Qing China: History, Fiction, and Fantasy ANS 372/HIS364G TTH 2-3:30, MEZ 1.204 Iris Ma Office: 3.102 Garrison Hall Email: lujing.ma@gmail.com Office Hours: TTH 3:30-4:30, and by appointment Course Description: This course will examine the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) in its historical manifestations, literary representations, and contemporary re-imaginings in various popular media. The course will introduce students to the fundamental issues pertaining to this last imperial dynasty of China, the scholarly interpretations of these issues, and the lasting fascination with the dynasty, particularly its emperors and empresses, in film and television entertainment in Mainland China since the 1990s till the present. Expectations & Assignments: The course is designed as an upper-division lecture/discussion class. Students will be responsible for weekly readings, participation in discussion (both in class and on Canvas), one presentation, two papers of 5-6 pages in length, several short in-class assignments, and a take-home final exam. Grading Distributions: Two papers (20% each) Class participation (15%) Presentation and in-class assignments (20%) Final take-home exam (25%) Flag: This course carries the Global Cultures flag. Global Cultures courses are designed to increase your familiarity with cultural groups outside the United States. You should therefore expect a substantial portion of your grade to come from assignments covering the practices, beliefs, and histories of at least one non-u.s. cultural group, past or present. Required Texts (available at UT Co-op Bookstore): Cao Xueqin (trans. by David Hawkes), The Story of the Stone, Volume 1: The Golden Days (New York: Penguin Books, 1973). ISBN: 9780140442939 Pamela Kyle Crossley, The Manchus (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1997). ISBN: 9780631235910 Mark C. Elliott, The Manchu Way: The Eight Banners and Ethnic Identity in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001). ISBN: 0804736065 Page 1 of 6
Patrick Hanan, trans., The Sea of Regret: Two Turn-of-the-Century Chinese Romantic Novels (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1995). ISBN: 0824817095 James L. Hevia, English Lessons: The Pedagogy of Imperialism in Nineteenth-Century China (Durham: Duke University Press, 2003). ISBN: 9780822331889 Philip A. Kuhn, Soulstealers: The Chinese Sorcery Scare of 1768 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990). ISBN: 0674821521 Victor Segalen, René Leys (New York: New York Review of Books, 1974). ISBN: 1590170415 Jonathan D. Spence, Treason by the Book (New York: Penguin Books, 2001). ISBN: 0142000418 Students are encouraged to browse online used bookseller sites to find cheap copies of all the assigned monographs. These books are also on reserve under the course number at the UT Main Library. Additional required readings will be available online via the course website (indicated by * in the weekly listings below). Students will be expected to read the assigned weekly readings and post one question or observation on weekly readings on Canvas before coming to the class. Weekly posting is due 10am each Thursday. Each week s readings should be brought to class for discussion. COURSE SCHEDULE Week One: Introduction Class One (8/25) Overview and Expectations *Joseph Fletcher, Integrative History: Parallels and Interconnections in the Early Modern Period, 1500-1800, Journal of Turkish Studies 9 (1985): 37-57. Week Two: Dynastic Origins I Class One (8/30) 17th-Century Crisis Class Two (9/1) Discussion: The Manchus I Crossley, The Manchus, preface & 1-46; *Frederic Wakeman, Jr., Romantics, Stoics, and Martyrs in Seventeenth-Century China, Journal of Asian Studies 43.2 (August 1984): 631-65. Page 2 of 6
Week Three: Dynastic Origins II Class One (9/6) Issues in the Historiography of the Qing Class Two (9/8) Discussion: The Manchus II, The Manchu Way I Crossley, The Manchus, 47-108; Elliott, The Manchu Way, preface & 1-35; Week Four: Pax Manjurica Class One (9/13) Establishing a New Order Class Two (9/15) Discussion: The Manchu Way II Elliott, The Manchu Way, 39-209 & 345-361. Week Five: Manchu & Han I Class One (9/20) Yongzheng: Then and Now Class Two (9/22) Discussion: Excerpt from The Yongzheng Dynasty Spence, Treason by the Book, 1-190; *Matthias Niedenführ, Revising and Televising the Past in East Asia: History Soaps in Mainland China, Steffi Richter, ed., Contested Views of a Common Past: Revisions of History in Contemporary East Asia (Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2008), 351-70; *Ying Zhu, Yongzheng Dynasty and Totalitarian Nostalgia, Zhu, Keane, and Bai eds., TV Drama in China (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2008), 21-32. Video. Excerpt from The Yongzheng Dynasty: contemporary soap opera Week Six: Manchu & Han II Class One (9/27) Manchu Identity and Sinicization First paper due at the beginning of the class Class Two (9/29) Discussion: Treason by the Book Page 3 of 6
Spence, Treason by the Book, 191-247; Cao, Story of the Stone, vol. 1, Introduction & chs. 1-6. Week Seven: The High Qing Class One (10/4) State & Society in the Qianlong Era Class Two (10/6) Discussion: Story of the Stone Cao, Story of the Stone, vol. 1, chs. 7-26. Week Eight: The Qing Imperium Class One (10/11) Techniques of Empire Building Class Two (10/13) Discussion: Opera and the City *Goldman, Opera and the City, chs. 2 &3; *Peter C. Perdue, Moving through the Land, in China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005), 409-61; *Patricia Berger, Artful Collecting, in Empire of Emptiness: Buddhist Art and Political Authority in Qing China (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2003), 63-82. Week Nine: Prosperity or Roots of Decline? Class One (10/18) Popular Culture in the Qing Class Two (10/20) Discussion: Soulstealers Kuhn, Soulstealers, chs. 1-5, 10. Week Ten: Clash of Empires Class One (10/25) Western Imperialism in China Class Two (10/27) Discussion: English Lessons Hevia, English Lessons, chs. 1-4, 10. Page 4 of 6
Week Eleven: Nineteenth-Century Crises Class One (11/1) Internal Unrest and External Threats Class Two (11/3) Film: Once Upon a Time in China Second paper due at the beginning of the class *Kuhn, Rebellion and its Enemies in Late Imperial China: Militarization and Social Structure, 1796-1864 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980), 105-152, 189-225. Week Twelve: With Regard to Emotion Class One (11/8) The Cult of Qing Class Two (11/10) Discussion: Stones in the Sea & Sea of Regret *Martin Huang, Sentiments of Desire: Thoughts on the Cult of Qing in Ming-Qing Literature, Chinese Literature: Articles, Essays, and Reviews (CLEAR), Vol. 20 (Dec. 1998), 153-184. Hanan, The Sea of Regret (in full). Week Thirteen: Gender, Culture, and Power Class One (11/15) The Question of Women Class Two (11/17) Discussion: Excerpt from Empresses in the Palace *Susan Mann, Precious Records: Women in China s Long Eighteenth Century (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), chs. 1-3. *Li and Zurndorfer, Rethinking of Empress Dowager Cixi through the Production of Art, Nan Nü 14 (Brill: 2012), 1-20. Video Excerpts from Empresses in the Palace: Contemporary TV Drama Week Fourteen: Through Western Eyes Class One (11/22) Discussion: René Leys Page 5 of 6
Segalen, René Leys (in full). Week Fifteen: The End of Qing and its Aftermath Class One (11/29) Fiction: The Travels of Lao Ts an Class Two (12/1) Film: The Last Emperor Liu E (trans. by Harold Shadick), The Travels of Lao Ts an (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), Author Preface, chs. 1-12. Take-home final exam due Friday, December 2, 3:30 pm Note: Late work (including papers and exam) will be subject to penalties, including but not limited to the deduction of 1/3 of a grade for each day the assignment is late. 1. Students shall inform the instructor at the beginning of the semester if he or she requires any special accommodations due to disabilities. 2. Students will not be penalized because of observances of religious beliefs. Rather, whenever feasible, an opportunity will be given to make up within a reasonable time any academic assignment missed due to individual participation in religious observances. Students shall inform the instructor at the beginning of the semester if he or she is going to miss any assignments due to religious observances. 3. Students should be aware that all required writing assignments may be submitted to a plagiarism-detection tool such as Turnitin.com. Turnitin is a software resource intended to address plagiarism and improper citation. The software works by cross-referencing submitted materials with an archived database of journals, essay, newspaper articles, books, and other published work. In addition, other methods may be used to determine the originality of the paper. This software is not intended to replace or substitute for the faculty member's judgment regarding detection of plagiarism. 4.Plagiarism in any form will not be tolerated. Violations of ethical academic conduct will be turned over to the Office of the Dean of Students for adjudication. This syllabus may be subject to change. Students will be notified in advance of important changes that could affect grading, assignments, etc. Page 6 of 6