Lecturer and PhD candidate at the Department of Chinese Studies, University of Tübingen
Academic Career

• 2021 - Lecturer and PhD candidate, University of Tübingen
• 2021 M.A. in Sinology, Universität Tübingen
• 2017 B.A. in Sinology and Business Administration (Studies abroad in the Peking University, National Taiwan University and Chung Hsing University)

Research Focus
Patrick Aberle’s primary research interests lie in the fields of the history of science and technology as well as the history of economy and ecology in pre-modern China. In his master thesis he translated the Celiang fayi 測量法義 (The Meaning and Methods of Measurement) composed by Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) and Xu Guangqi 徐光啟 (1562-1633). He did not only analyze its reception in Ming and Qing China, but also inquired into how the authors performed the transmission of technical terms and methods between different traditions of knowledge by embedding the newly introduced methods in the context of Chinese mathematics and measurement technology and thus defining them within the context of the receiving knowledge tradition. In his PhD thesis, Patrick Aberle examines the technological aspects of forestry in pre-modern China with a specific focus on the economic utilization of trees beyond the production of timber. In this context, he first analyses and translates relevant passages of agronomic classics such as the Nongzheng quanshu 農政全書 (Complete Treatise of Agriculture, 1639) by Xu Guangqi 徐光啟.

Other activities
From 2018-2020, Patrick Aberle worked in a Start Up in Stuttgart. Besides programming software, he was responsible for writing scientific articles and conducting market analysis. In addition to his Chinese studies, he currently completes an economics degree with a focus on economic history. Furthermore, Patrick Aberle is an associated researcher in the international research project “Translating Western Science, Technology and Medicine to Late Ming China: Convergences and Divergences in the Light of the Kunyu gezhi 坤輿格致 (Investigations of the Earth’s Interior; 1640) and the Taixi shuifa 泰西水法 (Hydromethods of the Great West; 1612)” directed by Prof. Dr. Hans Ulrich Vogel.