Because of the dramatic growth of Asian economies, the salience of Asia among world historians has risen significantly in the past decades. We can see this prominence in the greater space devoted to Asia in world history textbooks, curricula, and to some extent in faculty positions. Yet because of the lingering influence of Eurocentrism and the constraints imposed by traditional Area Studies, gaps and discrepancies remain. To point towards ways of overcoming these limitations, I will comment on recent work in China in the early modern and modern period, from the perspective of frontiers and environmental history.