Introduction: the border of histories
Part I. Cosmic and semiotic centers of knowledge
1. The shifting locations of the translation of science
2. Semiotic modernity: the politics of philology and compilation
Part II. The carnival and the radical
3. Urban festivity as a disruptive history
4. In search of a habitable globe
Part III. Interiors projecting the globe
5. Reenvisioning the urban interior: gardens and the paradox of the public sphere
6. The rise of an entertainment cosmopolitanism
Conclusion: Chinese cosmopolitanism repositioned.