Winter

This course introduces the basic narrative and critical discourses of the history of early modern Japan, roughly from 1500 to 1868.  The course examines the emergence of the central power that unified feudal domains and explores processes of social, cultural, and political changes that transformed Japan into a "realm under Heaven."  Some scholars consider early modern Japan as the source of an indigenous birth of capitalism, industrialism, and also of Japan’s current economic vitality, while others see a bleak age of feudal oppression and isolation.  We will explore both sides of the debate and examine the age of many contradictions.

The dynamic interplay between painting, poetry, and calligraphy in the Chinese tradition is encapsulated by Su Shi’s observation that there is “poetry in painting, and painting in poetry.” Further articulation of this truism requires us to examine developing modes of visual expression, and to define ways in which a painting might be “written,” or a text “imaged.” We will consider case studies which demonstrate increasingly fluid negotiation between these mediums: from pictures that labor in “illustrative” juxtaposition with didactic texts (image vs. word), to representations of the natural world that are inscribed with poetry as sites of social and cultural identity (image cf. word), and which achieve formal and conceptual integration in expressive purpose (imageword).

This course is an introduction to the arts of China focusing on major monuments and artworks produced in imperial, aristocratic, literati, religious, and public milieus. Lectures will reconstruct the functions and the meanings of objects, to better understand Chinese culture through the objects it produced. Note(s): Students must attend first class to confirm enrollment. For nonmajors, any ARTH 14000 through 16999 course meets the general education requirement in the dramatic, musical, and visual arts.

Open to undergraduates and gradute students who do not read Chinese, although those who can do so will be expected to read the text in its original form. Paper will be required end of second course. A careful reading and discussion of this major work of traditional Chinese fiction in both the original language and in English translation, with excursions into the relevant secondary scholarship.

This is a two-quarter course: those who sign up for autumn must also sign up for EALC 52301 in winter quarter. Reading and research in Japanese history, which culminates in a major seminar paper at the end of winter term.

This quarter the focus is on the genre of religious/philosophical exegesis. We will read representatives commentaries of the Laozi and the Heart Sūra.

This course will survey works of Japanese fiction and poetry revolving around issues of money stretching from the late 17th through the late 20th century. We will also read key works in the philosophy of money (Adam Smith, Karl Marx, George Simmel, Karatani Kojin), works of critical theory on the relationship between literature and money, and recent scholarship on the history of money in Japan. All readings will be available in English, although some texts will also be provided in Japanese.

Discussion of Wang Bi's (226-249 AD) intellectual and social world, using a selected list of West.-lang. and Chinese-lang. secondary works. Exploration of the history of the metaphor/trope "wanwu" , including the recovered pre-Han text of that name. Discussion of its role in Xici zhuan, as well as its repurposing in Wang's Zhouyi zhu. We shall try to suggest Wang Bi's motivations for his own use of "wanwu" , whether fr

This course examines the relation between historicity and the literary, using Sima Qian's Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian) as the primary example. The Shiji is arguably the most influential Chinese work of historiography, and we will also explore its interdisciplinary and international afterlife. Particular attention will be paid to notions of the immaterial (the unreal, the fictional, the spiritual, the theoretical), the exotic (the non-Chinese, the foreign), and the universal, in traditional Chinese historiography and poetics, in modern archaeology, and in critical theory. Students without classical Chinese reading knowledge are welcome to join and to write their final papers on comparative topics.