaboration to foster solutions to new global challenges; 2) the thirty-year development of these consortia was divided into three phases, and most of the member universities are from the EU, China, and the US; 3) world-class universities were, are and will be playing the leading roles in these consortia continuously.

This chapter shows how in early antiquity the universal appeal of silk spread across Eurasia through a trade network known as the Silk Roads. Silk inspired the economic exchange of trading goods, which produced a network of trade centers and cities. The value of silk was so great that traders endured harsh conditions as they passed through the great mountain ranges of the Tien Shan, Karakorams, and Hindu Kush and skirted inhospitable deserts, such as the Taklamakan and Gobi. Caravanserais, rest stops along the Silk Roads, allowed travelers to exchange ideas and innovations and created awareness of different cultures and religions. The product of the domestic silkworm figured prominently in the development of dominant Central and Western Asian empires and Chinese dynasties and produced significant historical figures, such as Timur and Mongol leader, Genghis Khan. As this chapter shows, that rich, arcane history developed because of the domestic silkworm.

The rise of the New Silk Road is generating fierce debates over the emergence of new megaregions and their role in reshaping world politics. Chinese writers are avid consumers of and contributors to these discussions both at home and internationally. China’s growing interest in megaregional integration accompanied a sharp turn in foreign policy—from a defensive posture that feared provoking war with the United States toward a bold campaign to assert global leadership, economically and diplomatically. Gradually, Chinese leaders are beginning to realize that all of the emerging megaregions are developing lives of their own that cannot be directed by a hierarchical network centered in Beijing. This realization is forcing China’s policymakers to reconsider their traditional assumption that sovereignty belongs only to formal governments and the elites that control them rather than to the all of the citizens who comprise the national communities.

Despite the resurgence of nationalism in China, the United States, and several European countries, and rhetoric of a “decoupling” between China and the West, the internationalist agendas of Chinese universities remain robust. This trajectory would appear to be strengthened by the broad, inclusive, if still ill-defined mission given to Chinese institutions by Beijing to “go out” along the “New Silk Road” (NSR). Although the international origins and aspirations of Chinese universities have been shaped mainly by Western models, there are increased incentives for exchange between Chinese and NSR-based universities. However, hopes that educational exchanges will strengthen higher education in both China and the NSR may be unrealistic. Themselves products of international models, Chinese institutions have no distinct “China model” to offer NSR universities. Furthermore, although academic collaboration along the NSR may increase the quantity of Chinese scholarship, it is unlikely to help Chinese universities achieve a larger goal: world-class status.

This chapter evaluates how the shipping lanes that traverse the South China Sea region are the lifelines of China's future and will shape and influence its trajectory as a great power. If China can maintain and control the regional sea lanes of communication and the trade and maritime logistics hubs across the region, it can expand and project power well beyond the region, fulfilling President Xi Jinping's “Chinese Dream” that seeks “the great rejuvenation of China.” The aggregate is that China has much riding on the future development, success, and prosperity of its Maritime Silk Road and maritime economy. The chapter examines China's growing dominance in shipping, shipbuilding, logistics and supply chains, fisheries and aquaculture (also known as aquafarming), and regional port acquisitions and development from Taiwan to Australia. Moreover, China's growing maritime geoeconomic entrenchment in Cambodia, Brunei, and Malaysia will make it increasingly harder for other regional and global powers — particularly the United States, India, Japan, Taiwan, and others — to compete economically in the maritime space. It also makes it more challenging to box China in regionally owing to its increasingly independent and reinforced maritime networks.

For something like two millennia, the Silk Road has functioned as a conduit, for ideas as well as trade. China’s rise now presents both challenges and opportunities to countries situated on both the maritime and terrestrial Silk Roads, particularly in higher education. Beginning with Europe’s response to China’s renaissance as a major knowledge system, differential responses within Europe are charted, and student and staff flow treated. Some signs of change are evident, from 2018, particularly in relation to sensitive high-tech areas such as those listed in the signature Made in China 2025 policy. But the Silk Road also points South, hence the remainder of the chapter addresses higher education relations between China and ASEAN, and in particular, Malaysia. The Six Pillars framework is used to outline the major elements of China–ASEAN relations, particularly regarding higher education, including the development of the overseas campus of Xiamen University in Malaysia.