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CLIT 2090: Orientalism, China, and Globalization
Dr. Daniel Vukovich
Venue: CPD-LG59
*For those students not in HK this term, we will still provide weekly audio-video recordings (live, simulataneous) from the classroom when/if we meet in person
When: Tuesdays, from 1.30—4.20
ZOOM LOCATION: https://hku.zoom.us/j/6415244213
CLASSWEB: https://sites.google.com/site/honggangdaxue/clit-2090--china--orientalism--and-globalization\
Phone: 3917- 7934
Office: 934 RR Shaw Arts Bldg, Centennial Campus
Office Hours: By appointment.
Email: vukovich@hku.hk Please allow for at least a 24 hour response time for email.
Description:
This course focuses on the theory and history of orientalism – the phenomenon and institution -- in relation to China and the PRC and to Asia and the world. Edward Said’s book Orientalism (1978) helped transform how we understand the “Others” of the West as well as the impact of colonialism and empire on global intellectual political culture. It is a founding text of post-colonial studies, even though Said himself had mixed thoughts about the new field he helped create.
China and the PRC were usually left out of such studies until fairly recently. In this class we are going to correct that by reading a good deal of Western writing about China and Chinese people, from about Marco Polo up to the present. Our main purpose is to learn what we can from this encounter between foreign or Western writers and China, which is also the encounter between China and modern colonialism and global capitalism. From the basis of these readings we will work our way towards understanding what “orientalism” means. Texts include extracts from classic and obscure writers from the US and Europe: folks like Marco Polo, Matteo Ricci, Voltaire, and Montesquieu but also some Christian missionaries and modern “China experts.” We will also read about important “friends of China” like Mikhail Borodin and Norman Bethune who tried to change China not just by writing about it but by living there and working for it (for the revolution). What can we learn from their efforts? Can one change China, or is it imperialist to even think so?
And how do we fit Hong Kong into this mix?
Statement on Learning Outcomes:
The course will develop your skills in textual and cross-cultural analysis, as well as critical thinking. It will do this by placing you into a position where you have to read, explore and then write about orientalism and encounters between China and the West.
The immersion in Sino-Western texts will help develop your knowledge of world and Chinese history.
The course should also develop your intellectual and ethical awareness of encounters with “the Other,” be it Chinese, Hong Kong-ese or otherwise.
Texts:
1. All readings will be scanned and made available to students only at our class googlesite: https://sites.google.com/site/honggangdaxue/clit-2090--china--orientalism--and-globalization
The readings will include the full text of Mackerras, Colin. Sinophiles and Sinophobes: Western Views of China. (Oxford: OUP, 2000). (It is currently out of print.) We’ll also read some of: Edward Said’s Orientalism (New York: Vintage, 1978. Rev ed. 2002); J. Spence's To Change China: Western Advisers in China. (New York: Penguin, 1969. Rep 2002. ), and other selected texts.
Grading:
100% Continuous Assessment:
*Instructions and a prompt for each essay will be given in class 1-2 weeks before the due date.
* Each paper will be about 1k-1.25k words.
25 % Participation
25% Paper 1. Due Date: Week 7. Length: about 1.5 k words.
50% Paper 2. Due Date: Finals Week. Length: About 2--2.5k words.
Late Work Policy:
Late work is NOT accepted, except under verified medical or other emergencies. If you need a brief extension for a particular assignment, you must see me one week in advance and commit to a new due date.
You must complete ALL major assignments to pass the course. Don’t skip a paper.
Plagiarism:
A writer who presents the ideas or words of another as if they were the writer’s own commits plagiarism. This is a disciplinary offense that can result in failure or expulsion. Consult http://ec.hku.hk/plagiarism and http://www.hku.hk/plagiarism. Do not offer quotes or paraphrases of others’ work without providing proper citation. If you have any questions see me to steer you right. Learn the MLA format.
SCHEDULE
1. This schedule is subject to change. If you miss class it is your responsibility to find out what you missed or if there is new work.
2. http://sites.google.com/site/honggangdaxue/ This is the course website, where you can find lecture notes and related materials.
Week 1, Sep 1: Syllabus Review. Some Keywords & Questions. Capitalism, Orientalism, Globalization (Trade versus Colonialism versus Imperialism)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-bangs/hong-kong-quest-for-the-d_b_659707.html
Week 2, Sep 8: Orientalism, the theory.
Readings: Said, “Introduction” to Orientalism. xi—31.
Week 3, Sep 15: Discovering, Revealing China.
Readings : Sinophiles and Sinophobes (S&S), Parts I through IV: pp. ix – 44.
RETURN OF FACE-TO-FACE CLASS OPTION, T.B.A 😊
Week 4, Sep 22: Orientalism and Imperialism
Readings:
1. S&S: Jesuits To Opium (19th C.): 47-88.
Week 5, Sep 29: The Qing Fall, Mao Rises. The West Stays Emotional.
Readings: S&S: 89-130 (read the few pages from Pearl S. Buck).
Week 6, Oct 6: From Maoism to Tiananmen & Beyond: The Impossibility of Western Approval
Readings: S&S: 130-179.
Recommended: S&S: 179─ 209.
*Paper 1 /Response Paper Due Friday
Week 7, Oct 13: READING WEEK, NO CLASS
Week 8, Oct 20: Covid and Sinophobia:
Readings: 1. "Ignorance, Orientalism and Sinophobia in Knowledge Production on COVID‐19" . Yunpeng Zhang & Fang Xu. Journal of Economic and Social Geography, 2020.
2. "The End of Re-colonization." Vukovich, Neo-helicon, 2012.
Week 9, Oct 27: The East is a Career: Schall and Verbiest + Todd & Bethune
Readings:: Spence, To Change China" Western Advisers in China, chapters: Introduction + "To God Through the Stars" + "Overcome All Terrors."
Week 10, Nov 6 : East/West/Sex/Orient/
Readings: Richard Bernstein, The East, the West, and Sex (selections)
1. Chapters 1-2
Week 11, Nov 13 : East/West/Sex/Orient/
1. Bernstein, chapters 7-8.
2. Bernstein, chapter 10 "The Inescapable Courtesy of Japan" and "Interlude/The Butterfly Complex"
3. Bernstein, Chapter 13, "Judgments."
Week 12, Nov 20: Lecture/summary : Catch-up Day: Spence and "The East is a Career" + East/West/Sex
* No readings....
We will do this one online at usual place and time: ZOOM LOCATION: https://hku.zoom.us/j/6415244213
Week 13, Nov 27: Occidentalism and/or China: Flip-side of Orientalism, or Same Problem?
AND ALSO: * Workshop/Discussion on Final essay: details, prompts, directions TBA in class.
Reading: 1. Encyclopedia article on Occidentlaism by Prof. E. Wang. -- pdf below and sent via email.
2. Workshop/Discussion on Final essay: details, prompts, directions TBA in class. *Reminder that we're not doing 3 essays but two this term.
FINAL ESSAY DUE TUESDAY, DECEMBER 15, VIA EMAIL.
“One ought again to remember that all cultures impose corrections on raw reality, changing it from free-floating objects into units of knowledge. The problem is not that conversion takes place. It is perfectly natural for the human mind to resist the assault on it of untreated strangeness; therefore cultures have always been inclined to impose complete transformations on other cultures, receiving these cultures not as they are but as, for the benefit of the receiver, as the way they ought to be. Yet the Orientalist makes it his work to be always converting the Orient from something into something else: he does this for himself, for the sake of his culture; in some cases for what he believes is the sake of the Oriental.”
– Edward Said, Orientalism.
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