East Asian Languages & Civilization (EALC)
EALC 0001 East Asia: Past and Present
This course surveys the history of East Asia from early times to the present. We will study the establishment of various sociopolitical orders and their characteristics alongside major cultural developments. Covered topics include: state formation and dissolution; the role of ideology and how it changes; religious beliefs and values; agriculture, commerce, and industry; changing family relations; responses to imperialism; and East Asia's growing stature in the modern world as well as future prospect. Although a main focus will be on understanding how the regions we now know as China, Japan, and Korea emerged with their respective identities, the course will also give attention to various groups that are rarely noticed in the contemporary world but nonetheless historically important, such as the Tibetans, Khitans, Jurchens, Mongols, and Manchus.
1 Course Unit
EALC 0020 Introduction to Chinese Civilization
This course introduces Chinese history from ancient to modern times. In addition to the political, social, economic, and intellectual developments, this course will look at Chinese history from the perspective of women, the peripheries, environment, and oceanic trade networks. It challenges the notion of “civilization” and the imagination of history as singular and monolithic. The lectures and readings will include some of the most up-to-date scholarship in Chinese and East Asian history. The recitations and short paper assignments are designed for students to practice historical analysis of primary sources.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 0040 Introduction to Japanese Civilization
Survey of the civilization of Japan from prehistoric times to the present.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 0060 Introduction to Korean Civilization
What is Korean civilization—is it a singular notion, or are there many that became what we know as South and North Korea today? How have Koreans interpreted and represented their own cultures, traditions, and history through the years? This introductory course offers a broad chronological survey of Korean history, arts, and culture from its early days to the present moment. Our readings will include a selection of literature—from foundation myths, poetry, to modern fiction—as well as royal edicts and political manifestoes and op-eds. Alongside the readings, we will also engage with multimedia resources including various artwork, film, and music. Through these cultural texts, we will explore the political, economic, and social order of different historical eras and identify major currents and events on the Korean peninsula such as shifting political climates, class struggles, gender dynamics, and complex relations with its East Asian neighbors and the West. We will also be treated to guest lectures from the interdisciplinary Korean studies scholars affiliated with the James Joo-Jin Kim Center for Korean Studies at Penn. By the end of the semester, students will become familiar with the many continuities and breaks that constitute Korean culture from ancient to modern times and gain good insight into where it might be headed in the future. No prior knowledge of Korea or the Korean language is required.
Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0860
1 Course Unit
EALC 0080 Mongolian Civilization: Nomadic and Sedentary
This course will explore how two intertwined ways of life - pastoral nomadism and settling down for religious, educational, and economic reasons - have shaped the cultural, artistic, and intellectual traditions of Mongolia. In this course students will learn about Mongolian pastoral nomadism, and how the Mongolian economy, literature, and steppe empires were built on grass and livestock. We will also explore how Mongolians have also just as consistently used the foundations of empire to build sedentary monuments and buildings, whether funerary complexes, Buddhist monasteries, socialist boarding schools, and modern capitals. Over time, these cities have changed shape, location, and ideology, all the while remaining linked to the mobile pastoralists in the countryside. We will also explore how these traditions of mobile pastoralism and urbanism were transformed in the 20th century, by urbanization, communist ideology, and the new reality of free-market democracy, ideological pluralism, and a new mining dependent economy. We will meet modern painters and musicians who interweave Mongolian nomadic traditions with contemporary world trends, and consider the future of rural traditions in a modern world.
Spring, odd numbered years only
Also Offered As: HIST 0757
1 Course Unit
EALC 0100 Art and Civilization in East Asia
Introduction to the major artistic traditions of China and Japan and the practices of art history. We will also consider aspects of Korean and Indian artistic traditions as they relate to those of China and Japan. Our approaches will be methodological in addressing how we understand these objects through careful looking; chronological in considering how the arts developed in and through history; and thematic in studying how art and architecture were used for philosophical, religious and material ends. Special attention will be given to the relationship between artistic production and the afterlife; to the impact of Buddhism and its purposes; to painting traditions and their patronages; and to modernist transformations of traditions.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 1030, VLST 2330
1 Course Unit
EALC 0120 Arts of China
A broad survey of Chinese architecture, sculpture, and painting from the Neolithic age through the nineteenth century. Topics include excavated material from China's Bronze Age, Chinese funerary arts, Buddhist caves and sculpture (including works in the University Museum), the Chinese city, the Chinese garden, and major masterpieces of Chinese painting.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: ARTH 2140
1 Course Unit
EALC 0140 Arts of Japan
This lecture course introduces the major artistic traditions of Japan, from the Neolithic period to the present, and teaches the fundamental methods of the discipline of art history. Special attention will be given to the places of Shinto, the impact of Buddhism, and their related architectures and sculptures; the principles of narrative illustration; the changing roles of aristocratic, monastic, shogunal and merchant patronage; the formation of the concept of the artist over time; and the transformation of tradition in the modern age.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 2130
1 Course Unit
EALC 0160 Arts of Korea
The goal of this course is understanding the development of visual, performing, and literary arts in Korea and the historical, religious, and social contexts in which they flourished. It serves as an introduction to the arts of Korea, with emphasis on painting, sculpture, ceramics, and architecture and additional consideration of dance, drama, poetry, and culinary arts. Covers the whole history of Korea, from prehistoric times to the twenty-first century.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 0355 Monsters of Japan
Godzilla! Mothra! Rodan! Totoro! Pikachu! If you know who they are, join us to discover the deeper meanings of monstrosity in Japan. If you don't know who they are, learn the literal, metaphorical, and cinematic implications of these giant (and not so giant) beasts. Watch Tokyo go down in flames, and discuss what that means for New York and Philadelphia! Explore the history, literature, and films of Japanese monsters in this undergraduate seminar.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 0500 East Asian Religions
This course will introduce students to the diverse beliefs, ideas, and practices of East Asia's major religious traditions: Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism, Shinto, Popular Religion, as well as Asian forms of Islam and Christianity. As religious identity in East Asia is often fluid and non-sectarian in nature, there religious traditions will not be investigated in isolation. Instead, the course will adopt a chronological and geographical approach, examining the spread of religious ideas and practices across East Asia and the ensuing results of these encounters. The course will be divided into three units. Unit one will cover the religions of China. We will begin by discussing early Chinese religion and its role in shaping the imperial state before turning to the arrival of Buddhism and its impact in the development of organized Daoism, as well as local religion. In the second unit, we will turn eastward into Korea and Japan. After examining the impact of Confucianism and Buddhism on the religious histories of these two regions, we will proceed to learn about the formation of new schools of Buddhism, as well as the rituals and beliefs associated with Japanese Shinto and Korean Shamanism. The third and final unit will focus on the modern and contemporary periods through an analysis of key themes such as religion and modernity, the global reception and interpretation of East Asian religions, andthe relationship between religion and popular culture. The class will be conducted mainly in the form of a lecture, but some sessions will be partially devoted to a discussion of primary sources in translation. The course assignments are designed to evaluate the development of both of these areas. No previous knowledge of East Asian languages is necessary, and all readings will be available in English on the Canvas site in PDF form.
Fall
Also Offered As: RELS 0500
1 Course Unit
EALC 0501 Introduction to Buddhism
This course seeks to introduce students to the diversity of doctrines held and practices performed by Buddhists in Asia. By focusing on how specific beliefs and practices are tied to particular locations and particular times, we will be able to explore in detail the religious institutions, artistic, architectural, and musical traditions, textual production and legal and doctrinal developments of Buddhism over time and within its socio-historical context. Religion is never divorced from its place and its time. Furthermore, by geographically and historically grounding the study of these religions we will be able to examine how their individual ethic, cosmological and soteriological systems effect local history, economics, politics, and material culture. We will concentrate first on the person of the Buddha, his many biographies and how he has been followed and worshipped in a variety of ways from Lhasa, Tibet to Phrae, Thailand. From there we touch on the foundational teachings of the Buddha with an eye to how they have evolved and transformed over time. Finally, we focus on the practice of Buddhist ritual, magic and ethics in monasteries and among aly communities in Asia and even in the West. This section will confront the way Buddhists have thought of issues such as "Just-War," Women's Rights and Abortion. While no one quarter course could provide a detailed presentation of the beliefs and practices of Buddhism, my hope is that we will be able to look closely at certain aspects of these religions by focusing on how they are practiced in places like Nara, Japan or Vietnam, Laos.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: RELS 1730, SAST 1730
1 Course Unit
EALC 0502 Gods, Ghosts, and Monsters
This course seeks to be a broad introduction. It introduces students to the diversity of doctrines held and practices performed, and art produced about "the fantastic" from earliest times to the present. The fantastic (the uncanny or supernatural) is a fundamental category in the scholarly study of religion, art, anthropology, and literature. This course fill focus both theoretical approaches to studying supernatural beings from a Religious Studies perspective while drawing examples from Buddhist, Shinto, Christian, Hindu, Jain, Zoroastrian, Egyptian, Central Asian, Native American, and Afro-Caribbean sources from earliest examples to the present including mural, image, manuscript, film, codex, and even comic books. It will also introduce students to related humanistic categories of study: material and visual culture, theodicy, cosmology, shamanism, transcendentalism, soteriology, eschatology, phantasmagoria, spiritualism, mysticism, theophany, and the historical power of rumor. It will serve as a gateway course into the study of Religion among numerous Asian, and East Asian Studies, as well as Visual Culture and Film Studies. It will include guest lectures from professors from several departments, as well as an extensive hands-on use of the collections of the Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology and the manuscripts held in the Schoenberg Collection of Van Pelt Library. It aims to not only introduce students to major, approaches, and terms in the study of religion and the supernatural, but inspire them to take more advanced courses by Ilya Vinitsky, Liliane Weissberg, Projit Mukharji, Talya Fishman, Annette Reed,David Barnes, David Spafford, Frank Chance, Michael Meister, Paul Goldin, Renata Holod, Paul Rozin, among several others.
Fall
Also Offered As: RELS 0130
1 Course Unit
EALC 0730 History of Modern China
From an empire to a republic, from communism to socialist-style capitalism, few countries have ever witnessed so much change in a hundred year period as China during the twentieth century. How are we to make sense out of this seeming chaos? This course will offer an overview of the upheavals that China has experienced from the late Qing to the Post-Mao era, interspersed with personal perspectives revealed in primary source readings such as memoirs, novels, and oral accounts. We will start with an analysis of the painful transition from the last empire, the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), to a modern nation state, followed by exploration of a century-long tale of incessant reform and revolution. The survey will focus on three main themes: 1) the repositioning of China in the new East Asian and world orders; 2) the emergence of a modern Chinese state and nationalistic identity shaped and reshaped by a series of cultural crises; and finally, 3) the development and transformation of Chinese modernity. Major historical developments include: the Opium War and drug trade in the age of imperialism, reform and revolution, the Nationalist regime, Mao's China, the Cultural Revolution, and the ongoing efforts of post-Mao China to move beyond Communism. We will conclude with a critical review of the concept of "Greater China" that takes into account Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Chinese diaspora in order to attain a more comprehensive understanding of modern China, however defined, at the end of the last century.
Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0550
1 Course Unit
EALC 0750 Modern Japanese History
This course will survey the major political, economic, social and intellectual trends in the making of modern Japan. Special emphasis will be given to the turbulent relationship between state and society from 1800 to the present.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0560
1 Course Unit
EALC 0954 Sushi & Ramen: Making Japanese Food Global
Who defines Japanese food? Is it the chef at a top establishment in Tokyo, a home cook in Osaka, a tea master in Kyoto, the ancient capital? Or is it the midwestern American who thinks sushi means raw fish? Is it the person who scarfs cup noodles, or the devotee of artisan ramen stock? Perhaps it is the Japanese government, which in 2006 sent undercover agents abroad to guard against inferior Japanese food outlets. In this class we will consider how Japanese food came to be defined in distinction to Western and Chinese foods beginning in the nineteenth century, and how Japanese food became a global cuisine. Among our questions: What makes a dish Japanese? How did Portuguese or Spanish frying habits (tempura) and Chinese lamian (ramen) become hallmarks? How traditional is the diet of rice and fish, and in what ways does it interact with the environment? How did Buddhist vegetarians justify sukiyaki? What relationship does food have to the longevity of Japanese today? How does gender affect Japanese food cultures? What are the origins of Iron Chef and bento? We will survey the Philadelphia Japanese food scene and learn to make our own sushi. Some controversies we will discuss include the consumption of whale meat in Japan. We will also investigate Japanese government controls of food to combat obesity and to make food safe. after the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe. Materials include essays, films, novellas, menus, and cookbooks.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1098 Sports in East Asia
This course will examine sports in East Asia from the nineteenth century to the present. Recently, East Asia plays an important role in transforming the global geopolitics of sport. The post-war East Asian Olympic Games-1964 Tokyo Olympics, 1972 Sapporo Winter Olympics, 1988 Seoul Olympics, 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics, and 2008 Beijing Olympics-and the 2002 FIFA World Cup Korea/Japan illustrate the fact that a new global sports order led by East Asia has emerged. East Asia nations will play hosts to other major sporting events, including the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. Chinese, Japanese, and Korean athletes have been highly active in MLB, NBA, English Premier League, and LPGA. The popularity of the various martial arts proves that East Asian sports seem to be everywhere these days. This class will focus on helping students understand how sports have affected and transformed East Asia exploring various issues: imperialism, colonialism, race, class, gender, foreign policy, nationalism, religion, economics, industrialization, tourism, and urbanization. Course contents include lecture, discussions, secondary readings, primary source readings, documentaries, and films.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1101 Introduction to East Asian History
This course will provide an overview of early modern and modern East Asian history. We will discuss developments from ca. 1400 to the present as integrally bound to the history of the modern world. We will also introduce the craft of history and some basic tools and methods of humanities/social science research. By the end of this course you will be able to develop a basic understanding of major topics in early modern and modern East Asian history; learn critical approaches to both primary and secondary sources; compose coherent and persuasive reviews of scholarly works.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1105 Buddhist Arts of East Asia: Sources, Iconography and Styles
Survey of art and architecture created for Buddhist religious purposes in China, Japan, and to a lesser extent Korea, Tibet, and Central Asia. The course will include a brief overview of Buddhist monuments in South Asia, study of the iconography of Buddhist images in graphic and sculptural media, and analysis of a variety of Buddhist styles in painting, sculpture, and architecture.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 1105
1 Course Unit
EALC 1106 East Asian Gardens
Explore the beauty of gardens (and associated buildings) in Japan, China, and Korea from ancient times to the present. Lectures will be illustrated by photographs from dozens of sites in East Asia, and by a field trip to the Japanese House and Garden in Fairmount Park. The main body of the course will be a historical survey of the evolution of East Asian garden art forms from the sixth century to the present. Discussion will touch on geographic and climatic parameters, spiritual and aesthetic principles, practical limitations and creative innovations of East Asian gardens. There will be an additional fee for the Japanese House visit, and possibly for other field trips.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1116 East Asian Cinema
This survey course introduces students to major trends, genres, directors, and issues in the cinemas of East Asian countries/regions, including Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Charting key developments over more than a hundred years from the early twentieth century to the present, this course examines films as aesthetic objects, asking questions about film form, narrative, and style. It also pays attention to the evolution of cinema as an institution (e.g. modes of production, circulation, and exhibition) in different cultural and political contexts. Weekly course materials will include both films (primary sources) and analytical readings (secondary sources). By the end of the course, students are expected to gain broad knowledge of East Asian cinema, develop skills of film analysis, and apply these skills to perform historically informed and culturally sensitive analysis of cinema. Prior knowledge of East Asian languages is NOT required.
Also Offered As: ARTH 2910, CIMS 2910
Mutually Exclusive: ARTH 6910, EALC 5116
1 Course Unit
EALC 1120 Oracle bones to the Chinese Classics: beginnings of writing in East Asia
China is one of several world regions where writing and literacy emerged independently. This course looks at the evidence for the beginnings and first 1000 years of writing in China, from the earliest records of divinations and gift-giving by the Shang kings, through to the establishment during the Han dynasty of the core of China's literary tradition - the "classical" texts that all subsequent educated East Asians knew. Although no prior knowledge of Chinese language is required, we will look at the functioning and early evolution of the Chinese script, and learn to read simple inscriptions. Longer texts will be read in English translation. These will include commemorative inscriptions on bronzes, and varieties of early specialist or technical writings that were buried in tombs with their owners: literature on medicine, handbooks for lawyers, and models for philosophical debate. The course emphasizes the materiality of these writings - their history as physical objects, and the tombs, buildings, and other archeological contexts in which they are found - and a comparative perspective that sets early literacy in East Asia together with similar and contrasting histories of early literacy in other part of the Ancient World.
1 Course Unit
EALC 1127 Chinese Painting
Study of Chinese painting and practice from the earliest pictorial representation through the late twentieth century. Painting styles are analyzed, but themes such as landscape and narrative are considered with regard to larger social, cultural, and historical issues. The class will pay particular attention to the construction of the concepts of the "artist" and "art criticism" and their impact on the field into the present. Visits to study paintings at the University of Pennsylvania Museum and Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: ARTH 2170
1 Course Unit
EALC 1129 Chinese Architecture
Survey of Chinese buildings and building technology from the formative period in the second millennium BCE through the twentieth century. The course will deal with well-known monuments such as the Buddhist monasteries of Wutai, imperial palaces in Chang'an and Beijing, the Ming tombs and the Temple of Heaven, and less frequently studied buildings. Also covered will be the theory and principles of Chinese construction.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 1141 Early Modern Japanese Art and the City of Edo
Study of the major art forms and architecture of Tokugawa (or Edo) period (1603-1868). In this lecture course, we will consider how the arts of this era occur within an increasingly urban and modern culture, particularly with regard to the city of Edo. Issues of the articulation of authority in the built environment, the reinvention of classical styles, and patronage will be raised. May include some visits to PMA, Penn Museum, or other local collections.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 2580
1 Course Unit
EALC 1180 Archaeology of Central Asia
A site by site investigation of Buddhist and non-Buddhist ruins in Central Asia. Included are Nisa, Khwarezm, Pyandzhikent, Khalchayan, Ay-Khanum, Bamiyan, Miran, Tumshuk, Kizil, Kucha, Khotan, Adzhina-Tepe, Khocho, Khara-Khoto, and Bezeklik.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 1242 Love and Loss in Japanese Literary Traditions: In Translation
How do people make sense of the multiple experiences that the simple words "love" and "loss" imply? How do they express their thoughts and feelings to one another? In this course, we will explore some means Japanese culture has found to grapple with these events and sensations. We will also see how these culturally sanctioned frameworks have shaped the ways Japanese view love and loss. Our materials will sample the literary tradition of Japan from earliest times to the early modern and even modern periods. Close readings of a diverse group of texts, including poetry, narrative, theater, and the related arts of calligraphy, painting, and music will structure our inquiry. The class will take an expedition to nearby Woodlands Cemetery to experience poetry in nature. By the end of the course, you should be able to appreciate texts that differ slightly in their value systems, linguistic expressions, and aesthetic sensibilities from those that you may already know. Among the available project work that you may select, if you have basic Japanese, is learning to read a literary manga. All shared class material is in English translation.
Fall
Also Offered As: GSWS 1242
1 Course Unit
EALC 1251 Tokyo Stories in Contemporary Japanese Fiction
Tokyo is one of the largest and most vibrant cities in the world. It's also one of the most storied, laying claim to centuries of history and countless colorful districts and neighborhoods. In this class we will explore Tokyo by delving into a collection of stories set in and around the great metropolis. We will work our way forward in time, beginning from the city's roots as the samurai capital of Edo. Along the way, we will investigate contemporary themes such as demographic crisis, social stratification, gender trouble, and the ruins of neoliberal capitalism. By the end of the semester, students will have been exposed to a diverse range of representative authors and cultural concerns that will help them develop a nuanced understanding of Japanese history and society.
Fall, odd numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 1321 18th-Century Seminar: China in the English Imagination
This course explores the material culture of china-mania that spread across England and Europe in the eighteenth century, from chinoiserie vogues in fashion, tea, porcelain, and luxury goods, to the idealization of Confucius by Enlightenment philosophers. The course texts include travel writing, poetry, essays, and plays, and is designed to provide historical background to contemporary problems of Orientalism, Sinophilia, and Sinophobia. See the English Department's website at www.english.upenn.edu for a description of the current offerings.
Also Offered As: ASAM 2310, COML 2031, ENGL 2031
1 Course Unit
EALC 1322 Chinese Fiction and Drama in Translation
This course explores Romance of Three Kingdoms the most popular classica l novel in East Asia and an important source for understanding Chinese culture, politics, history, and military strategy. We propose to read this work not only as a textbook of Chinese literature and culture, but also as a guidebook for career development and risk assessment. Why didn't t Pangtong have a career as successful as Zhuge Liang? Why did Ma Su volunteer in a project that he is not good at? If Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Sun Quan run for presidency in the U.S., who would you vote for and why? These are some of the questions that we will explore alongside our inquiry into the the historical development of various genres of Chinese fiction. In addition to Romance of Three Kingdoms, this course introduces Sun Tsu's The Art of War and other classical Chinese novels such as Dream of the Red Chamber and Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, as well as classical literary criticism such as Cao Pi's On the Standard of Literature (Dian lun), Lu Ji's Essays on Literature (Wen lun), and Liu Xie's The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 1331 Chinese and Sinophone Cinemas
This course is a survey of Chinese and Sinophone cinemas from the silent era to the present. The Sinophone refers to Sinitic film cultures both inside and outside the People’s Republic of China that have been in relatively marginalized positions against the Han-Chinese mainstream, such as Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Tibetan, and transpacific cinemas. One major goal of the course is to interrogate the national cinema framework and to show how the meaning of “Chineseness” has been problematized by filmmakers and critics throughout modern history. Students will learn about important film movements and trends such as leftist cinema from the 1930s, socialist cinema, Taiwanese and Hong Kong New Waves, the Fifth and Sixth Generation filmmakers, and contemporary transnational productions. Attention will be paid to both films known for awards and artistic achievements and popular genres including thrillers, horror, and wuxia (martial art).
Also Offered As: ARTH 3940, CIMS 3940
1 Course Unit
EALC 1335 Cultural Chinas: 20th Century Chinese Literature and Film
This course serves as a thematic introduction to modern Chinese literature and cinema in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other transnational Chinese communities in the twentieth century. By discussing a wide range of key literary and filmic texts, this class looks into major issues and discourses in China's century of modernization: enlightenment and revolution, politics and aesthetics, sentimental education and nationalism, historical trauma and violence, gender and sexuality, social hygiene and body politics, diaspora and displacement, youth sub-culture and urban imagination.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 1340 Post War Japanese Cinema
Mizoguchi Kenji, Ozu Yasujiro, and Kurosawa Akira are recognized today as three of the most important and influential directors in Japanese cinema. In their films of the late 1940s and 1950s, these directors focused upon issues surrounding the human condition and the perception of truth, history, beauty, death, and other issues of the postwar period. This lecture course places their films in period context, and pays particular attention to the connections to other visual media, and to how "art" and "history" are being defined in the cinematic context. How other directors also took up these issues, and referred to the "big three" is also be discussed.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 2900, CIMS 2900
1 Course Unit
EALC 1351 Contemporary Fiction & Film in Japan
This course will explore fiction and film in contemporary Japan, from 1945 to the present. Topics will include literary and cinematic representation of Japan s war experience and post-war reconstruction, negotiation with Japanese classics, confrontation with the state, and changing ideas of gender and sexuality. We will explore these and other questions by analyzing texts of various genres, including film and film scripts, novels, short stories, manga, and academic essays. Class sessions will combine lectures, discussion, audio-visual materials, and creative as well as analytical writing exercises. The course is taught in English, although Japanese materials will be made available upon request. No prior coursework in Japanese literature, culture, or film is required or expected; additional secondary materials will be available for students taking the course at the 600 level. Writers and film directors examined may include: Kawabata Yasunari, Hayashi Fumiko, Abe Kobo, Mishima Yukio, Oe Kenzaburo, Yoshimoto Banana, Ozu Yasujiro, Naruse Mikio, Kurosawa Akira, Imamura Shohei, Koreeda Hirokazu, and Beat Takeshi.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: CIMS 1351, COML 1351, GSWS 1351
1 Course Unit
EALC 1359 Japanese Popular Culture
Today, Japanese manga, anime, J-pop, and film have a global audience. But these exports can only be truly understood in light of longstanding domestic anxieties about sex, violence, gender, and "the kids these days." More recent concerns about the country's declining birthrate, weakening geopolitical position, and vulnerability to natural and anthropogenic disaster also deeply influence Japanese media products. This course explores some of these anxieties through critical examinations of manga, anime, video games, television, music, and fashion in Japan. Film screenings include work by directors Kon Satoshi, Otomo Katsuhiro, Takahata Isao, Miyazaki Hayao; Itami Juzo, and Takita Yojiro; manga excerpts include work by Tezuka Osamu, Urasawa Naoki, and Yazawa Ai. Secondary readings include scholarship in anthropology, history, sociology, literature, film studies and religious studies.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1371 New Korean Cinema
In 2019, Bong Joon-ho's Parasite won the Palme d'Or at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival. This event marked the apex of South Korean cinematic renaissance, having steadily become a tour de force in the international film festival scene since 1997 onwards. This course explores the major auteurs, styles, themes, and currents of the so-called "New Korean Cinema" that emerged in the mid-to-late 1990s to continue to this day. Drawing from texts on critical film and Korean studies, we will pay particular attention to how the selected works re-present, resist, and interweave the sociopolitical climate they concern and are born out of. Using cinema as a lens with which to see the society, we will touch upon major events of the twentieth century including national division, military dictatorship and democratization movements, IMF economic crisis, youth culture, hallyu (the Korean wave), and more. In so doing, we will closely examine how each cinematic medium addresses the societal power structure and the role of the "Other" it represents in terms of class, race, gender, and sexuality in the construction of contemporary Korean society. No prior experience of Korean studies courses necessary; all films will be screened with English subtitles.
Also Offered As: CIMS 1371
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 6371
1 Course Unit
EALC 1379 Art, Pop, and Belonging: Or, How to Talk about Korean Popular Culture
From K-pop and film to fashion, cosmetics, food, and art, South Korean culture seems to be everywhere. In this course, we will discuss how the cadences of Korean culture shifted in tandem with the sheer amount of historical and social change experienced by the Korean people throughout the twentieth century. Specifically, we will look at art and talk to artists, listen to K-pop, and contemplate how these cultural representations activate a sense of belonging and social coalition for marginalized communities in Korea. Addressing topics such as gender and sexuality, modernity and national trauma, xenophobia and racial tensions, queer feminist movements, and cultural transnationalism in the neoliberal era, we will pay particular attention to the structures of power and the role of the “other” in the construction of contemporary South Korea. In so doing, we will also rethink our own positionality in consuming Korean popular culture as North America-based scholars “looking at” Korea from a geographic, cultural, and social distance. All class materials will be in English; no previous knowledge of Korean language is required.
Fall, even numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 1411 Queer Chinas: Sexuality and Politics in the Sinophone World
This class examines queer phenomena in and around China, including Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the queer Sinophone world more generally. Beyond seeking to understand sexual subcultures and sites of queer intimacies on their own terms, the course examines their relationship to political economy and geopolitics. In addition to filmic and literary texts, the course includes readings that are theoretical, anthropological, sociological, and comparative. While the focus is largely on modern China, the class also attends to historical reference points both inside and outside the Sinophone world. From a macro perspective, this course examines China’s place in discourses of development, focusing on the role of desire in constituting the sexual and political subject of modernity. The overall goal of this class is to develop alternative frameworks for understanding the relationship between sexuality and politics. The course does not require specialized knowledge of China.
Also Offered As: GSWS 1411
1 Course Unit
EALC 1520 What is Taoism?
This course introduces a wide variety of ideas and practices that have at one time or another been labeled as Daoist (or "Taoist" in the Wade-Giles Romanization), in order to sort out the different senses of the term, and consider whether these ideas and practices have had any common features. We will begin with the two most famous Daoist works--the Zhuangzi and the Daodejing (or Laozi). We will also survey other bio-spiritual practices, such as the meditational techniques of Inner Alchemy and the self-cultivation regimens known today as Qigong and Tai-chi, as well as the theological and ritual foundations of organized Daoist lineages, many of which are still alive across East Asia. We will conclude with a critical review of the twentieth-century reinvention of "Daoism," the scientization of Inner Alchemy, and the new classification of "religious" versus "philosophical Daoism." While familiarizing ourselves with the key concepts, practices, and organizations developed in the history of Daoism, this course emphasizes the specific socio-political context of each of them. Throughout the course, we will think critically about the label of "Daoist" (as well as "Confucian" and "Buddhist") in Chinese history and in modern scholarship. We will also question modern demarcations between the fields of philosophy, religion, and science.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 1520
1 Course Unit
EALC 1521 Introduction to Classical Chinese Thought
This course is intended as an introduction to the foundational thinkers of Chinese civilization, who flourished from the fifth to the second centuries B.C. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed, and there are no prerequisites, although Introduction to Chinese Civilization is recommended.
Spring, even numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 1550 The Religion of Anime
Be it shrine maidens, gods of death, and bodhisattvas fighting for justice; apocalypse, the afterlife, and apotheosis... the popular Japanese illustrated media of manga and anime are replete with religious characters and religious ideas. This course uses popular illustrated media as a tool for tracing the long history of how media and religion have been deeply intertwined in Japan.
Fall
Also Offered As: CIMS 0790, RELS 0790
1 Course Unit
EALC 1623 Language, Script and Society in China
The Chinese writing system is the only major surviving script in the world that is partially picto-ideographic, Egyptian hieroglyphic and Sumero-Akkadian cuneiform having passed out of use about two millennia ago. Partly because it is so unique, a tremendous number of myths have grown up around the Chinese script. In an attempt to understand how they really function, this seminar will examine the nature of the sinographs and their relationship to spoken Sinitic languages, as well as their implications for society and culture. We will also discuss the artistic and technological aspects of the Chinese characters and the ongoing efforts to reform and simplify them. The use of sinographs in other East Asian countries than China will be taken into account. There are no prerequisites for this class.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 1711 East Asian Diplomacy
Home to four of the five most populous states and four of the five largest economies, the Asia/Pacific is arguably the most dynamic region in the twenty-first century. At the same time, Cold War remnants (a divided Korea and China) and major geopolitical shifts (the rise of China and India, decline of the US and Japan) contribute significantly to the volatility of our world. This course will examine the political, economic, and geopolitical dynamism of the region through a survey of relations among the great powers in Asia from the sixteenth century to the present. Special emphasis will be given to regional and global developments from the perspective of the three principal East Asian states--China, Japan and Korea. We will explore the many informal, as well as formal, means of intercourse that have made East Asia what it is today. Graduate students should consult graduate syllabus for graduate reading list, special recitation time and graduate requirements.
Fall
Also Offered As: HIST 1550
Mutually Exclusive: HIST 5550
1 Course Unit
EALC 1712 China & USSR Compared
A comprehensive and multi-faceted survey of China and Russia, mostly in the twentieth century, through examining preludes and postludes, but focusing above all on their time as Communist states and sometimes quarreling Cold War allies. Of course we will cover the history, the geography, the economics, the leaders (Stalin, Mao), and the great events - not least the Second World War in each - always comparing, contrasting, and drawing linkages. We will also examine, however, daily life and work for ordinary people, developments in society, and not least their common attemps at revolution, at somehow creating new and unprecedented polities, having populations of radically transformed new people. This informative, fascinating quest will take us from folklore to literature and the arts to dissent and religion and ecology, among other topics. As far as possible we will let their people speak for themselves, by assigning mostly translations of original sources including novels and memoirs, even poetry. A comprehensive assessment of the strategically critical Asian heartland - which at over 14 million square miles is larger than Canada, the United States, and Western Europe combined. Lectures, readings, midterm, short paper, and in-class final.
Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 1790, REES 1580
1 Course Unit
EALC 1720 Late Imperial China
This lecture course -- the first of a two-part sequence -- examines the history of late imperial China through the early 19th century. We begin with the Song dynasty transformation: the rise of gentry society and imperial absolutism, the institution of Confucian orthodoxy, the shift of the population and the economic center of gravity to the south, the commercialization of the economy, and change in the relative status of women and men. We then trace China's subsequent political and social history, including the following themes: inner vs. outer court politics; law, government, and society; intellectuals and political dissent; gender, family, and kinship practices; patterns of peasant life and rebellion; traditional foreign relations and first contacts with the West; internal sources of the decline of imperial order.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0500
1 Course Unit
EALC 1731 20th Century China: Democracy, Constitutions, and States
Since 1900 four types of states have ruled China: dynastic, elective parliamentary, authoritarian nationalist, and communist. We will trace each from its intellectual origins to conclusion. By doing so we will present a solid and wide-ranging narrative of China's past century, introducing newly discovered material, some controversial. Above all we will dig into the issues raised by the century's mixture of regimes. Right now China is a dictatorship but once it was an imperfect democracy. Does this prove that Chinese are somehow incapable of creating democracy? That sadly it is just not in their DNA? Or only that the task is very difficult in a country nearly forty times the size of England and developing rapidly? That without dictatorship the Chinese almost inevitably collapse into chaos? Or only that blood and iron have been used regularly with harsh effectiveness? You will be given a solid grounding in events, and also in how they are interpreted, right up to the present. Readings will be mostly by Chinese authors (translated), everything from primary sources to narrative to fiction. We will also use wartime documentary films. Two lectures per week, regular mid-term and final exams, and a paper on a topic of your own choice. No prerequisites.
Fall
Also Offered As: HIST 1593
1 Course Unit
EALC 1732 China and the World: Modern Times
History 1594 is a comprehensive introduction to the last hundred years of China's relations with the world, with emphasis on American-Chinese relations, but within the necessary context of China's relations with other countries from Asia to Europe to Africa and elsewhere (as well as Washington's changing relations with Beijing). China's role in the world can be understood only when the full background and international context is made clear. This course has no prerequisites: first year and other students lacking background will find it manageable and interesting. Students who have successfully completed this course will be well positioned to understand some of the most important of current events, and if they like, pursue the topics as careers (there will be no shortage, I assure you). Although much will be said about diplomacy, and Chinese diplomatic strategy in particular, the mile-posts of the course will be a series of wars: World War I and its effects on China; the heroic Chinese war of resistance against Japan (1937-1945) in which, effectively without allies, the Chinese avoided defeat; the bitter Civil War that followed almost immediately (1946-1949) and brought Mao Zedong and his Communists to power while the predecessor Nationalist government fled to the island of Taiwan; then the Korean War (1950-1953) and the close Chinese-Soviet alliance that followed; The Taiwan Straits Crises (1954-1955, 1958, 1996); the Chinese-Indian war (1962) the origin of a situation now heating up; the Sino-Soviet border conflicts (1969); the Vietnam War (1955-1975) which changed the United States profoundly while reorientating China internationally; the (at the time) little noticed Chinese invasion of Vietnam (1979) - and finally the increasingly tense situation today, between Chine and India, and China and her maritime neighbors from Japan to Indonesia, many U.S. allies.
Also Offered As: HIST 1594
1 Course Unit
EALC 1733 Chinese Foreign Policy
An examination of China’s policies since 1950 not so much in general terms, but rather by looking at policies toward specific countries, such as Korea 1950-53, Taiwan 1958, India 1962, Japan 1963, USSR 1969, US recognition 1971-79 and failure of Kissinger policies. Vietnam both wars: i.e. we cover the ongoing conflict that began in 1979 as well as the war that ended in 1975, toward Cambodia, and not least the South China Sea and the whole world today. We will also examine China’s immense military build up (for what purpose?) the concept that China is rising, the US declining, and Beijing is foreordained lord of the East. The goal is to start from empirical information then build some sense of whether policy has continuity, common features etc. or not, and to what extent it is domestically driven or not. Lots of political background but little theory or grand generalization. A serious research paper will be required.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 3550
1 Course Unit
EALC 1742 From Shamans to Shoguns: The Texts that Made Pre-Modern Japanese History
This course tackles about a millennium of pre-modern Japanese political, social, and cultural history (roughly, 700-1700). Instead of attempting to cover the period chronologically, as an introductory survey might, this class is structured as a series of case studies. Each of these will take a primary source as its point of departure and explore one or more facets of Japanese history and writing. In the course of each case study, lectures and discussions will branch out from the main source to examine its historical context as well as the (political, cultural, textual) traditions that informed that source s composition. In general, students will read the entire texts of the main sources (or significant portions of them), along with scholarly articles and shorter excerpts from other sources, composed at the same time or in the same vein/genre. During lectures and discussions alike, students will be asked to engage the readings, so as to grasp the specifics of Japanese history and practice the analytical skills required of historical discourse.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: HIST 0750
1 Course Unit
EALC 1746 Japan: The Age of the Samurai
Who (or what) where the samurai? What does it mean to say that Japan had an "Age of the Samurai"? In popular imagination, pre-modern Japan has long been associated with its hereditary warrior class. Countless movies have explored the character and martial prowess of these men. Yet warriors constituted but a tiny portion of the societies they inhabited and ruled, and historians researching medieval Japan have turned their attentions to a great range of subjects and to other classes (elite and commoner alike). This class is designed to acquaint students with the complex and diverse centuries that have been called the "Age of the Samurai"-roughly, the years between ca. 1110 and 1850. In the course of the semester, we will explore the central themes in the historiography of warrior society, while introducing some of the defining texts that have shaped our imagination of this age (from laws to epic poems, from codes of conduct to autobiographies).
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: HIST 0751
1 Course Unit
EALC 1759 Current Issues in Contemporary Japan
In this course, we aim to understand what social issues in Japanese society exist and how they occur. Japan had experienced rapid industrial and economic developments until the 1980s. The Japanese systems of education, labor markets, and social security, which have continued until today, were established by this period approximately. Although people at that time were suffered from problems like harsh entrance examinations for secondary and higher educations, long working hours after they started a job, and gender inequality, they accepted these problems in exchange for their economic flourishment.
Also Offered As: SOCI 2700
Mutually Exclusive: SOCI 5690
1 Course Unit
EALC 1774 Two Koreas: The Politics of Division
In today's world, the inter-Korean border or DMZ (demilitarized zone) is widely regarded as one of the most impermeable and conflictual frontiers. The purpose of this course is to explore the dynamics of its formation between, and impact within, the two Koreas. The course therefore proposes to analyze how the division of the Korean peninsula not only came into being but also how it has shaped the socio-political trajectories of both the North and the South since 1945. The course also aims at introducing students to conceptual frameworks and comparative debates relevant to understanding the Korean case(s) from a social science perspective.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 1781 Silk Road: From the Mediterranean to the Pacific
A journey along the overland and sea routes that connected China, India, Iran, and Rome from 200-1000 CE and served as conduits for cultural exchange. Precursor and successor routes will also be taken into consideration. The lives of merchants, envoys, pilgrims, and travelers interacting in cosmopolitan communities will be examined. Exploration of long-known and newly discovered archaeological ruins, along with primary sources in translation, will be studied.
Also Offered As: SAST 1781
1 Course Unit
EALC 1790 The Vietnam War
A thorough historical, military, and social history of the Vietnam war, which lasted in one form or another from the end of WWII in 1945 to 1975, in which occurred the longest and most humiliating defeat in our history. Since that time the Vietnamese have published hundreds of documents, some in English, which provide an entirely new perspective on what we believed during the war. These, supplemented by other primary and secondary materials, as much as possible written by Vietnamese or by Americans having first-hand knowledge, will form the backbone of the course. The various American and Vietnamese strategies will be scrutinized carefully, and a good deal said about the home front in America. The actual fighting, thatdetermined the outcome, will not be slighted. We expect at least some guest speakers having long diplomatic or military experience in Vietnam. The present will be our conclusion. Lectures TTH 12-1:30; midterm in class, short paper, anregular final. If you want to understand the world you now live in, this coursea good place to start.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 1591
1 Course Unit
EALC 1791 The Vietnam War
The Vietnam war was a great watershed in twentieth century history that rearranged geo-politics while changing the United States through dissent and social unrest. Frankly, things have never quite recovered. It was a catastrophic and humiliating defeat, but that is all the more reason to study it, for failure often has more to teach us than success. This course provides a framework of free discussion and basic readings—ranging from battlefield memoirs to Graham Greene’s great novel The Quiet American—in which to pursue research on whatever aspect of the war they choose, from strategy to cinema and the arts. We will start with a look at the Empire of Vietnam that lasted a millennium, producing a uniquely refined and pure culture. Then we turn to the century of French colonialism and its end in 1954, which was followed by an invasion of South Vietnam from the north, through Laos. American policy was both arrogant and uninformed, converting a protracted loss (1955-1975) into what could easily have been a relatively bloodless success. That process we trace in its many strands. Finally we spend some time on contemporary Vietnam, on how the war is now understood, remembered, and memorialized, as well as how the country seeks to advance. And not least, without removing our focus from Vietnam, we assess how the United States has been changed. For every Tuesday meeting we will have some reading, to provide a common time line and set of issues. As the semester progresses, students will make informal presentations about their work. This is a “Research Seminar” which means a 15-20 page paper on a topic you choose yourself. This can be the most enjoyable and interesting part of the course.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 3707
1 Course Unit
EALC 1792 Pacific World
Following ongoing attempts by historians to move beyond the confines of national and imperial histories, this research seminar highlights the interaction of peoples and cultures across what may be described as the most dynamic world region of the twenty-first century. While discussions of Mediterranean, Atlantic and Indian Ocean Worlds are now commonplace, scholars have, to date, paid less attention to the idea of a Pacific World. How useful is it to identify a “Pacific World” before and after the Age of Discovery—that is, to locate distinctive patterns of human, material and cultural exchange across the Pacific before and after the flood of European power from the fifteenth century? What has been the effect of the rise of the nation-state, modern empires, modern war and globalization? How critical are national and/or imperial legacies to enduring patterns of human interaction and exchange in the twenty-first century Pacific? As global economics, politics and culture increasingly tilt toward the Pacific, we will attempt to uncover the source of the region’s extraordinary energy.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 3551
1 Course Unit
EALC 1955 Environment, Climate, and Culture in Japan
This course explores how Japanese literature, cinema, and popular culture have engaged with questions of environment, ecology, pollution, and climate change from the wake of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945 to the ongoing Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster in the present. Environmental disasters and the slow violence of their aftermath have had an enormous impact on Japanese cultural production, and we examine how these cultural forms seek to negotiate and work through questions of representing the unrepresentable, victimhood and survival, trauma and national memory, uneven development and discrimination, the human and the nonhuman, and climate change's impact on imagining the future. Special attention is given to the possibilities and limitations of different forms--the novel, poetry, film, manga, anime--that Japanese writers and artists have to think about humans' relationship with the environment.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2100 East Asian Art Seminar
Undergraduate seminar in East Asian art history. Topics vary from semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 3130
1 Course Unit
EALC 2101 Archaeology of Northeast Asia
This seminar explores the major civilizations of Northeast Asia (Beijing, Northern Hebei, Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Korea, and Eastern Mongolia; and in the early period, Japan) from the early CE centuries through the seventeenth. The sources of evidence are archaeological sites, palaces, monasteries, tombs, and excavated objects.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2104 East Asian Funerary Arts
Study of tombs and tomb decoration of emperors and officials in China, Korea, and Japan from the pre-Buddhist era through the 19th century.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2109 East Asian Ceramics
History of ceramic forms, techniques, and aesthetic principles in China, Korea, and Japan from neolithic times to the present century, illustrated by slides and examples, augmented by readings, field trips, and student presentations. Aimed at students with general interest in Japan and/or ceramics history; particularly but not exclusively those majoring in Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, East Asian Area Studies or History of Art; also art majors interested in ceramics.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2121 Chinese Wall Painting
This courses examines murals in Chinese temples and tombs from their earliest appearance in the first millennium BCE through the 20th century. Some are in situ; others are in museums. Murals are studied alongside paintings on silk and paper. Chinese wall painting is also studied alongside murals in temples and tombs in Korea, Japan, and Mongolia.
Not Offered Every Year
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 6121
1 Course Unit
EALC 2140 Japanese Art Seminar
Undergraduate seminar in early modern, modern, or contemporary Japanese art. Topics vary from semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 3150
1 Course Unit
EALC 2201 Modern East Asian Texts
This course is an introduction to and exploration of modern East Asian literatures and cultures through close readings and discussion of selected literary works from the early 20th century to the start of the 21st century. Focusing on China, Japan, and Korea, we will explore the shared and interconnected experiences of modernity in East Asia as well as broaden our perspective by considering the location of East Asian cultural production within a global modernity. Major issues we will encounter include: nation-building and the modern novel; cultural translation; media and technology; representations of gender, race, and class; history and memory; colonialism; war; body and sexuality; globalization. No knowledge of the original language is required.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: COML 2201
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 6201
1 Course Unit
EALC 2211 Colonial Japanese Literature
This course will explore the development of Japanese and colonial identities in literature produced in and about Japan's colonies during the first half of the 20th century. Throughout the semester, we will read works written during and about the Japanese empire by Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Okinawan, and Taiwanese writers. Looking at the different representations of empire, we will examine concepts such as assimilation, mimicry, hybridity, travel, and transculturation in the context of Japanese colonialism. By bringing together different voices from inside and outside of Japan's empire, students will gain a deeper understanding of the complexities of colonial hegemony and identity. In particular, reading works by Japanese, Okinawan, Korean, Taiwanese and Chinese subjects will enable students to transcend binary notions of colonizer and colonized while also acknowledging the realities of colonial complicity.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2221 Chinese Poetry & Prose: In translation
A wide variety of poetic & prose genres from the earliest times to the 19th century is introduced through English translation. A few selections will also be studied in Chinese characters with romanized transcriptions. There are no prerequisites for this course.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 2236 Seminar in Modern Chinese Literature
Modern Chinese writers are known for their efforts in creating a literary revolution that sought to reformulate the paradigm of Chinese writing .However, these Chinese writers also endeavored to learn from other cultures such as the European and Indian civilizations. For example, Tagore was invited to visit to China in 1923 and was considered a cultural model by many Chinese cultural elites. Hu Shi, a leading Chinese intellectual, wrote The Indianization of China: A Case Study in Cultural Borrowing and India Our Great Teacher, to emphasize the Indian elements in Chinese culture. Other Chinese writers also sought to compare the European with Chinese cultures in different occasions in order to find a path for the rise of modern China. This course explores the ways in which foreign cultures were introduced and how they influence the way the Chinese see themselves in their search for a cultural identity free from the constraints of classical tradition. We will read a variety of writers from the Peoples Republic of China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Malaysia, in order to examine how modern Chinese literature thrives on cross-cultural elements. All readings will be in English. No prior knowledge is required. Those who are proficient in Chinese are invited to read some of the texts in Chinese.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2243 Loyal Warriors in Japanese Literature
From the earliest literature to the latest think piece on Japanese society, the roles of the "warrior" and of "loyalty" in Japanese culture have fascinated those both inside and outside of Japan. In this course we will trace the development of paragons of loyalty and warrior prowess from the earliest literary works, through the epic Tales of the Heike, and on to the "Treasury of Loyal Retainers," theater, and film. We will read in the philosophy of fidelity and samurai codes to track the growing dedication to ideals of loyalty, exploring evidence of behavior less than loyal as we seek the real influence of these notions. Related topics include the extremes of vengeance and fanaticism.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2255 Modern Japanese Literature
This course surveys Japanese literature (novels, short stories, poetry, drama, essays) from 1868 to World War II. The purpose is not only to read some of the most important and interesting literary texts of this period, but also to reflect on the ways we read and study literature, and how we draw connections between literature, self, and society. The reading material will be entirely in English.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 2314 Cinema and Socialism
Films from socialist countries are often labeled and dismissed as "propaganda" in Western democratic societies. This course complicates this simplistic view, arguing for the value in understanding the ties between socialist governments, the cinematic arts, and everything in between. We will examine films from past and present socialist countries such as the Soviet Union, China, North Korea, and Cuba, as well as films made with socialist aspirations. See the English Department's website at www.english.upenn.edu for a description of the current offerings.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 3100, CIMS 3100, ENGL 2934, REES 3770
1 Course Unit
EALC 2501 Buddhist Literature
This course seeks to introduce students to the diversity of texts, textual practices, and textual communities in Buddhist Asia. We will look at cosmological, historical, narrative, psychological, grammatical, magical, didactic, and astrological genres to gain an understanding of how Buddhist writers from various places and times have expressed their views on the inner workings of the mind, the nature of action, the illusion of phenomena, the role of the ethical agent, the origin of chaos, the persistence of violence, the contours of the universe, and the way to Enlightenment.
Also Offered As: RELS 2730
1 Course Unit
EALC 2502 Science and Technology in Modern East Asia
Technology from East Asia is ubiquitous in everyday life in the 21st century. You may be reading these very words on a device designed or assembled in Japan, China, South Korea, or Taiwan. The region, now a global center of research and innovation, contains some of the modern world’s most impressive technological and scientific achievements. It also exhibits some of the most distressing—from mass facial recognition surveillance in China to nuclear disaster in Japan. This course explores how this state of affairs has taken shape from the 19th century through the present. Topics include industrialization, military technology, science and the rise of nationalism, the proliferation of consumer electronics, and environmental engineering in a warming world.
Also Offered As: STSC 2146
1 Course Unit
EALC 2531 Religion in Modern China
This course focuses on the history and role of religion in the Chinese cultural sphere (Mainland China, Taiwan, and the Diaspora) from the mid-19th century to the present day, focusing on the relationship between religious institutions and the state during the imperial, republican, and communist regimes. We will learn about the impact of religious ideas, practices, and organizations on social, political and economic processes and inspect the role of religion in the consolidation of individual, communal, and national identity. Adopting a comparative and interdisciplinary approach, we will attempt to ascertain the impact of the various Chinese religious traditions: Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, and popular sects, as well as global religions such as Islam and Christianity, on the internal sociopolitical structure of the Chinese state and their role in shaping power relations on a transregional, national, and local level. Special emphasis will be given to the role and use of the grand narratives of secularism and modernity in the shaping of the Chinese nation-state, as well as the value of using these frameworks in the study of modern China. The class is discussion based, supplemented by lectures, student presentations, and documentary films. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed. All readings will be in English.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 2531
1 Course Unit
EALC 2550 The Politics of Shinto
Shinto-derived images and ideas frequently appear in Japanese anime and film, and journalists and academics frequently mobilize the term Shinto as a way of explaining Japan's past or envisioning its future. The environmentalist left champions a green Shinto while Shinto-derived ideas serve as red meat for politicians pandering to Japan's nationalist right. While the influential position Shinto occupies in Japanese sociopolitical life is therefore clear, the term Shinto itself is actually not. Depending on who one asks, Shinto is either the venerable indigenous religion of the Japanese archipelago, the irreducible core of Japanese culture, a tiny subset of Japanese Buddhism, an environmentalist ethic, or some combination of these. This course investigates the multifarious types of Shinto envisioned by these competing interest groups.
Spring
Also Offered As: RELS 2710
Mutually Exclusive: RELS 6710
1 Course Unit
EALC 2701 Innovation, Regulations, Technology, and Society: Experience from East Asia
Innovation and creativity are universally recognized as aspects of modern life. From stem cell research to nanotechnology and machine learning, innovation is heralded as a thing of value to be actively fostered, as a key ingredient for the betterment of the human condition, and often as a desirable process for economic growth. While existing innovative activities are often based in the so-called advanced economies, particularly the United States and the European Union, increasingly we see new players on the global scene vying for influence and offering new forms of innovation and upgrading. These new players are often countries from East Asia. What positions do these East Asian countries occupy in the global knowledge economy? How are they navigating a constantly evolving and competitive frontier technology market where ownership of intellectual property rights remains in the hands of a handful of advanced economies? Technological innovation can take a toll, not least in the form of increased level of risks that a society must bear, as well as in environmental degradation, worker strife stemming from a shortage of jobs, gender disparity, and expanding wealth and knowledge gaps (including access to knowledge) between different socioeconomic classes. In this course, we will consider how regional patterns (and national variations) of economic growth and sociocultural changes under way in East Asia have been influenced by the global technological revolution, as well as the infrastructure of power and governance. Particularly, the course exposes students to scholarship on the governance of the global political economy, with a focus on the socio-legal regulation of emerging science and technology. The course will begin with discussing how states strike a balance between innovation and protection through implementing relevant regulatory frameworks. In addition, we will explore what implications emerging technologies have for societies, as well as how these evolving dynamics impact the lived experience of local communities.
Also Offered As: SOCI 2691
1 Course Unit
EALC 2711 Knights with Katanas: Medieval Japan and Europe Compared
This course aims to provide an overview of some of the main themes and problemsin the history and historiography of medieval Japan by drawing on comparisons with European counterparts and interpretive models. To this end, each week's readings on Japan are paired with one or more works on medieval Europe dealing with a similar theme. The primary purpose is not only to draw comparisons between the two civilizations and their development but also to use the great riches of scholarship on the European Middle Ages to shed light on possible new avenues of inquiry and perspectives on Japan.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: HIST 0752
1 Course Unit
EALC 2721 History of Private Life in China
Underneath the grandeur of empires, war, revolutions, history eventually is about people’s life. This seminar explores how the boundaries of private life in China intersect with the public arena and how such an intersection has significantly re-shaped Chinese private life between the 16th century and the present. The first half of the seminar will explore how the private realm in late imperial China was defined and construed by Confucian discourses, architectural design, moral regulation, cultural consumption, and social network. Moving into the twentieth century, the remaining part of the seminar will examine how the advent of novel concepts such as modernity and revolution restructured the private realm, particularly in regard to the subtopics outlined above. Organizing questions include: How did female chastity become the center of a public cult which then changed the life paths of countless families? How did the practice of female foot-binding intersect with marriage choices, household economy, and social status? How did print culture create a new space for gentry women to negotiate the boundaries between their inner quarters and the outside world? What was the ideal and reality of married life in late imperial China? How did people’s life change when the collective pursuit for Chinese modernity placed romantic love, freedom to marry and divorce at the center of public debates? How was “Shanghai modern” related to the emerging middle class life style as evidenced in advertisement posters? How has the ideal of gender equality been re-interpreted and realized under the Communist regime? How have the current market reforms reformulated the contours of private life in China?
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: GSWS 2500, HIST 2500
1 Course Unit
EALC 2722 Cities in Chinese History
This seminar will study the development of Chinese cities over the past two millennia with respect to their spatial structure, social constitution, economic system, political functions, and cultural representation (including cityscape paintings, maps, and films).As China transitioned from a collection of city-states to a united empire to nation state, Chinese urbanism underwent transformations as drastic as those of the country itself. Cities, which serve as a critical mechanism for the operation of a vast agrarian empire/nation like China , offer a unique vantage point for us to observe and analyze the continuities and discontinuities between dynastic empires as well as the radical transition from empire to modern nation state. Topics include: the city-state system in ancient China; the creation and evolution of imperial capitals; the medieval urban revolution and the subsequent collapse of classic city plans; the development of urban public sphere/public space in late imperial China; the rise of commercial power in urban politics; the negotiation of urban class and gender relations via cultural consumption; the role of cities in the building of a modern Chinese nation state; the anti-city experiment under the communist regime; urban citizenship in the reform era; as well as the expanding urbanization and shifting urbanism of Greater China as reflected in cinematic representations of Shanghai, Hongkong, and Taipei.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 2501, URBS 2501
1 Course Unit
EALC 2732 History of Hong Kong
Hong Kong is almost explosively alive today, as Professor Waldron discovered on a recent trip to prepare for this course. From 1842-1997 the British Colony was a sleepy city having a mostly transient population until 1945; then she swelled with refugees after 1950 to become a rapidly growing economy now richer than Britain. In 1997 she was turned over to China under the “one country two systems” motto. Since then, however, relations with China have proven increasingly fraught. The legislative election of autumn 2016 saw the pro-China candidates crushed in a massive vote that returned a number of young people (Hong Kong politics are generational) to the Legislature who explicitly favor the independence of the city from China—the worst of heresies from Beijing’s point of view. Nearly all favor democracy and real law—also anathema to Beijing. As the course is being taught, a new Chief Executive election will be going on. Hong Kong is not simply a fascinating city. She is also a window of sorts into China and her politics.. We will read everything from colonial accounts to campaign leaflets, examining the situation in three dimensions, integrated with China and the region. Seminar meets T 1:30-4:30; readings, discussion, and a short paper on a topic of your choice.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 2551
1 Course Unit
EALC 2761 Traditional Korea and the Human Experience
This course provides a survey of Chosŏn Korea (1392-1910), focusing on the insights this period and place offer us into fundamental problems that have engaged societies throughout history, including those of our present time. Through translated primary-source readings, images, and objects, we will explore topics such as public duties and private desires, exclusion and belonging, the pursuit of power and wealth, legal justice, gender and class relations, the politics of language and writing, and ecological vulnerability and resilience. Students will be invited to contribute comparative perspectives that draw on their knowledge of other societies and times; they will also assess contemporary dramatizations of this period with the historical understanding they will develop throughout the course. On completion, students will gain an overview of politics, society, and culture in traditional Korea that will serve as the foundation for their further study of modern Korean history and contemporary affairs. No prior knowledge of Korea or the Korean language is required.
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 6761
1 Course Unit
EALC 2763 Readings in Korean History
This course introduces students to English-language scholarship on social history of Korea from the founding of the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910) to the mid-nineteenth century. Conducted as a reading seminar, the course will examine status and gender in early modern Korean society by considering, among others, descent, kinship, marriage, education, and economy. A reading list of noteworthy studies is intended to help the students map some critical questions and debates that have shaped the historiography. Everyone must participate actively in discussions, provide oral presentations as a discussion leader, and submit two review essays. No knowledge of Korean language or culture is presumed. This course satisfies Cross Cultural Analysis requirement.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 2801 East Asian Digital Humanities
Are you interested in cutting-edge digital methods for the humanities in East Asia, but don't know where to start? This course covers a wide range of current and emerging digital projects and topics in East Asian studies.Students will engage with digital projects focused on East Asia (encompassing Japan, China, Korea, and Taiwan) as well as research being done on Digital methodologies for the humanities in those areas. Coursework consists of project and research analysis, active discussion, and learning about the implementation of various digital projects. Example topics include text analysis, APIs, network analysis, digital literary studies, and mapping. No technical expertise is required but students must have reading knowledge of Chinese, Japanese, or Korean at the high-intermediate or advanced level. Class presentations, discussions, and all course readings will be in English, but midterm and final projects involve reading articles and midterm and final projects involve reading articles and/or critiquing projects. Prerequisite: Reading knowledge (intermediate or above) of East Asian language required.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3111 Tang China and Nara Japan
This is a seminar about Tang China and Nara Japan, and Early Heian Japan, Unified Silla Korea, Northeast Asia under Parhae, and Uyghur Inner Asia through their cities, palaces, monasteries, Buddhist art, and painting. We begin by studying material remains of the two best-documented civilizations of East Asian in the seventh-ninth centuries. Using painting, sculpture, ceramics, and architecture of Tang China and Nara Japan, we investigate the validity of the frequent assessment of an international Tang through material remains in China and Japan. We then move to Korea, Mongolia, and Central Asia. Students will have a wide range of topics to work on. They will be encouraged to find comparative topics. This seminar is an opportunity for students to use Chinese, Japanese, or Korean in research papers. There are no exams. Readings will be assigned to the whole group and to individual students for short presentations every week. Undergraduates will write one short and write and present one long paper.
1 Course Unit
EALC 3116 Chinese Art Under the Mongols
The Yuan Dynasty (1257-1368), the period of Mongolilan rule, was the only time in Chinese history when China was part of a larger empire that spanned the Asian continent. Using architecture, sculpture, painting, and excavated evidence, this course examines the unique results of an international Asian world centered in China.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3121 Life and Death in Han China
Using maps, city-panning, architecture, wall painting, sculpture, and minor arts as evidence, the course will examine the attitudes toward life and death in Han (206 BCE-AD 220) China.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 3211 Modern Chinese Poetry in a Global Context
The tumultuous political and economic history of modern China has been mirrored in and shaped by equally fundamental revolutions in language and poetic expression. In this course, we will take Chinese poetry as a crucible in which we can observe the interacting forces of literary history and social change. From diplomats who saw poetry as a medium for cultural translation between China and the world, to revolutionaries who enlisted poetry in the project of social transformation, we will examine the lives and works of some of China’s most prominent poets and ask, what can we learn about modern China from reading their poetry? In asking this question, we will also reckon with the strengths and limitations of using poetry as an historical source. In addition to poems, the course will include fiction, essays, photographs, and films by both Chinese and non-Chinese artists that place our poets in a broader context. We will pay close attention to how these poets represent China’s place in the world, as well as the role of language in social change. Topics of discussion include: national identity, revolution, translation, gender, the body, ethnicity, and technology. Familiarity with Chinese or related cultural context is beneficial, but not required. This course introduces students to Chinese poetry in English translation. Students will leave the course with an in-depth understanding of the main figures, themes, and techniques of Chinese poetry, and will be introduced to some of the major developments in the history of China. Through a focus on primary texts, students will develop the vocabulary and analytical skills to appreciate and analyze poetry in translation and will gain confidence as writers thinking about literary texts.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ASAM 3211, COML 3211
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 7211
1 Course Unit
EALC 3244 War and Literature in Japan: Tales of the Heike
Our subject is Tale of the Heike, a multifaceted narrative of the twelfth-century battles that brought the Taira clan down and led to the establishment of Japan's first military government. We will read the Heike tales with an eye toward how they fictionalize history and idealize certain types, most notably loyal women and warriors; the development of the warrior tale genre; central aspects of the Japanese ethos; and later works of literature based on episodes and characters from the Tale of the Heike. All material is in English translation. (Students of Japanese language may learn to read a famous section in the original.) There are no pre-requisites.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3246 The Tale of Genji
"Crowning masterpiece of Japanese literature," "the world's first novel," "fountainhead of Japanese literary and aesthetic culture," "a great soap opera in the vein of Jacqueline Susann." Readers over the centuries have praised the Tale of Genji, the monumental prose tale finished just after the year 1000, in a variety of ways. In this course we will read the latest English translation of Murasaki Shikibu's work. We will watch as Genji loses his mother at a tender age, is cast out of the royal family, and begins a quest to fill the void she left. Along the way, Genji's loyalty to all the women he encounters forges his reputation as the ideal lover. We will consider gender issues in the female author's portrayal of this rake, and question the changing audience, from bored court women to censorious monks, from adoring nationalists to comic book adaptors. Study of the tale requires consideration of poetry, imagery, costume, music, history, religion, theater, political and material culture, all of which will be components of the course. We will also trace the effect of the tale's many motifs, from flora and fauna to murderously jealous spirits, on later literature and conceptions of human emotions. All material is in English translation. There are no prerequisites.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: GSWS 3246
1 Course Unit
EALC 3251 Japanese Science Fiction and Fantasy
This course will provide an overview of the major tropes, themes, and interpretations of contemporary Japanese science fiction and fantasy. As we establish a foundational knowledge of the history and structural formulations of genre fiction in Japan, we will cover topics such as folklore, high fantasy, apocalypse, dystopia, magical realism, posthumanism, video games, and transnational media franchises and cross-cultural marketing. By the end of the semester, students will possess a deeper understanding and appreciation of the role that science fiction and fantasy play in shaping contemporary media cultures in Japan and around the world.
1 Course Unit
EALC 3252 Japanese Ghost Stories
This course offers a survey of the numinous and supernatural through Japanese fiction, films, drama, comics, and video games from ancient times to the present day. Students will assemble a foundational knowledge of Japanese mythology and folk religion while studying popular narrative traditions representative of their historical eras. By peering into the liminal spaces connecting the living with the dead, students will also develop critical thinking and media literacy through careful investigation into the matters that people of different times and places have perceived as monstrous, alien, and unspeakable. Issues of gender, sexuality, and ethnic minority status will receive special attention as we navigate theories relating to the cultural role and relevance of ghosts. Strong writing skills are recommended, but no prior knowledge of Japan or the Japanese language is required.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3355 Japanese Theater
Japan has one of the richest and most varied theatrical traditions in the world. In this course, we will examine Japanese theater in historical and comparative contexts. The readings and discussions will cover all areas of the theatrical experience (script, acting, stage design, costumes, music, and audience). Audio-visual material will be used whenever appropriate and possible. The class will be conducted in English, with all English materials.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: COML 3555, THAR 3355
1 Course Unit
EALC 3424 Gender and Sexuality in Chinese History
This course examines gender and sexuality in Chinese history from ancient to contemporary times. It focuses on historiographical developments and methods of studying gender and sexuality in history as well as in Chinese history. The readings will include, but not be limited to, works by Robin Wang, Paul Goldin, Jen-der Lee, Patricia Ebrey, Beverly Bossler, Charlotte Furth, Susan Mann, Dorothy Ko, Francesca Bray, Yi-Li Wu, Matthew Sommer, Janet Theiss, Siyen Fei, Judith Zeitlin, Keith McMahon, Nicole Barnes, Gail Hershatter, Tani Barlow, and Lisa Rofel.
Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0756
1 Course Unit
EALC 3425 Gender, Religion, and China
This course examines the interrelationship among "gender," "religion," and "China" as conceptual and historical categories. We ask, for example, how gender plays critical and constitutive roles in Chinese religious traditions, how religion can be used both to reinforce and to challenge gender norms, how religious women impact Chinese society and culture, and what the construction of "China" as a cultural identity and as a nation-state has to do with women, gender, and religion. We will also think about what assumptions we have when speaking of gender, religion, and China, and the infinite possibilities when we strive to think beyond. We will read three kinds of materials: (1) scholarship on gender and religion in historical and contemporary China as well as the Chinese-speaking world, (2) scholarship concerning theories and methodology of gender and religious studies not necessarily focused on China, and (3) historical record of religious women in English translation.
Spring
Also Offered As: GSWS 3425, RELS 3425
1 Course Unit
EALC 3429 Sex and Society in Ancient China
Ancient Chinese writers considered sexual activity to be an essential component of humanity, and the study of human sexuality to be essential to the study of human history. Sexuality constituted a fundamental source of imagery and categories that informed the classical Chinese conception of social, political, and military relationships. This course will survey the major sources dealing with sex and society in ancient China. There are no prerequisites, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3522 Medicine and Healing in China
This course explores Chinese medicine and healing culture, its diversity, and its change over time. We will discuss topics including the establishment of canonical medicine, Daoist approaches to healing and longevity, diverse views of the body and disease, the emergence of treatments for women, medical construction of sex difference and imagination of female sexuality, the thriving and decline of female healers, the identity of scholar physicians, the transmission of medical knowledge, domestic and cross-regional drug market, healer-patient relations, and new visions of traditional Chinese medicine in modern China.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: HSOC 3326
1 Course Unit
EALC 3523 Chinese Aesthetics
This seminar investigates classical Chinese conceptions of art and beauty as exemplified in philosophy, literature, music, painting, calligraphy, and architecture. All readings will be in English, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed. Graduate students should see the instructor to discuss requirements for graduate credit.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3524 Daoist Traditions
This course examines the history of various intellectual and religious traditions that came to be known as Daoist (or Taoist in the Wade-Giles Romanization). We will begin with a critical review of the twentieth-century reinvention of Daoism and the new classification of religious versus philosophical Daoism, before tracing chronologically the textual, institutional, and social history of Daoist traditions from the fourth century B.C.E. While familiarizing students with the key concepts, practices, and organizations developed in the history of Daoism, this class emphasizes the specific socio-political context of each of them. Throughout the course, we will think critically about the labeling of Daoist (as well as Confucian and Buddhist) in Chinese history and in modern scholarship. We will also question modern demarcations between philosophy, religion, and science, as well as that between the spiritual and the physical.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 3524
1 Course Unit
EALC 3528 Apocalypse and Utopia in China
Representations of a perfect society and imagined scenarios of a dystopian or apocalyptic future are a common features of all human societies. Philosophical, religious, and literary attempts to imagine alternative futures and critique present conditions enjoyed wide popularity and considerable influence throughout Chinese history. The goal of this course will be to introduce students to the major themes and trends in utopian and apocalyptic thought in China, from the premodern age to our times. In the first part of the semester, we will learn about the utopian and apocalyptic narratives that emerged in early and medieval China. We will begin by discussing the two archetypal models of a utopian society in early China: the Confucian harmonious moral society and its Daoist counterpart of an idyllic secluded community located in faraway lands. We will then turn our attention to the emergence of organized religion and the utopian and apocalyptic scenarios promoted by Daoist and Buddhist writers and religious innovators. In the second part of the semester, we will focus on the modern and contemporary periods and the study the impact of the introduction of Western utopian and millenarian narratives on the Chinese imagination. In addition to surveying some real-world attempts to establish a utopian society, such as the 19th century Taiping Rebellion, Mao Zedong's attempts to re-fashion China into a Community Utopia in the 20th century, and the 21st century eco-village green movement, students will be introduced to a wide variety of literary and cinematic texts that try to imagine a possible future - from the utopian sci-fi nationalism of The Wandering Earth to the dystopian fiction of leading writers such as Han Song, Chen Qiufan, and Han Jingfang. Using these works as case studies, we will strive to ascertain the role of utopianism as a tool of political, social, and environmental criticism and as a way to construct a better and more just society in the 21st century. No knowledge of Chinese is necessary - all readings will be in English. As a split-level seminar, the course will be discussion-based. Students will be asked to post weekly 500-word response papers in which they will analyze and critique the readings. The goal of this task is to help students familiarize themselves with the assigned sources before the in-class discussion thus facilitating a meaningful and productive discussion. For their final project, students will conduct their own research on a topic of their choice and present it during the last meeting. Undergraduate paper will be limited to 10-pages; graduate papers should be around 20-25 pages, including original-language research.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3531 Chinese Law and Society
This course is an introduction to the study of law and society in China in a comparative and global context. We will begin by considering the tradition of imperial Chinese law and its social and philosophical foundations. We will then turn to the confrontation between the Qing empire and Euro-American imperial powers in the nineteenth century and the attendant collision between European and Chinese notions of sovereignty. Next, we will consider early twentieth-century law reforms as the Qing empire was transformed into the constitutional form of a modern republic, followed by the introduction of socialist law and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China. The course will conclude with post-Mao reforms and their implications for the future of Chinese law and society. Throughout the course, we will pay attention to the use of historical and comparative methods. What are the potentials and liabilities of using law as an analytical category in cross-cultural study? What happens when “Eastern” and “Western” legal cultures come in contact with each other? How is law related to capitalism and socialism? How does law structure political and socio-economic relations globally? How does law produce as well as constrain subjects and identities? What is the relationship between law, gender, and sexuality?
Spring
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 7531
1 Course Unit
EALC 3532 Constitutionalism and Democracy in China: 1900-present
Research on constitutional thought in China from the late Qing to the present, as well as the political and practical aspects of attempts at implementation. A presentation and a research paper of moderate length are expected. Chinese language is not necessary, though if you have it, that will be useful.
Also Offered As: HIST 3552
1 Course Unit
EALC 3559 Gender and Sexuality in Japan
If you have ever wondered about the following questions, then this is the right course for you: Is Japan a hyper-feminine nation of smiling geisha and obedient wives? Is it a hyper-masculine nation of samurai and economic warriors? Is it true that Japanese wives control the household? Is it true that Japanese men suffer from over-dependence on their mothers? What do young Japanese women and young men worry about? What does the government think about the future of Japanese women and men? Assuming that expressions of gender and sexuality are deeply influenced by cultural and social factors, and that they also show profound differences regionally and historically, this course examines a variety of texts--historical, biographical, autobiographical, fictional, non-fictional, visual, cinematic, analytical, theoretical--in order to better understand the complexity of any attempts to answer the above questions.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: GSWS 3559
1 Course Unit
EALC 3621 Introduction to Classical Chinese I
Introduction to the classical written language, beginning with Shadick, First Course in Literary Chinese. Students with a background in Japanese, Korean, Cantonese, Taiwanese, and other East Asian languages are welcome; it is not necessary to know Mandarin. The course begins from scratch, and swiftly but rigorously develops the ability to read a wide variety of classical and semi-classical styles. Original texts from the 6th century BC to the 20th century AD are studied. This course is taught in English and there are no prerequisites.
Fall
Also Offered As: CHIN 1050
1 Course Unit
EALC 3622 Introduction to Classical Chinese II
Continuation of Intro to Classical Chinese I, which is the only prerequisite for this course. Upon completion of Shadick, readings in a wide selection of texts with Chinese commentaries may be taken up. These readings are in part chosen to reflect student interest. This is the second half of a year-long course. Those who enroll must take both semesters.
Spring
Also Offered As: CHIN 1055
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 7622
Prerequisite: EALC 3621
1 Course Unit
EALC 3623 Advanced Classical Chinese I
Close reading and interpretation of texts in various styles of classical Chinese drawn from the Han, Wei, Tang, and Song periods. Focus on strengthening students' reading ability in classical Chinese. Attention to questions of style, rhetoric, and syntax.
Fall
Also Offered As: CHIN 1150
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 8621
1 Course Unit
EALC 3624 Advanced Classical Chinese II
Close reading and interpretation of texts in various styles of classical Chinese drawn from the Han, Wei, Tang, and Song periods. Focus on strengthening students' reading ability in classical Chinese. Attention to questions of style, rhetoric, and syntax. It is preferred, but not required, that students take Advanced Classical Chinese I first.
Spring
Also Offered As: CHIN 1155
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 8622
1 Course Unit
EALC 3641 Readings in Classical Japanese I
Readings in classical texts drawn from the Heian, Kamakura, Muromachi, and Edo periods. Introduction to the different styles of classical Japanese, and to classical Japanese as a whole.
Fall
Also Offered As: JPAN 1050
Prerequisite: JPAN 0600
1 Course Unit
EALC 3681 Introduction to Classical Mongolian
In this class students who already know some modern Mongolian in the Cyrillic script will learn how to transfer that knowledge to the reading of first post-classical, and then classical texts written in the vertical or Uyghur-Mongolian script. Topics covered will include the Mongolian alphabetic script, dealing with ambiguous readings, scholarly transcription, vowel harmony and syllable structure, post-classical and classical forms of major declensions, converbs, verbal nouns, and finite verbs, syntax, pronunciation and scribal readings. Readings will be adjusted to interests, but as a rule will include selections from short stories, diaries, chronicles, Buddhist translations, government documents, popular didactic poetry, ritual texts, and traditional narratives. Students will also be introduced to the most important reference works helpful in reading classical and post-classical Mongolian.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 3682 Introduction to Classical Mongolian II
Continuation of EALC293/693, which is the only prerequisite for this course. Upon completion of the basic introduction to grammar, spelling rules, and diachronic levels (pre-classical, classical, post-classical), readings in a wide selection of texts with Mongolian commentaries may be taken up. These readings are in part chosen to reflect student interest. This is the second half of a year-long course. Those who enroll should take both semesters.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 3720 Early Chinese History
This seminar covers the span of Chinese history from the Bronze Age to the end of the Han dynasty in A.D. 220. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed, but EALC 0020 (Introduction to Chinese Civilization) is a prerequisite. Graduate students who wish to enroll should meet with the instructor to discuss additional requirements for graduate credit.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 3721 Law in Pre-Modern China
This course, intended for graduate students and advanced undergraduates, offers a survey of the sources and research problems of pre-modern Chinese law. For reasons to be examined in the course, traditional Sinological education has neglected law as a legitimate field of inquiry; consequently, the secondary literature is surprisingly meager. Our readings will take us from the Warring States Period to the Qing dynasty--an interval of over two millennia--and will cover several varieties of legal documents, including statutes, handbooks, court records, and theoretical treatises. All the readings will be in English, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed. Graduate students should see the instructor to discuss requirement for graduate credit.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 3742 City & Citizenship: Samurai Politics and Commoner Culture in Early Modern Japan
In the early modern period (1600-1867), Japan underwent a staggering urban transformation. Edo, the shogunal capital, grew in barely a century from a new settlement to a sprawling metropolis of over a million. Indeed, most of Japan's current urban centers descend directly from the castle towns built by regional warlords in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries in an effort keep the peace after over a hundred years of civil war. As a result, Japanese cities in the early modern period became a central component of what historians have called a "re-feudalization" of society, and retained strong vestiges of their military origins. At the same time the samurai-centered space of the new cities created opportunities for the development of alternative cultural practices and values by urban commoners. The juxtaposition of the regimented, honor-driven society designed and longed for by samurai and the fluid, money-driven society that grew out of the burgeoning cities' commoner quarters is one of the animating forces of the early modern period. Through study of scholarship and contemporary sources (laws and sumptuary regulations, codes of conducts, but also diaries, novels, plays), this course will explore the many facets of early modern urban society, its medieval antecedents, and its legacies in contemporary Japan.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: HIST 0753
1 Course Unit
EALC 3744 Law and Violence in Pre-Modern Japan
This course will be an exploration of premodern Japanese history through the lens of violence. The centuries under consideration (roughly, the eighth thought nineteenth) were characterized by greatly varying levels of violence, both of the state-sanctioned variety (war, punishments for law-breakers and political losers) and of the non-sanctioned variety (piracy, banditry, warrior and peasant rebellions). Examining a wide variety of translated sources, from diaries to chronicles, from legal codes to fiction, we shall examine the changing social, political, economic, and cultural contexts of violence, in order to interrogate not only why certain periods were remarkably peaceful while others were not, but also why violence took different forms in relation to different circumstances. We shall consider how contempories made sense of the violence that surrounded them (or didn't) and how they divided the acceptable use of force from the wanton and society-threatening abuse of it. The course will feature presentations and severl (very short) papers.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: HIST 0754
1 Course Unit
EALC 3783 Pastoralism & Mobility
"Pastoralism and Mobility" will examine the society and history of mobile pastoralists (nomads) in Inner Asia from earliest times to the present. Peoples covered will include Mongols, Tibetans, Turkic nomads (such as Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and Turkmen), and their ancestors and predecessors. The class will focus on questions such as: Is there a distinctive form of Inner Asian pastoralist society? At the grass roots level? At the elite level? How have states (native and foreign) influenced Inner Asian pastoralist society in pre-modern and modern contexts? How have Inner Asian pastoralists influenced neighboring states? What role does kinship play in governing group formation, property, and status in Inner Asian pastoralist society? Does this role vary over time, space, or ethnic background? If so, how? What purposes does mobility serve in Inner Asian societies? How have various forms of livestock lease-holding changed and shaped wealth in Inner Asian pastoralist society? How did class differentiation emerge & function in pre-modern pastoralist societies? What happens when pastoralists become farmers? How have modern schemes of social improvement and productivity, especially collectivization and decollectivization, shaped pastoralist lives?
Fall, odd numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 4030 Major Seminar on China
This is a seminar required for all Chinese majors in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilization. Topic varies year to year.
Fall or Spring
Prerequisite: EALC 0020
1 Course Unit
EALC 4050 Major Seminar on Japan
This is a seminar required for all Japanese majors in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilization. Topic varies year to year.
Fall
Prerequisite: EALC 0040
1 Course Unit
EALC 4070 Major Seminar on Korea
This is a seminar required for all Korean majors in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilization. Topic varies year to year.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 4950 Honors Thesis
Course credit for EALC majors pursuing honors
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 4990 Transfer Credit Away: Free Elective
Course credit for courses taken in an approved program.
1 Course Unit
EALC 5000 East Asian History and Civilizations
This seminar is designed for incoming graduate students in the department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, offering a thematic overview of the academic study of Chinese and Japanese history and cultures from the Neolithic period to the 21st century. Over the course of the semester, students will be introduced to different scholarly approaches to the study of East Asian history and culture through a close reading and analysis of the work of leading scholars in the fields of Sinology and Japanology. Together, we will learn about the diverse approaches to the study of China and Japan, from the various subfields of historical studies (such as social, intellectual, legal, and religious history) to other academic disciplines such as religious studies, anthropology, gender studies, and archaeology. We will examine the different methodological frameworks and tools used by past and present scholars and draw on them in order to problematize and enrich our understanding of East Asia. In addition, this seminar will provide incoming students with the relevant skills to produce their own original graduate-level research and present it in a clear and persuasive fashion both orally and in written form. While original-language research for the final project is encouraged, all weekly readings will be in English.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 5020 Chinese History and Civilization
This seminar offers a thematic overview of the academic study of Chinese history from the Neolithic period to the 21st century. Over the course of the semester, students will be introduced to different scholarly approaches to the study of history through a close reading and analysis of the work of leading scholars in the field of Sinology. We will learn about the various subfields in the study of history, such as cultural history, social history, administrative and legal history, intellectual history, history of religion, literary history, history of gender, world history, and historiography, examine their different methodological frameworks and tools, and draw on them in order to problematize and enrich our understanding of Chinese culture. In addition, this seminar will provide incoming students with the relevant tools to produce original graduate-level research on all aspects of Chinese history, society, and culture and present it in a clear and persuasive fashion orally and in written form. While original-language research for the final project is encouraged, all course materials will be in English.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 5040 Japanese History and Civilization
This seminar introduces students to the graduate-level study of Japan. In addition to getting a broad overview of Japanese culture, students in the course will develop familiarity with major debates in the history of the field of Japanese studies. The course also provides basic training in using primary and secondary sources in Japanese, Japanese bibliographic conventions, and other skills necessary for pursuing advanced research or a teaching career in the field. Open to all graduate students and to undergraduates with permission from the instructor. Familiarity with Japanese language is a plus but is not required.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5060 Korean History & Civilization
This graduate-level seminar focuses on the political, social, and cultural history of the Korean Peninsula and the vicinity from early times to the contemporary era. Readings will consist of primary and secondary sources, including influential modern studies of Korean history and civilization. All course materials are in English and no knowledge of Korean is presumed.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5080 Introduction to Inner Asian Civilizations
This class is intended for new graduate students and upper-division undergraduates with some prerequisites who wish to get a solid grounding in the study of Inner Asia. The class will introduce Inner Asia as a coherent civilizational network, focusing on: 1) the steppe-imperial tradition; 2) the Tibetan-rite Buddhist commonwealth that developed from the Tibetan and Mongol empires; and 3) the increasing integration of these two Inner Asian civilizational patterns with that of imperial China. There will also be some consideration of the Islamic Turco-Mongolian synthesis that developed in the post-Mongol period. Regionally, the class introduce: 1) core Inner Asia (the Mongolian plateau, the Tarim Basin, the Tibetan plateau, the Manchuria) and 2) the main dynasties of China that formed in the Mongolia and Manchuria (Liao, Jin, Yuan and Qing). There will also be some consideration of historically Inner Asian populations in Hexi (Gansu-Qinghai), and the North China plains and the Shaanxi-Shanxi-Rehe uplands. Chronologically, the class will touch on prehistory and the contemporary period, but will mostly cover the period from the emergence of historical records on the Mongolian plateau and the Tarim basin to roughly 1950. Prehistory and the contemporary period will be give less detailed coverage.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5100 How to Look at and Write Asian Art
This seminar focuses on ten very different monuments of Asian art in order to learn how to ask questions about and write about painting, sculpture, and buildings. Following a general introduction to the art of East Asia and South Asia, each class will focus on a major monument and similar examples of it: a Chinese bronze vessel, the Tomb of the First Emperor, Sokkuram, Elephanta, Traveling through Famous Sites of Wu, Tale of Genji, Gold Pavilion, the Forbidden City, Taj Mahal, the city Xi'an. We will discuss why each is important, its religious or philosophical context, and assess how it has been discussed in literature and modern writing. We will then discuss optimal or innovative ways to present it and write about it. Each week students will analyze writing about that week's subject and turn in a short evaluation of writings about the subject of the former week's class. The final paper will be an article of the kind one would submit to a newspaper or magazine. The class will be taught synchronously. However, students will be encouraged to write about an object in a local museum for the final project.
1 Course Unit
EALC 5101 Buddhist Arts of East Asia: Sources, Iconography and Styles
Survey of art and architecture created for Buddhist religious purposes in China, Japan, and to a lesser extent Korea, Tibet, and Central Asia. The course will include a brief overview of Buddhist monuments in South Asia, study of the iconography of Buddhist images in graphic and sculptural media, and analysis of a variety of Buddhist styles in painting, sculpture, and architecture.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5106 East Asian Gardens
Explore the beauty of gardens (and associated buildings) in Japan, China, and Korea from ancient times to the present. Lectures will be illustrated by photographs from dozens of sites in East Asia, and by a field trip to the Japanese House and Garden in Fairmount Park. The main body of the course will be a historical survey of the evolution of East Asian garden art forms from the sixth century to the present. Discussion will touch on geographic and climatic parameters, spiritual and aesthetic principles, practical limitations and creative innovations of East Asian gardens. There will be an additional fee for the Japanese House visit, and possibly for other field trips.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5109 East Asian Ceramics
History of ceramic forms, techniques, and aesthetic principles in China, Korea, and Japan from neolithic times to the present century, illustrated by slides and examples, augmented by readings, field trips, and student presentations. Aimed at students with general interest in Japan and/or ceramics history; particularly but not exclusively those majoring in East Asian Languages & Civs, East Asian Area Studies or History of Art; also art majors interested in ceramics.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5116 East Asian Cinema
This survey course introduces students to major trends, genres, directors, and issues in the cinemas of East Asian countries/regions, including Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Charting key developments over more than a hundred years from the early twentieth century to the present, this course examines films as aesthetic objects, asking questions about film form, narrative, and style. It also pays attention to the evolution of cinema as an institution (e.g. modes of production, circulation, and exhibition) in different cultural and political contexts. Weekly course materials will include both films (primary sources) and analytical readings (secondary sources). By the end of the course, students are expected to gain broad knowledge of East Asian cinema, develop skills of film analysis, and apply these skills to perform historically informed and culturally sensitive analysis of cinema. Prior knowledge of East Asian languages is NOT required.
Also Offered As: ARTH 6910
Mutually Exclusive: ARTH 2910, CIMS 2910, EALC 1116
1 Course Unit
EALC 5120 Arts of China
A broad survey of Chinese architecture, sculpture, and painting from the Neolithic age through the nineteenth century. Topics include excavated material from China's Bronze Age, Chinese funerary arts, Buddhist caves and sculpture (including works in the University Museum), the Chinese city, the Chinese garden, and major masterpieces of Chinese painting.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5127 Chinese Painting
Study of Chinese painting and practice from the earliest pictorial representation through the late twentieth century. Painting styles are analyzed, but themes such as landscape and narrative are considered with regard to larger social, cultural, and historical issues. The class will pay particular attention to the construction of the concepts of the "artist" and "art criticism" and their impact on the field into the present. Visits to study paintings at the University of Pennsylvania Museum and Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5129 Chinese Architecture
Survey of Chinese buildings and building technology from the formative period in the second millennium BCE through the twentieth century. The course will deal with well-known monuments such as the Buddhist monasteries of Wutai, imperial palaces in Chang'an and Beijing, the Ming tombs and the Temple of Heaven, and less frequently studied buildings. Also covered will be the theory and principles of Chinese construction.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5140 Arts of Japan
This lecture course introduces the major artistic traditions of Japan, from the Neolithic period to the present, and teaches the fundamental methods of the discipline of art history. Special attention will be given to the places of Shinto, the impact of Buddhism, and their related architectures and sculptures; the principles of narrative illustration; the changing roles of aristocratic, monastic, shogunal and merchant patronage; the formation of the concept of the artist over time; and the transformation of tradition in the modern age.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 6130
1 Course Unit
EALC 5141 Early Modern Japanese Art and the City of Edo
Study of the major art forms and architecture of Tokugawa (or Edo) period (1603-1868). In this lecture course, we will consider how the arts of this era occur within an increasingly urban and modern culture, particularly with regard to the city of Edo. Issues of the articulation of authority in the built environment, the reinvention of classical styles, and patronage will be raised. May include some visits to PMA, Penn Museum, or other local collections.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 6580
1 Course Unit
EALC 5160 Arts of Korea
The goal of this course is understanding the development of visual, performing, and literary arts in Korea and the historical, religious, and social contexts in which they flourished. It serves as an introduction to the arts of Korea, with emphasis on painting, sculpture, ceramics, and architecture and additional consideration of dance, drama, poetry, and culinary arts. Covers the whole history of Korea, from prehistoric times to the twenty-first century. Students enrolled in this graduate number are expected to do research in an East Asian language.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5242 Love and Loss in Japanese Literary Traditions: In Translation
How do people make sense of the multiple experiences that the simple words "love" and "loss" imply? How do they express their thoughts and feelings to one another? In this course, we will explore some means Japanese culture has found to grapple with these events and sensations. We will also see how these culturally sanctioned frameworks have shaped the ways Japanese view love and loss. Our materials will sample the literary tradition of Japan from earliest times to the early modern and even modern periods. Close readings of a diverse group of texts, including poetry, narrative, theater, and the related arts of calligraphy, painting, and music will structure our inquiry. The class will take an expedition to nearby Woodlands Cemetery to experience poetry in nature. By the end of the course, you should be able to appreciate texts that differ slightly in their value systems, linguistic expressions, and aesthetic sensibilities from those that you may already know. Among the available project work that you may select, if you have basic Japanese, is learning to read a literary manga. All shared class material is in English translation.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 5322 Chinese Fiction and Drama in Translation
This course explores Romance of Three Kingdoms the most popular classica l novel in East Asia and an important source for understanding Chinese culture, politics, history, and military strategy. We propose to read this work not only as a textbook of Chinese literature and culture, but also as a guidebook for career development and risk assessment. Why didn't t Pangtong have a career as successful as Zhuge Liang? Why did Ma Su volunteer in a project that he is not good at? If Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Sun Quan run for presidency in the U.S., who would you vote for and why? These are some of the questions that we will explore alongside our inquiry into the the historical development of various genres of Chinese fiction. In addition to Romance of Three Kingdoms, this course introduces Sun Tsu's The Art of War and other classical Chinese novels such as Dream of the Red Chamber and Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, as well as classical literary criticism such as Cao Pi's On the Standard of Literature (Dian lun), Lu Ji's Essays on Literature (Wen lun), and Liu Xie's The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5335 Cultural Chinas: 20th Century Chinese Literature and Film
This course serves as a thematic introduction to modern Chinese literature and cinema in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other transnational Chinese communities in the twentieth century. By discussing a wide range of key literary and filmic texts, this class looks into major issues and discourses in China's century of modernization: enlightenment and revolution, politics and aesthetics, sentimental education and nationalism, historical trauma and violence, gender and sexuality, social hygiene and body politics, diaspora and displacement, youth sub-culture and urban imagination.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5340 Post War Japanese Cinema
Mizoguchi Kenji, Ozu Yasujiro, and Kurosawa Akira are recognized today as three of the most important and influential directors in Japanese cinema. In their films of the late 1940s and 1950s, these directors focused upon issues surrounding the human condition and the perception of truth, history, beauty, death, and other issues of the postwar period. This lecture course places their films in period context, and pays particular attention to the connections to other visual media, and to how "art" and "history" are being defined in the cinematic context. How other directors also took up these issues, and referred to the "big three" is also be discussed.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 6900
1 Course Unit
EALC 5351 Contemporary Fiction & Film in Japan
This course will explore fiction and film in contemporary Japan, from 1945 to the present. Topics will include literary and cinematic representation of Japan s war experience and post-war reconstruction, negotiation with Japanese classics, confrontation with the state, and changing ideas of gender and sexuality. We will explore these and other questions by analyzing texts of various genres, including film and film scripts, novels, short stories, manga, and academic essays. Class sessions will combine lectures, discussion, audio-visual materials, and creative as well as analytical writing exercises. The course is taught in English, although Japanese materials will be made available upon request. No prior coursework in Japanese literature, culture, or film is required or expected; additional secondary materials will be available for students taking the course at the 600 level. Writers and film directors examined may include: Kawabata Yasunari, Hayashi Fumiko, Abe Kobo, Mishima Yukio, Oe Kenzaburo, Yoshimoto Banana, Ozu Yasujiro, Naruse Mikio, Kurosawa Akira, Imamura Shohei, Koreeda Hirokazu, and Beat Takeshi.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5501 Advanced Topics in Buddhism
This is an advanced course for upper level undergraduates and graduate students on various issues in the study of Buddhist texts, art, and history. Each semester the theme of the course changes. In recent years themes have included: Magic and Ritual, Art and Material Culture, Texts and Contexts, Manuscript Studies. Fall 2013 Topic: Buddhist repertoires (idiosyncratic and personal assemblages of beliefs, reflections, wonderings, possessions, and practices) for a large part, material and sensual. Buddhists are often sustained by their collection, production, and trading of stuff amulets, images, posters, protective drawings, CDs, calendars, films, comic books, and even Buddhist-themed pillow cases, umbrellas, and coffee mugs. Aspirations are interconnected with objects. Beliefs are articulated through objects. Objects are not empty signifiers onto which meaning is placed. The followers and the objects, the collectors and their stuff, are overlooked in the study of religion, even in many studies in the growing field of material culture and religion. What is striking is that these objects of everyday religiosity are often overlooked by art historians as well. Art historians often remove (through photography or physical movement to museums or shops) images and ritual implements from their ritual context and are seen as objets d'art. While art historians influenced by Alfred Gell, Arjun Appadurai, and Daniel Miller have brought the study of ritual objects into the forefront of art historical studies, in terms of methodologies of studying Buddhist art, art historians have generally relegated themselves to the study of either the old and valuable or the static and the curated. This course aims to 1) bring a discussion of art into the study of living Buddhism. Art historians have primarily concentrated on the study of images, stupas, manuscripts, and murals produced by the elite, and primarily made before the twentieth century; 2) study art as it exists and operates in dynamic ritual activities and highly complex synchronic and diachronic relationships; 3) focus on the historical and material turn in the study of images, amulets, and murals in Buddhist monasteries and shrines.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 5120, RELS 5710
1 Course Unit
EALC 5521 Introduction to Classical Chinese Thought
This course is intended as an introduction to the foundational thinkers of Chinese civilization, who flourished from the fifth to the second centuries B.C. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed, and there are no prerequisites, although Introduction to Chinese Civilization is recommended. Graduate students should see the instructor to discuss requirements for graduate credit.
Spring, even numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 5623 Language, Script and Society in China
The Chinese writing system is the only major surviving script in the world that is partially picto-ideographic, Egyptian hieroglyphic and Sumero-Akkadian cuneiform having passed out of use about two millennia ago. Partly because it is so unique, a tremendous number of myths have grown up around the Chinese script. In an attempt to understand how they really function, this seminar will examine the nature of the sinographs and their relationship to spoken Sinitic languages, as well as their implications for society and culture. We will also discuss the artistic and technological aspects of the Chinese characters and the ongoing efforts to reform and simplify them. The use of sinographs in other East Asian countries than China will be taken into account. There are no prerequisites for this class.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5702 Economic Development, Education, and Inequality in East Asia
Where are East Asian economies and education headed? Can a new model of East Asian economy and education be established to achieve economic sustainability and equity in rapidly changing global contexts? In this seminar, we will survey 1) evolution of the East Asian economic model, focusing on changes in economic development strategies, labor market structures, and relationships with global economies; and 2) features of East Asian educational systems, focusing on educational opportunities and learning outcomes. In reviewing East Asian economy and education, a central question is not only how productive East Asian economy and education is but also how equal economic and educational opportunities are in the region. In the final part of the seminar, students will come up with some policy recommendations for East Asian economy and education to better achieve economic sustainability and equity. This graduate-level course is also open to advanced undergraduate students.
Also Offered As: EDUC 5450, SOCI 5450
1 Course Unit
EALC 5711 East Asian Diplomacy
Home to four of the five most populous states and four of the five largest economies, the Asia/Pacific is arguably the most dynamic region in the twenty-first century. At the same time, Cold War remnants (a divided Korea and China) and major geopolitical shifts (the rise of China and India, decline of the US and Japan) contribute significantly to the volatility of our world. This course will examine the political, economic, and geopolitical dynamism of the region through a survey of relations among the great powers in Asia from the sixteenth century to the present. Special emphasis will be given to regional and global developments from the perspective of the three principal East Asian states--China, Japan and Korea. We will explore the many informal, as well as formal, means of intercourse that have made East Asia what it is today. Graduate students should consult graduate syllabus for graduate reading list, special recitation time and graduate requirements.
Also Offered As: HIST 5550
Mutually Exclusive: HIST 1550
1 Course Unit
EALC 5742 From Shamans to Shoguns: The Texts that Made Pre-Modern Japanese History
This course tackles about a millennium of pre-modern Japanese political, social, and cultural history (roughly, 700-1700). Instead of attempting to cover the period chronologically, as an introductory survey might, this class is structured as a series of case studies. Each of these will take a primary source as its point of departure and explore one or more facets of Japanese history and writing. In the course of each case study, lectures and discussions will branch out from the main source to examine its historical context as well as the (political, cultural, textual) traditions that informed that source's composition. In general, students will read the entire texts of the main sources (or significant portions of them), along with scholarly articles and shorter excerpts from other sources, composed at the same time or in the same vein/genre. During lectures and discussions alike, students will be asked to engage the readings, so as to grasp the specifics of Japanese history and practice the analytical skills required of historical discourse.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5746 Japan: The Age of the Samurai
Who (or what) where the samurai? What does it mean to say that Japan had an "Age of the Samurai"? In popular imagination, pre-modern Japan has long been associated with its hereditary warrior class. Countless movies have explored the character and martial prowess of these men. Yet warriors constituted but a tiny portion of the societies they inhabited and ruled, and historians researching medieval Japan have turned their attentions to a great range of subjects and to other classes (elite and commoner alike). This class is designed to acquaint students with the complex and diverse centuries that have been called the "Age of the Samurai"-roughly, the years between ca. 1110 and 1850. In the course of the semester, we will explore the central themes in the historiography of warrior society, while introducing some of the defining texts that have shaped our imagination of this age (from laws to epic poems, from codes of conduct to autobiographies).
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5774 Two Koreas: The Politics of Division
In today's world, the inter-Korean border or DMZ (demilitarized zone) is widely regarded as one of the most impermeable and conflictual frontiers. The purpose of this course is to explore the dynamics of its formation between, and impact within, the two Koreas. The course therefore proposes to analyze how the division of the Korean peninsula not only came into being but also how it has shaped the socio-political trajectories of both the North and the South since 1945. The course also aims at introducing students to conceptual frameworks and comparative debates relevant to understanding the Korean case(s) from a social science perspective.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 5780 Mongol Century
This course deals with the empire built by the Mongols in the 13th century - the largest land empire in the world. Most readings will be from translated primary sources of the 13th and 14th centuries, written by the Mongols themselves and also by Persians, Chinese, Eastern Christians, Europeans, and other peoples that fought, surrendered to, or traded with the Mongol conquerors. The course will explore the Mongols, the most spectacular example of the nomadic conquerors who played such a large role in all Eurasian history, and survey how their empire affected themselves and the peoples they conquered. By using primary sources, the course will also provide a survey of civilizations in Eurasia in the 13th and 14th centuries, and give a hands-on example of how historians build historical knowledge from varied sources. Graduate students will receive training in more advanced source critical methodologies for dealing with these sources and for beginning research in this topic.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 5781 Silk Road: From the Mediterranean to the Pacific
A journey along the overland and sea routes that connected China, India, Iran, and Rome from 200-1000 CE and served as conduits for cultural exchange. Precursor and successor routes will also be taken into consideration. The lives of merchants, envoys, pilgrims, and travelers interacting in cosmopolitan communities will be examined. Exploration of long-known and newly discovered archaeological ruins, along with primary sources in translation, will be studied.
Also Offered As: SAST 5781
1 Course Unit
EALC 5801 East Asian Digital Humanities
Are you interested in cutting-edge digital methods for the humanities in EastAsia, but don't know where to start? This course covers a wide range of current and emerging digital projects and topics in East Asian studies. Students will engage with digital projects focused on East Asia (encompassing Japan, China, Korea, and Taiwan) as well as research being done on digital methodologies for the humanities in those areas. Coursework consist of project and research analysis, active discussion, and learning about the implementation of various digital projects. Example topics include text analysis, APIs, network analysis, digital literary studies, and mapping. No technical expertise is required but students must have reading knowledge of Chinese, Japanese, or Korean at the high-intermediate or advanced level. Class presentations, discussions, and all course readings will be in English, but midterm and final projects involve reading article,s and midterm and final projects involve reading articles and/or critiquing projects.
1 Course Unit
EALC 5955 Environment, Climate, and Culture in Japan
This course explores how Japanese literature, cinema, and popular culture have engaged with questions of environment, ecology, pollution, and climate change from the wake of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945 to the ongoing Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster in the present. Environmental disasters and the slow violence of their aftermath have had an enormous impact on Japanese cultural production, and we examine how these cultural forms seek to negotiate and work through questions of representing the unrepresentable, victimhood and survival, trauma and national memory, uneven development and discrimination, the human and the nonhuman, and climate change's impact on imagining the future. Special attention is given to the possibilities and limitations of different forms--the novel, poetry, film, manga, anime--that Japanese writers and artists have to think about humans' relationship with the environment.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 6104 East Asian Funerary Arts
Study of tombs and tomb decoration of emperors and officials in China, Korea, and Japan from the pre-Buddhist era through the 19th century.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 6121 Chinese Wall Painting
This courses examines murals in Chinese temples and tombs from their earliest appearance in the first millennium BCE through the 20th century. Some are in situ; others are in museums. Murals are studied alongside paintings on silk and paper. Chinese wall painting is also studied alongside murals in temples and tombs in Korea, Japan, and Mongolia.
Not Offered Every Year
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 2121
1 Course Unit
EALC 6201 Modern East Asian Texts
This course is an introduction to and exploration of modern East Asian literatures and cultures through close readings and discussion of selected literary works from the early 20th century to the start of the 21st century. Focusing on China, Japan, and Korea, we will explore the shared and interconnected experiences of modernity in East Asia as well as broaden our perspective by considering the location of East Asian cultural production within a global modernity. Major issues we will encounter include: nation-building and the modern novel; cultural translation; media and technology; representations of gender, race, and class; history and memory; colonialism; war; body and sexuality; globalization. No knowledge of the original language is required.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: COML 6201
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 2201
1 Course Unit
EALC 6211 Colonial Japanese Literature
This course will explore the development of Japanese and colonial identities in literature produced in and about Japan's colonies during the first half of the 20th century. Throughout the semester, we will read works written during and about the Japanese empire by Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Okinawan, and Taiwanese writers. Looking at the different representations of empire, we will examine concepts such as assimilation, mimicry, hybridity, travel, and transculturation in the context of Japanese colonialism. By bringing together different voices from inside and outside of Japan's empire, students will gain a deeper understanding of the complexities of colonial hegemony and identity. In particular, reading works by Japanese, Okinawan, Korean, Taiwanese and Chinese subjects will enable students to transcend binary notions of colonizer and colonized while also acknowledging the realities of colonial complicity.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 6221 Chinese Poetry & Prose In Translation
A wide variety of poetic & prose genres from the earliest times to the 19th century is introduced through English translation. A few selections will also be studied in Chinese characters with romanized transcriptions. There are no prerequisites for this course.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 6236 Seminar in Modern Chinese Literature
Modern Chinese writers are known for their efforts in creating a literaryrevolution that sought to reformulate the paradigm of Chinese writing.However, these Chinese writers also endeavored to learn from other culturessuch as the European and Indian civilizations. For example, Tagore wasinvited to visit to China in 1923 and was considered a cultural model by manyChinese cultural elites. Hu Shi, a leading Chinese intellectual, wrote TheIndianization of China: A Case Study in Cultural Borrowing and India Our GreatTeacher, to emphasize the Indian elements in Chinese culture. Other Chinesewriters also sought to compare the European with Chinese cultures in differentoccasions in order to find a path for the rise of modern China. This courseexplores the ways in which foreign cultures were introduced and how theyinfluence the way Chinese see themselve s in their search for a culturalidentity free from the constraints of classical tradition. We will read avariety of writers from the Peoples Republic of Ch ina, Hong Kong, Taiwan, andMalaysia, in order to examine how modern Chinese literature thrives oncross-cultural elements. All readings will be in English. No prior knowledgeis required. Those who are proficient in Chinese are invited to read some ofthe texts in Chinese.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 6255 Modern Japanese Literature
This course surveys Japanese literature (novels, short stories, poetry, drama, essays) from 1868 to World War II. The purpose is not only to read some of the most important and interesting literary texts of this period, but also to reflect on the ways we read and study literature, and how we draw connections between literature, self, and society. The reading material will be entirely in English.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 6371 New Korean Cinema
In 2019, Bong Joon-ho's Parasite won the Palme d'Or at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival. This event marked the apex of South Korean cinematic renaissance, having steadily become a tour de force in the international film festival scene since 1997 onwards. This course explores the major auteurs, styles, themes, and currents of the so-called "New Korean Cinema" that emerged in the mid-to-late 1990s to continue to this day. Drawing from texts on critical film and Korean studies, we will pay particular attention to how the selected works re-present, resist, and interweave the sociopolitical climate they concern and are born out of. Using cinema as a lens with which to see the society, we will touch upon major events of the twentieth century including national division, military dictatorship and democratization movements, IMF economic crisis, youth culture, hallyu (the Korean wave), and damunhwa (multiculturalism initiative). In so doing, we will closely examine how each cinematic medium addresses the societal power structure and the role of the "Other" it represents in terms of class, race, gender, and sexuality in the construction of contemporary Korean society. We will also briefly survey the history of South Korean cinema that has evolved hand-in-hand with the history of modern Korea itself, walking through its five different phases (1945-Korean War era;1955-1972 "Golden Age"; 1973-1979 censorship era; 1980-1996 democratization era; and 1997 onwards). No prior experience of Korean studies courses necessary; all films will be screened with English subtitles.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: CIMS 6371
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 1371
1 Course Unit
EALC 6550 The Politics of Shinto
Shinto-derived images and ideas frequently appear in Japanese anime and film, and journalists and academics frequently mobilize the term Shinto as a way of explaining Japan's past or envisioning its future. The environmentalist left champions a green Shinto while Shinto-derived ideas serve as red meat for politicians pandering to Japan's nationalist right. While the influential position Shinto occupies in Japanese sociopolitical life is therefore clear, the term Shinto itself is actually not. Depending on who one asks, Shinto is either the venerable indigenous religion of the Japanese archipelago, the irreducible core of Japanese culture, a tiny subset of Japanese Buddhism, an environmentalist ethic, or some combination of these. This course investigates the multifarious types of Shinto envisioned by these competing interest groups.
Also Offered As: RELS 6710
Mutually Exclusive: RELS 2710
1 Course Unit
EALC 6761 Traditional Korea and the Human Experience
This course provides a survey of Chosŏn Korea (1392-1910), focusing on the insights this period and place offer us into fundamental problems that have engaged societies throughout history, including those of our present time. Through translated primary-source readings, images, and objects, we will explore topics such as public duties and private desires, exclusion and belonging, the pursuit of power and wealth, legal justice, gender and class relations, the politics of language and writing, and ecological vulnerability and resilience. Students will be invited to contribute comparative perspectives that draw on their knowledge of other societies and times; they will also assess contemporary dramatizations of this period with the historical understanding they will develop throughout the course. On completion, students will gain an overview of politics, society, and culture in traditional Korea that will serve as the foundation for their further study of modern Korean history and contemporary affairs. No prior knowledge of Korea or the Korean language is required.
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 2761
1 Course Unit
EALC 6763 Readings in Korean History
This course introduces students to English-language scholarship on social history of Korea from the founding of the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910) to the mid-nineteenth century. Conducted as a reading seminar, the course will examine status and gender in early modern Korean society by considering, among others, descent, kinship, marriage, education, and economy. A reading list of noteworthy studies is intended to help the students map some critical questions and debates that have shaped the historiography. Everyone must participate actively in discussions, provide oral presentations as a discussion leader, and submit two review essays. No knowledge of Korean language or culture is presumed, although graduate students will be encouraged to read selections in the original language. This course satisfies Cross Cultural Analysis requirement.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 6926 Chinese Martial Arts
This course offers a thematic introduction to the history of martial arts in China. Throughout the semester, we will explore the social, political, and cultural contexts of martial arts practice, from the classical period to the 21st century. The course will take an interdisciplinary approach to situating martial arts practices in history through an examination of religious, literary, and visual sources, against the backdrop of theoretical approaches from across gender studies, anthropology, and cultural theory. The course will be divided into three units. The first unit will focus on the cultural background that led to the emergence of martial arts practices in the pre-modern period. We will examine classical discourses on the human body and its cultivation and the role of medical practices and religious institutions, such as the Shaolin Temple, in the development of martial arts regimens. In the second unit, we will discuss the spread and popularization of martial arts practices in late imperial and modern Chinese society through a close reading of literary sources, such as wuxia novels and other works of fiction. In addition, we will explore the modernization and re-invention of martial arts in the late 19th century and early 20th century, when China attempts to re-establish itself as a modern nation. The third and final unit will be devoted to the global impact of Chinese martial arts in contemporary popular culture. Through a discussion and analysis of Kung Fu films, as well as video games, we will explore the role of martial arts narratives and practices in the construction of gender, cultural, and national identity and the various ways in which they are used by the current Chinese regime to assert its influence in the global arena. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed, and all readings will be available in English on the Canvas website in PDF form. Graduate students may take this course as EALC 6926 and should see the instructor to discuss requirements for graduate credit.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7101 Archaeology of Northeast Asia
This seminar explores the major civilizations of Northeast Asia (Beijing, Northern Hebei, Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Korea, and Eastern Mongolia; and in the early period, Japan) from the early CE centuries through the seventeenth. The sources of evidence are archaeological sites, palaces, monasteries, tombs, and excavated objects.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7111 Tang China and Nara Japan
This is a seminar about Tang China and Nara Japan, and Early Heian Japan, Unified Silla Korea, Northeast Asia under Parhae, and Uyghur Inner Asia through their cities, palaces, monasteries, Buddhist art, and painting. We begin by studying material remains of the two best-documented civilizations of East Asian in the seventh-ninth centuries. Using painting, sculpture, ceramics, and architecture of Tang China and Nara Japan, we investigate the validity of the frequent assessment of an international Tang through material remains in China and Japan. We then move to Korea, Mongolia, and Central Asia. Students will have a wide range of topics to work on. They will be encouraged to find comparative topics. This seminar is an opportunity for students to use Chinese, Japanese, or Korean in research papers. There are no exams. Readings will be assigned to the whole group and to individual students for short presentations every week. Graduate students will write and present research papers.
1 Course Unit
EALC 7116 Chinese Art Under the Mongols
The Yuan Dynasty (1257-1368), the period of Mongolilan rule, was the only time in Chinese history when China was part of a larger empire that spanned the Asian continent. Using architecture, sculpture, painting, and excavated evidence, this course examines the unique results of an international Asian world centered in China.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7121 Life and Death in Han China
Using maps, city-panning, architecture, wall painting, sculpture, and minor arts as evidence, the course will examine the attitudes toward life and death in Han (206 BCE-AD 220) China.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7140 Japanese Art Seminar
Seminar in early modern, modern, or contemporary Japanese art. Topics vary from semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 5150
1 Course Unit
EALC 7141 Ukiyo-e: Beyond the Great Wave
In this seminar we will take a closer look at the prints, paintings, and illustrated books produced in the genre known as "ukiyo-e," the "pictures of the floating world." We'll begin by asking how the "Great Wave" became a global icon and we'll bust the myth of prints being used as wrapping paper. As we learn the history of the genre, from 1600 to ca. 1850, we'll also make critical interventions into that narrative, asking how "ukiyo-e" became a genre within a larger artistic sphere; how publishers collaborated with designers to construct artistic personae; how illustrated books contributed to knowledge formations; and how concepts of authenticity and authorship remain critical to its understanding. This course will also consider how internet resources affect our understanding of the work of art. Students need not have any Japanese language skills, but should have taken related courses in art history or East Asian Studies. Advanced undergraduates and graduate students preferred.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 5130
1 Course Unit
EALC 7142 Utamaro and his Contemporaries
In this seminar we will take a closer look at the prints, paintings, and illustrated books produced by one of ukiyo-e’s most famous artists, Kitagawa Utamaro (1753?-1806), with special focus upon works to be included in an upcoming exhibition. We will begin by surveying the larger history of the “pictures of the floating world” (ukiyo-e) and pay close attention to Utamaro’s teacher and his contemporaries. The status of the artist, the role of the publisher, networks of possible patrons, and Utamaro’s legacy are among the key issues the seminar will address. Our analysis will further attend to the ways in which works by Utamaro and other ukiyo-e artists were evaluated and appreciated in late 19th-century France by such figures as Edmond de Goncourt, Hayashi Tadamashi, and Siegfried Bing, among others. Students will have the opportunity to study works in local and regional collections, including the Kislak Center, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Freer/Sackler Galleries. Undergraduate students admitted by permission only.
Fall or Spring
Also Offered As: ARTH 5140
1 Course Unit
EALC 7180 Archaeology of Central Asia
A site by site investigation of Buddhist and non-Buddhist ruins in Central Asia. Included are Nisa, Khwarezm, Pyandzhikent, Khalchayan, Ay-Khanum, Bamiyan, Miran, Tumshuk, Kizil, Kucha, Khotan, Adzhina-Tepe, Khocho, Khara-Khoto, and Bezeklik.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7211 Modern Chinese Poetry in a Global Context
The tumultuous political and economic history of modern China has been mirrored in and shaped by equally fundamental revolutions in language and poetic expression. In this course, we will take Chinese poetry as a crucible in which we can observe the interacting forces of literary history and social change. From diplomats who saw poetry as a medium for cultural translation between China and the world, to revolutionaries who enlisted poetry in the project of social transformation, we will examine the lives and works of some of China’s most prominent poets and ask, what can we learn about modern China from reading their poetry? In asking this question, we will also reckon with the strengths and limitations of using poetry as an historical source. In addition to poems, the course will include fiction, essays, photographs, and films by both Chinese and non-Chinese artists that place our poets in a broader context. We will pay close attention to how these poets represent China’s place in the world, as well as the role of language in social change. Topics of discussion include: national identity, revolution, translation, gender, the body, ethnicity, and technology. Familiarity with Chinese or related cultural context is beneficial, but not required. This course introduces students to Chinese poetry in English translation. Students will leave the course with an in-depth understanding of the main figures, themes, and techniques of Chinese poetry, and will be introduced to some of the major developments in the history of China. Through a focus on primary texts, students will develop the vocabulary and analytical skills to appreciate and analyze poetry in translation and will gain confidence as writers thinking about literary texts.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: COML 7211
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3211
1 Course Unit
EALC 7244 War and Literature in Japan: Tales of the Heike
Our subject is Tale of the Heike, a multifaceted narrative of the twelfth-century battles that brought the Taira clan down and led to the establishment of Japan's first military government. We will read the Heike tales with an eye toward how they fictionalize history and idealize certain types, most notably loyal women and warriors; the development of the warrior tale genre; central aspects of the Japanese ethos; and later works of literature based on episodes and characters from the Tale of the Heike. All material is in English translation. (Students of Japanese language may learn to read a famous section in the original.) There are no pre-requisites.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7246 The Tale of Genji
"Crowning masterpiece of Japanese literature," "the world's first novel," "fountainhead of Japanese literary and aesthetic culture," "a great soap opera in the vein of Jacqueline Susann." Readers over the centuries have praised the Tale of Genji, the monumental prose tale finished just after the year 1000, in a variety of ways. In this course we will read the latest English translation of Murasaki Shikibu's work. We will watch as Genji loses his mother at a tender age, is cast out of the royal family, and begins a quest to fill the void she left. Along the way, Genji's loyalty to all the women he encounters forges his reputation as the ideal lover. We will consider gender issues in the female author's portrayal of this rake, and question the changing audience, from bored court women to censorious monks, from adoring nationalists to comic book adaptors. Study of the tale requires consideration of poetry, imagery, costume, music, history, religion, theater, political and material culture, all of which will be components of the course. We will also trace the effect of the tale's many motifs, from flora and fauna to murderously jealous spirits, on later literature and conceptions of human emotions. All material is in English translation. There are no prerequisites.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7251 Japanese Science Fiction and Fantasy
This course will provide an overview of the major tropes, themes, and interpretations of contemporary Japanese science fiction and fantasy. As we establish a foundational knowledge of the history and structural formulations of genre fiction in Japan, we will cover topics such as folklore, high fantasy, apocalypse, dystopia, magical realism, posthumanism, video games, and transnational media franchises and cross-cultural marketing. By the end of the semester, students will possess a deeper understanding and appreciation of the role that science fiction and fantasy play in shaping contemporary media cultures in Japan and around the world.
1 Course Unit
EALC 7255 Literary Criticism and Theory in Japanese Literature
While the focus of this seminar will shift from year to year, the aim is to enable students to gain 1) a basic understanding of various theoretical approaches to literature, 2) familiarity with the histories and conventions of criticism, literary and otherwise, in Japan; 3) a few theoretical tools to think in complex ways about some of the most interesting and controversial issues of today, such as nationalism, imperialism, colonialism, postmodernism, and feminism, with particular focus on Japan's position in the world. The course is primarily intended for graduate students but is also open to advanced undergraduates with permission of the instructor. The course is taught in English, and all of the readings will be available in English translation. An optional discussion section may be arranged for those students who are able and willing to read and discuss materials in Japanese.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: COML 7255
1 Course Unit
EALC 7355 Japanese Theater
Japan has one of the richest and most varied theatrical traditions in the world. In this course, we will examine Japanese theater in historical and comparative contexts. The readings and discussions will cover all areas of the theatrical experience (script, acting, stage design, costumes, music, and audience). Audio-visual material will be used whenever appropriate and possible. The class will be conducted in English, with all English materials.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7424 Gender and Sexuality in Chinese History
This course examines gender and sexuality in Chinese history from ancient to contemporary times. It focuses on historiographical developments and methods of studying gender and sexuality in history as well as in Chinese history. The readings will include, but not be limited to, works by Robin Wang, Paul Goldin, Jen-der Lee, Patricia Ebrey, Beverly Bossler, Charlotte Furth, Susan Mann, Dorothy Ko, Francesca Bray, Yi-Li Wu, Matthew Sommer, Janet Theiss, Siyen Fei, Judith Zeitlin, Keith McMahon, Nicole Barnes, Gail Hershatter, Tani Barlow, and Lisa Rofel.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7425 Gender, Religion, and China
This course examines the interrelationship among "gender," "religion," and "China" as conceptual and historical categories. We ask, for example, how gender plays critical and constitutive roles in Chinese religious traditions, how religion can be used both to reinforce and to challenge gender norms, how religious women impact Chinese society and culture, and what the construction of "China" as a cultural identity and as a nation-state has to do with women, gender, and religion. We will also think about what assumptions we have when speaking of gender, religion, and China, and the infinite possibilities when we strive to think beyond. We will read three kinds of materials: (1) scholarship on gender and religion in historical and contemporary China as well as the Chinese-speaking world, (2) scholarship concerning theories and methodology of gender and religious studies not necessarily focused on China, and (3) historical record of religious women in English translation.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 7425
1 Course Unit
EALC 7429 Sex and Society in Ancient China
Ancient Chinese writers considered sexual activity to be an essential component of humanity, and the study of human sexuality to be essential to the study of human history. Sexuality constituted a fundamental source of imagery and categories that informed the classical Chinese conception of social, political, and military relationships. This course will survey the major sources dealing with sex and society in ancient China. There are no prerequisites, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7522 Medicine and Healing in China
This course explores Chinese medicine and healing culture, its diversity, and its change over time. We will discuss topics including the establishment of canonical medicine, Daoist approaches to healing and longevity, diverse views of the body and disease, the emergence of treatments for women, medical construction of sex difference and imagination of female sexuality, the thriving and decline of female healers, the identity of scholar physicians, the transmission of medical knowledge, domestic and cross-regional drug market, healer-patient relations, and new visions of traditional Chinese medicine in modern China.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7523 Chinese Aesthetics
This seminar investigates classical Chinese conceptions of art and beauty as exemplified in philosophy, literature, music, painting, calligraphy, and architecture. All readings will be in English, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed. Graduate students should see the instructor to discuss requirements for graduate credit.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7524 Daoist Traditions
This course examines the history of various intellectual and religious traditions that came to be known as Daoist (or Taoist in the Wade-Giles Romanization). We will begin with a critical review of the twentieth-century reinvention of Daoism and the new classification of religious versus philosophical Daoism, before tracing chronologically the textual, institutional, and social history of Daoist traditions from the fourth century B.C.E. While familiarizing students with the key concepts, practices, and organizations developed in the history of Daoism, this class emphasizes the specific socio-political context of each of them. Throughout the course, we will think critically about the labeling of Daoist (as well as Confucian and Buddhist) in Chinese history and in modern scholarship. We will also question modern demarcations between philosophy, religion, and science, as well as that between the spiritual and the physical.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 7524
1 Course Unit
EALC 7528 Apocalypse and Utopia in China
Representations of a perfect society and imagined scenarios of a dystopian or apocalyptic future are a common features of all human societies. Philosophical, religious, and literary attempts to imagine alternative futures and critique present conditions enjoyed wide popularity and considerable influence throughout Chinese history. The goal of this course will be to introduce students to the major themes and trends in utopian and apocalyptic thought in China, from the premodern age to our times. In the first part of the semester, we will learn about the utopian and apocalyptic narratives that emerged in early and medieval China. We will begin by discussing the two archetypal models of a utopian society in early China: the Confucian harmonious moral society and its Daoist counterpart of an idyllic secluded community located in faraway lands. We will then turn our attention to the emergence of organized religion and the utopian and apocalyptic scenarios promoted by Daoist and Buddhist writers and religious innovators. In the second part of the semester, we will focus on the modern and contemporary periods and the study the impact of the introduction of Western utopian and millenarian narratives on the Chinese imagination. In addition to surveying some real-world attempts to establish a utopian society, such as the 19th century Taiping Rebellion, Mao Zedong's attempts to re-fashion China into a Community Utopia in the 20th century, and the 21st century eco-village green movement, students will be introduced to a wide variety of literary and cinematic texts that try to imagine a possible future - from the utopian sci-fi nationalism of The Wandering Earth to the dystopian fiction of leading writers such as Han Song, Chen Qiufan, and Han Jingfang. Using these works as case studies, we will strive to ascertain the role of utopianism as a tool of political, social, and environmental criticism and as a way to construct a better and more just society in the 21st century. No knowledge of Chinese is necessary - all readings will be in English. As a split-level seminar, the course will be discussion-based. Students will be asked to post weekly 500-word response papers in which they will analyze and critique the readings. The goal of this task is to help students familiarize themselves with the assigned sources before the in-class discussion thus facilitating a meaningful and productive discussion. For their final project, students will conduct their own research on a topic of their choice and present it during the last meeting. Undergraduate paper will be limited to 10-pages; graduate papers should be around 20-25 pages, including original-language research.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7531 Chinese Law and Society
This course is an introduction to the study of law and society in China in a comparative and global context. We will begin by considering the tradition of imperial Chinese law and its social and philosophical foundations. We will then turn to the confrontation between the Qing empire and Euro-American imperial powers in the nineteenth century and the attendant collision between European and Chinese notions of sovereignty. Next, we will consider early twentieth-century law reforms as the Qing empire was transformed into the constitutional form of a modern republic, followed by the introduction of socialist law and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China. The course will conclude with post-Mao reforms and their implications for the future of Chinese law and society. Throughout the course, we will pay attention to the use of historical and comparative methods. What are the potentials and liabilities of using law as an analytical category in cross-cultural study? What happens when “Eastern” and “Western” legal cultures come in contact with each other? How is law related to capitalism and socialism? How does law structure political and socio-economic relations globally? How does law produce as well as constrain subjects and identities? What is the relationship between law, gender, and sexuality?
Spring
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3531
1 Course Unit
EALC 7537 Asian Religions in the Global Imagination
This seminar critically examines the missionary impulses, colonial exploits, and translation endeavors that contributed to the rise of Asian studies and the emergence of the scholarly notion of "Asian religions." It shows the crucial roles played by Asian agents and their European counterparts in the formation of modern conceptions of "religion"; it also engages reflexive questions regarding theory, method, and the geopolitical underpinnings of both Asian studies and the non-confessional academic study of religion. Students will conduct sustained research projects on the country or region of their choice.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 7537
1 Course Unit
EALC 7559 Gender and Sexuality in Japan
If you have ever wondered about the following questions, then this is the right course for you: Is Japan a hyper-feminine nation of smiling geisha and obedient wives? Is it a hyper-masculine nation of samurai and economic warriors? Is it true that Japanese wives control the household? Is it true that Japanese men suffer from over-dependence on their mothers? What do young Japanese women and young men worry about? What does the government think about the future of Japanese women and men? Assuming that expressions of gender and sexuality are deeply influenced by cultural and social factors, and that they also show profound differences regionally and historically, this course examines a variety of texts--historical, biographical, autobiographical, fictional, non-fictional, visual, cinematic, analytical, theoretical--in order to better understand the complexity of any attempts to answer the above questions.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7590 Southeast Asian Manuscript Traditions
This is an advanced PhD seminar in which the students will need advanced proficiency in Pali and at least one Southeast Asian Language (Burmese, Thai, Khmer, Lao, Leu, Khoen, Shan, and/or Lanna). Original manuscripts from Penn's collection of Southeast Asian religious, medical, botanical, historical, art, and literary archives will be examined and discussed.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: RELS 7730, SAST 7730
1 Course Unit
EALC 7621 Introduction to Classical Chinese I
Introduction to the classical written language, beginning with Shadick, First Course in Literary Chinese. Students with a background in Japanese, Korean, Cantonese, Taiwanese, and other East Asian languages are welcome; it is not necessary to know Mandarin. The course begins from scratch, and swiftly but rigorously develops the ability to read a wide variety of classical and semi-classical styles. Original texts from the 6th century BC to the 20th century AD are studied. This course is taught in English and there are no prerequisites.
Fall
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3621
1 Course Unit
EALC 7622 Introduction to Classical Chinese II
Continuation of Introduction to Classical Chinese I, which is the only prerequisite for this course. Upon completion of Shadick, readings in a wide selection of texts with Chinese commentaries may be taken up. These readings are in part chosen to reflect student interest. This is the second half of a year-long course. Those who enroll must take both semesters.
Spring
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3622
Prerequisite: EALC 7621
1 Course Unit
EALC 7641 Readings in Classical Japanese I
Readings in classical texts drawn from the Heian, Kamakura, Muromachi, and Edo periods. Introduction to the different styles of classical Japanese, and to classical Japanese as a whole.
Fall
Prerequisite: JPAN 0600
1 Course Unit
EALC 7681 Introduction to Classical Mongolian
In this class students who already know some modern Mongolian in the Cyrillic script will learn how to transfer that knowledge to the reading of first post-classical, and then classical texts written in the vertical or Uyghur-Mongolian script. Topics covered will include the Mongolian alphabetic script, dealing with ambiguous readings, scholarly transcription, vowel harmony and syllable structure, post-classical and classical forms of major declensions, converbs, verbal nouns, and finite verbs, syntax, pronunciation and scribal readings. Readings will be adjusted to interests, but as a rule will include selections from short stories, diaries, chronicles, Buddhist translations, government documents, popular didactic poetry, ritual texts, and traditional narratives. Students will also be introduced to the most important reference works helpful in reading classical and post-classical Mongolian.
Fall
1 Course Unit
EALC 7682 Introduction to Classical Mongolian II
Continuation of EALC 3681/EALC 7681, which is the only prerequisite for this course. Upon completion of the basic introduction to grammar, spelling rules, and diachronic levels (pre-classical, classical, post-classical), readings in a wide selection of texts with Mongolian commentaries may be taken up. These readings are in part chosen to reflect student interest. This is the second half of a year-long course. Those who enroll should take both semesters.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7720 Early Chinese History
This seminar covers the span of Chinese history from the Bronze Age to the end of the Han dynasty in A.D. 220. No knowledge of Chinese is presumed, but EALC 001 (Introduction to Chinese Civilization) is a prerequisite. Graduate students who wish to enroll should meet with the instructor to discuss additional requirements for graduate credit.
Spring
1 Course Unit
EALC 7721 Law in Pre-Modern China
This course, intended for graduate students and advanced undergraduates, offers a survey of the sources and research problems of pre-modern Chinese law. For reasons to be examined in the course, traditional Sinological education has neglected law as a legitimate field of inquiry; consequently, the secondary literature is surprisingly meager. Our readings will take us from the Warring States Period to the Qing dynasty--an interval of over two millennia--and will cover several varieties of legal documents, including statutes, handbooks, court records, and theoretical treatises. All the readings will be in English, and no knowledge of Chinese is presumed. Graduate students should see the instructor to discuss requirement for graduate credit.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7744 Law and Violence in Pre-Modern Japan
This course will be an exploration of premodern Japanese history through the lens of violence. The centuries under consideration (roughly, the eighth thought nineteenth) were characterized by greatly varying levels of violence, both of the state-sanctioned variety (war, punishments for law-breakers and political losers) and of the non-sanctioned variety (piracy, banditry, warrior and peasant rebellions). Examining a wide variety of translated sources, from diaries to chronicles, from legal codes to fiction, we shall examine the changing social, political, economic, and cultural contexts of violence, in order to interrogate not only why certain periods were remarkably peaceful while others were not, but also why violence took different forms in relation to different circumstances. We shall consider how contempories made sense of the violence that surrounded them (or didn't) and how they divided the acceptable use of force from the wanton and society-threatening abuse of it. The course will feature presentations and severl (very short) papers.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 7783 Pastoralism & Mobility
"Pastoralism and Mobility" will examine the society and history of mobile pastoralists (nomads) in Inner Asia from earliest times to the present. Peoples covered will include Mongols, Tibetans, Turkic nomads (such as Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and Turkmen), and their ancestors and predecessors. The class on focus on questions such as: Is there a distinctive form of Inner Asian pastoralist society? At the grass roots level? At the elite level? How have states (native and foreign) influenced Inner Asian pastoralist society in pre-modern and modern contexts? How have Inner Asian pastoralists influenced neighboring states? What role does kinship play in governing group formation, property, and status in Inner Asian pastoralist society? Does this role vary over time, space, or ethnic background? If so, how? What purposes does mobility serve in Inner Asian societies? How have various forms of livestock lease-holding changed and shaped wealth in Inner Asian pastoralist society? How did class differentiation emerge & function in pre-modern pastoralist societies? What happens when pastoralists become farmers? How have modern schemes of social improvement and productivity, especially collectivization and decollectivization, shaped pastoralist lives?
Fall, odd numbered years only
1 Course Unit
EALC 8100 East Asian Art Seminar
Graduate seminar in East Asian art. Topics vary from semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 7140
1 Course Unit
EALC 8101 Seminar in East Asian Art
Seminar in East Asian Art: High-level, research-oriented seminar whose subject changes. Students must be fluent readers of at least one East Asian language.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8102 Twentieth-Century Art in East Asia: Modernity and Confrontation
This seminar considers modern and contemporary art in China, Japan and Korea over the course of the twentieth century. What does it mean to make modern art and whom should it serve were essential questions in this century in East Asia. In this course the confrontations between modernity and tradition, state and self, the colonizer and the colonized, and collecting and the market are all issues under consideration. We begin with a study of the way “modern art” was defined at the turn of the century, its place in the nation state, the promotion of oil painting in Academic styles, and the call to preserve “national” styles. We also consider how the avant-garde pursuit of individuality constituted a confrontation over state-sponsored “modernism,” and how these confrontations played out in world’s fairs and expositions (and continue today). We will further engage how Japan’s imperialist actions against its neighbors had an impact on artistic development in territories it controlled, and the place of the work of art as propaganda in Japan’s war effort. Turning to the postwar era, we will study how China’s Communist Revolution, the Korean War, and the Occupation in Japan likewise established new paradigms for the production and reception of art, as well as more recent confrontations between art and politics in recent decades and the place of Chinese, Korean and Japanese art in the contemporary market.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 7141
1 Course Unit
EALC 8140 Japanese Art Seminar
This seminar engages specific topics in Japanese art history from 1600 to the present, with the specific focus varying from year to year. Previous topics have included: the concept of the artist; gender and its representation; the visualization of place from the early modern to the present; collecting, the market, modernity, and the construction of the field; print cultures; among others. Sessions will be conducted on site, in museums, galleries, and libraries, as available. Assignments vary depending upon the focus of the seminar. Japanese language ability useful but not necessary; curiosity and engagement required.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 7150
1 Course Unit
EALC 8211 Language, Nation, and Diaspora in East Asia and the World
This course examines the nexus between language, nation, and diaspora by bringing literary and cultural texts together with foundational and cutting-edge scholarship. Recent scholarship has attempted to account for the history, politics, aesthetics, and rich complexity of texts produced at or across the boundaries of national and linguistic communities. This course focuses on East Asia in the modern period and the texts produced by diasporic, migrant, exile, and other global communities thereof in order to investigate and reconsider how scholars might account for such texts. Topics for discussion include, for example: diaspora and migration, cosmopolitanism and universalism, nation and nationalism, translation and multilingualism, media and mediation, gender and sexuality, and the human and posthuman. Our readings will include a wide range of scholarship drawn from across disciplines and regions of focus, as well as literary, cultural, and cinematic texts which will allow us to think through the ideas put forth in scholarship.
1 Course Unit
EALC 8290 Approaches to Literary Texts
Most seminars focus on literary texts composed during a single historical period; this course is unusual in inviting students to consider the challenges of approaching texts from a range of different historical eras. Taught by a team of literary specialists representing diverse periods and linguistic traditions and conducted as a hands-on workshop, this seminar is designed to help students of literature and related disciplines gain expertise in analysis and interpretation of literary works across the boundaries of time, geography, and language, from classic to modern. Students will approach literature as a historical discipline and learn about key methodological issues and questions that specialists in each period and field ask about texts that their disciplines study. The diachronic and cross-cultural perspectives inform discussions of language and style, text types and genres, notions of alterity, fictionality, literariness, symbolism, intertextuality, materiality, and interfaces with other disciplines. This is a unique opportunity to learn in one course about diverse literary approaches from specialists in different fields.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: CLST 7601, COML 6160, ENGL 6160, REES 6450, ROML 6160
1 Course Unit
EALC 8301 History of the Book in East Asia
From handscrolls to manga, books play a vital role in East Asian societies. In this seminar we will introduce the spread of book cultures across East Asia and reconsider the role and impact of material texts on societies in China, Korea, and Japan. Among the questions we ll engage are: What is a book, an author, or an edition? How do readers affect books? How do publishers decide when to use illustrations, woodblock printing, or movable type? How has the history of books differed in China, Japan, and Korea from the history of the book in the West? We will consider various media (bamboo, paper, silk, and the digital), formats (scrolls, folded books, bound books, small to oversize), and the tensions between handwritten manuscript and printed pages. Hands-on sessions may include paper-making, bookbinding, and printing. This is an Objects-Based Learning course, using materials from the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books and Manuscripts, and the Penn Museum, with visits to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Free Library of Philadelphia. Requires no knowledge of any Asian language.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: ARTH 5170
1 Course Unit
EALC 8521 Tang-Song Religious and Medical Texts
This seminar aims at developing the skill in reading religious and medical texts of a range of different genres from the Tang-Song period, including treatises in medical theory, no sological texts, recipe compilations, material medical, macrobiotic texts, Buddhist and Daoist meditation and ritual instructions, as well as case histories in anecdotal forms. There are a variety of topics we can choose to focus on the studying those texts, and the choice will be made on the students' on research interests. Each week we will look at one type of texts, consider its edition, textual history, chapter organization and genre (sometimes with background readings), read line-by-line a sample text assigned in advance, as well as sight-read short samples that students bring to class. . At least one year Classical Chinese is required.
Not Offered Every Year
Prerequisite: CHIN 491 AND CHIN 492
1 Course Unit
EALC 8540 Japanese Religions
A broad survey of Japanese religions from ancient times to the present. Topics include kami worship, Buddhism, Shinto, Shugendo, Onmyodo,"new religions", and Japanese variants of Christianity and Islam. Students will make weekly presentations on reading material in class and will have two major written assignments. This course serves as preparation for a comprehensive exam in Japanese religions or for dissertation research on some aspect of Japanese religions.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8588 Religion & Ethnicity in Inner Asia
"Religion and Ethnicity in Inner Asia" will examine these two phenomena and their interaction in Inner Asia from earliest times to the present. The class will cover Mongolia, Tibet, Kazakhstan, and Turkic and Mongolian peoples of Russia and China. Religions addressed primarily include Buddhism, Islam, shamanism, and secularism. Why "ethnicity and religion"? In practice the scholarly research and literature on these two topics in Inner Asia have been closely related. In addition to theoretical works on ethnicity, nationalism, religion and identity, the class will focus on issues such as ethnicity and religious conversions, place-based ethnic and religious identities, ethnicity and the Chinese and Russian states, nationalism, nationality policy, reformist and atheist secularisms, revivalist and apocalyptic movements, and the intersection of ethnicity, race, sexuality, and international networks.
1 Course Unit
EALC 8600 Chinese Language Pedagogy and Methods
This graduate course is designed to equip students with the most advanced and up-to-date theoretical knowledge and practical skills of teaching modern Chinese with emphasis on the instruction of beginning and intermediate levels. The theoretical component introduces you to both mainstream and innovative theoretical frameworks in second-language acquisition and sociology of education, including teaching within the National Standards; communication-based audio-lingo approach; backward design; prosodic syntax in Chinese; official knowledge; tracking; ecologies of resources; assessment and testing. The practical component emphasizes everyday classroom situations and discusses diverse teaching concepts and the development of individual teaching strategies and styles. Special attention will be given to concrete teaching and learning strategies within the communication-based audio-lingo approach, including Chinese grammar illustration, corrective feedback, teaching techniques, educational technologies, etc. Chinese proficiency at the advanced level is required because this course will be taught in both Chinese and English, and many of the reading materials are in Chinese.
Fall, even numbered years only
Also Offered As: CHIN 8600
1 Course Unit
EALC 8621 Advanced Classical Chinese I
Close reading and interpretation of texts in various styles of classical Chinese drawn from the Han, Wei, Tang, and Song periods. Focus on strengthening students' reading ability in classical Chinese. Attention to questions of style, rhetoric, and syntax.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: CHIN 8621
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3623
1 Course Unit
EALC 8622 Advanced Classical Chinese II
Close reading and interpretation of texts in various styles of classical Chinese drawn from the Han, Wei, Tang, and Song periods. Focus on strengthening students' reading ability in classical Chinese. Attention to questions of style, rhetoric, and syntax. It is preferred, but not required, that students take Advanced Classical Chinese I first.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: CHIN 8622
Mutually Exclusive: EALC 3624
Prerequisite: EALC 8621
1 Course Unit
EALC 8627 Song Dynasty Texts
The goal of this course is to gain a practical ability in doing research concerning the Song dynasty by utilizing Chinese primary sources. Each session we will take a type of source, look at examples of it in the library, consider indexes and other reference aids, consider historiographical uses and limitations, and do some communal reading of a sample text distributed in advance, as well as sight-reading of short samples students bring to class, prepared to translate for the class. We will cover sources including standard histories (Song shi, Liao shi, Jin shi), narrative history (Xu zizhi tongjian changbian), biographical accounts (epitaphs, index of Song biographies), diaries, letters, inscriptions, anecdotes, regional histories/gazetteers, and government documents (Song hui yao).
Not Offered Every Year
Prerequisite: CHIN 491 AND CHIN 492
1 Course Unit
EALC 8629 Seminar on Middle Vernacular Sinitic
Students will be introduced to works in Middle vernacular Sinitic. Specific readings will vary semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
Prerequisite: CHIN 491 AND CHIN 492
1 Course Unit
EALC 8659 Japanese for Sinologists
An accelerated course in scholarly Japanese for Sinologists and others with a knowledge of Chinese characters.
Fall
Prerequisite: JPAN 0400
1 Course Unit
EALC 8725 Readings in Song Dynasty History
This seminar will introduce graduate students to current scholarship on the Song dynasty (960-1276) by surveying both classic and recent work in the field. Students will gain a foundation in how historians have interpreted the Song period and learn the major debates within the field. Readings will be principally in English, and no background in Chinese studies is required.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8727 Chinese Economic History
This seminar will introduce graduate students to current scholarship and major scholarly debates in the field of Chinese economic history, focusing on the imperial period up to 1900. The course will proceed chronologically, combining a survey of the historiography of the Chinese economy (principally in English) with extended discussion of the most significant disagreements within the field. No background in Chinese studies is required.
1 Course Unit
EALC 8741 Readings in Early Modern Japanese History
The selection of specific authors and their works varies semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8747 Readings in Premodern Japanese History: War & Peace, 1000-1850
This seminar is an introduction to the most recent historiography on premodern Japan, with a special attention to work focused on the medieval and early modern periods (twelfth through nineteenth centuries). The course will range broadly from religious history to social history, from new takes on biography and material culture to new approaches to think of Japanese's relation to the other, within the archipelago and beyond. Each week will feature a monograph published in the last decade or so, alone or (when possible) in conversation with earlier pieces on similar subjects. Students will be expected to take turns presenting on readings, to write three short book reviews during the course of the semester and a longer seminar paper at the end of the semester (to be submitted by 12/15). The short papers should be handed in no more than three weeks after the book was discussed in class.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8765 Sources in Korean Studies
The selection of specific authors and their writings varies semester to semester.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8801 Theory in/and East Asia
"Theory" can be exciting and seductive to some scholars, but intimidating or pretentious to others. Unfortunately, this difference in feeling about theoretical scholarship and discussion has a tendency to produce a divide in academia between those who "do theory" and those who do not. This graduate seminar pursues the question of how theory can be engaged in the context of East Asian cultural studies, with the goal of collectively working through texts to understand how theoretical reflection opens up possibilities for productive conversations across disciplinary boundaries. Many critiques have been made of the way "traveling theory" serves as a Euro- American universal applied to the "raw material" of East Asian texts, or a transdisciplinary common language in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Instead, we will take such critiques as a starting point to pragmatically and creatively explore the intersections and interactions of "theory" and "East Asia," emphasizing the archival, historical, political, and institutional contexts that motivate theorization. In that spirit, special attention will be given to discussing what problems we find in our own work that require theoretical consideration, and how such considerations might contribute to, challenge, or transform theory originating outside of East Asia. Readings will primary be in English, but may also include Japanese, Chinese, or Korean depending on student interest and language abilities.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8820 Sinological Methods
This seminar is designed to acquaint graduate students with the basic methods and resources of Sino logical research. The course will begin with an overview of essential reference works and aids to study, such as dictionaries and concordances, and continue with a survey of the major primary sources for the study of traditional Chinese history. Students are required to demonstrate the use of the methods learned in the course in a research paper, to be presented to the class in the form of a brief lecture at the end of the semester. Only graduate students may enroll in this course. The prerequisites are reading knowledge of modern Chinese and two years of the classical language. Familiarity with Japanese, though not required, would prove helpful.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8840 Japanese Literature: Research Methods in the Classical Tradition
Introduction to bibliographic tools for research in pre-modern literature. Emphasis on hands-on library work, including how to use libraries in Japan. Covers history and terminology of bibliography. Students may attend lectures in EALC 152/552 simultaneously, when offered. Final project will use reference tools for substantive research in individual student's area of interest.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 8841 Current Japanology
This is a course designed for advanced undergraduate students and graduate students, primarily those majoring in Japanese and East Asian Studies and related disciplines. The main objective of the course is to survey recent and current scholarship on Japan. Each week we will focus on one monograph or a set of chapters or essays, reading them closely not merely to acquire up-to-date knowledge, but to gain new frameworks for approaching the study of Japanese culture, history, and society. Japanese-reading ability is not assumed and discussions will be in English, but optional readings in Japanese will be available.
Not Offered Every Year
Also Offered As: GSWS 8841
1 Course Unit
EALC 8860 Korean Studies: Methods
A seminar on the methods and tools available for conducting research on issues related to Korea. Specific topics may vary according to student needs.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
EALC 9997 Masters Thesis
Registration for MA students who have finished coursework and are writing their MA thesis or research papers.
Fall or Spring
0 Course Units