Asian Studies

This is a social and cultural history of what, when, why, and how people eat in China from the sixth century BCE to 1800s. Structured chronologically, the course explores the connection between food and agriculture, politics, religion, health, technology, and so forth. On the one hand, we examine foodways in China as human adaptation, knowledge formation, technological development, cultural appropriation, and so forth. On the other hand, we will also discuss historical evolution of food and their impacts on individuals and societies. Students will read both Chinese classics (Analects of Confucius, Family Principles, Books of Rites, etc.) and popular anecdotal bij style writings on recipes, foodstuff, and foodways. The course includes the following units: (1) a general introduction of historical “Chinese” and “China” reflected in Chinese foods; (2) several prominent foods (rice, soybeans, tofu, sorghum, etc.) in different historical moments; and (3) changing cultural significances of food, cooking, and eating in and beyond China.

The Vietnam War is a complicated part of modern American history. In this class students will examine the War, its impact on American popular culture, and the way historians have tried to understand and contextualize the War. Using a variety of sources, including books, government documents, and popular films, students will gain a greater understanding of this important period in American history.

A monkey named Wukong (aka Goku in Dragon Ball and Monkey King in Forbidden Kingdom) accompanies the monk Tripitaka on a journey to retrieve Buddhist sutras from India to China.  15 He is able to lift his 17, 000-pound iron cudgel with ease and to travel 34, 000 miles in one somersault. He knows 72 transformations into various shapes of animals and objects, even a clone of himself. He even knows various spells to command wind, to divide water, to conjure vprotective circles against spider spirts, and to freeze humans. Students, using a 16th-century novel Journey to the West, explore (1) the development of popular beliefs (in immortals, oxen demons, hungry ghosts, kitchen god, silkworm goddess, goddess of mercy, spider sprits, ancestors); (2) the boundaries between the seen and unseen realms of divine worlds; (3) a changing society entwined in what have formed/become the history of China. Focusing on Chinese religiosity within its own historical contexts, we examine and explore the knowledge and categorization of “religions” in the field of Chinese studies.
 

Examination of the changing constructions of gender and the shifting configurations of the family, from imperial times to the present. Primary sources (in translation) and secondary literature together convey how changing notions of kinship, property, ritual, space, and the body have informed notions of gender in China, from the traditional courtyard house to the modern high-rise apartment.