Course Schedule and Catalog

Long Title: INTRODUCTION TO CHINESE RELIGIONS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Surveys the major Chinese religious traditions of Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism. Readings will include both philosophical texts, historical and anthropological studies, as well as popular literature. Cross-list: RELI 140.

Long Title: LANGUAGE, IDEOLOGY AND IDENTITY IN SOUTH ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will explore how both in history and contemporary South Asian society, linguistic identity has transformed ideology in nationalist and post-nationalist struggles. In the process examining issues of multilingualism, morality and literacy, language conflicts, language use in media, advertising and cinema. Viewing the political, civil society and social movements through the prism of language pluralism. Cross-list: ANTH 209, LING 209.

Long Title: INTRODUCTION TO ASIAN CIVILIZATIONS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A team-taught interdisciplinary course focusing on certain major philosophical, religious and artistic traditions of pre-modern Asia, with an emphasis on the historical processes by which ideas, people, products, technologies and skills circulated within and beyond state boundaries. Cross-list: HART 211, HIST 206.

Long Title: PERSPECTIVES ON MODERN ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group II

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A team-taught interdisciplinary course focusing on the political, social and economic forces that are shaping the lives of the nearly one half of the world's population that lives in Asia. Provides a selective, in-depth look at certain important areas of East, Southeast and South Asia that reflect larger themes and problems. Cross-list: ANTH 212.

Long Title: HISTORY AND CINEMA IN NORTH ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Can we learn history by analyzing movies? Using documentary and feature films from Asian film culture's beginnings, we view 19-20th century Chinese, Japanese, and Korean history. Collective in-class film viewing, discussion and reading required. Cross-list: FILM 218, HIST 218.

Long Title: THE LIFE OF THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will examine the life of the Prophet Muhammad, focusing on its significance for Muslims and for non-Muslims. Readings in The Qur'an, Ibn Hisham, and Haykal. Cross-list: RELI 221.

Long Title: ASIAN RELIGIONS IN AMERICA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A survey course on Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Jainism in America, from the colonial period to the present, with a special focus on American metaphysical religion, the counterculture, the New Age, and the history of Western Colonialism, transcultural encounter, translation and immigration. Cross-list: RELI 230.

Long Title: AMERICAN METAPHYSICAL RELIGION

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Beginning with a historical survey of the American metaphysical tradition, this course turns to a close study of the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California, as a unique window into some of the different ways the tradition has appropriated Asian religions, psychological models of the unconscious, and contemporary scientific paradigms. Cross-list: RELI 231.

Long Title: RELIGIONS FROM INDIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will survey the religions of India, namely Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Christianity, Islam, and Sikhism. Emphasis will be placed on the study of scriptures of these traditions and their continuing global relevance, particularly in American history and culture. Cross-list: RELI 232.

Long Title: GENDER AND POLITICIZED RELIGION

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course examines the emergence of religion-based politics in various Asian countries-particularly Hindu and Muslim-focusing on the women participants in these movements as well as the movements' concern with gender roles in society. We will investigate, for instance, the extent to which women participants have been willing or able to reshape the central ideas of such movements. Cross-list: RELI 285, SWGS 240, Equivalency: ASIA 340. Mutually Exclusive: Cannot register for ASIA 240 if student has credit for ASIA 340.

Long Title: PERFORMING WOMEN AND SHIFTING PUBLICS IN SOUTH ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The course maps the relationship between gender and the public sphere in South Asia using autobiographies, fiction and cinema about women performers. It extends the idea of performance to mean sites such as art practices and protest performances by transgender communities, to understand debates around sexuality, censorship, pleasure, and violence.

Long Title: MEDITATION, MYSTICISM, AND MAGIC

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The course moves between Buddhist religious and Western psychological literature, analyzing these as models of human development, as guides to a meditative life or critiques of it, and above all as expressions of deeply rooted cultural proclivities. Reading Freud, Khakar, Milarepa, Norbu, Obeyesekere, Sutric and Tantric literature, Taylor and Wangyal. Cross-list: RELI 250.

Long Title: TAIWAN'S FILMS SINCE 1980: ART, CULTURE, SOCIETY AND LANGUAGE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Prerequisite(s): (CHIN 302 AND CHIN 312) or placement test or permission of instructor

Description: This course discusses influential Taiwanese films since 1980 as pieces of artwork and as reflections of Taiwan's cultural, social, economic, and political changes in the past three decades. Language assignments are designed to help students develop proficiency in reading authentic materials, writing essays, and giving reports. Current collaborations among Taiwan, China, and Hong Kong in film production also included. Cross-list: CHIN 315.

Long Title: RELIGIONS OF CHINA AND TIBET: A TRANSNATIONAL PERSEPCTIVE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will introduce the major religious traditions of China and Tibet, including Confucianism, Daoism, popular Chinese religion and Han and Tibetan forms of Buddhism. We will examine these traditions from historical and philosophical perspectives as well as through scripture and popular literature, recognizing transnational exchanges and influence. Cross-list: RELI 318.

Long Title: CHINA'S CULTURAL REVOLUTIONS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: 19th - 20th century China saw many revolutionary attacks on "culture." Course examines Chinese thinkers, ideologists, activists, revolutionaries and counter revolutionaries who focused on the culture question. It also asks: what is "culture" that requires so much revolutionary attention and what effect have China's multiple cultural revolutions had on the world. Cross-list: HIST 322.

Long Title: INTRODUCTION TO BUDDHISM

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Exploration of the Buddhist traditions of India, Tibet, China, and Japan, emphasizing the relationship between styles of meditation, their philosophical perspectives, cultural context, and classic Buddhist texts.

Long Title: THE KNOWING BODY: BUDDHISM, GENDER AND THE SOCIAL WORLD

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Western thought tends to regard mind and body dualistically, a view with significant impact on religious, cultural, gendered, and social processes. This course juxtaposes received Western assumptions with Buddhist perspectives (especially Tibetan Buddhist), mapping Western and Buddhist categories onto each other to better understand the implications of each. Cross-list: RELI 323, SWGS 323.

Long Title: INTRODUCTION TO TRADITIONAL CHINESE POETRY

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course seeks to decode enchanting features of traditional Chinese poetry through examining the transformation of poetic genres, the interaction between poetic creation and political, social and cultural changes, and the close association of poetry with art. Thus, this course also serves to understand Chinese culture and history through poetic perspectives. All readings in English translation. Cross-list: CHIN 330, MDST 370.

Long Title: SOUTH ASIAN LITERATURE, POETRY, AND POPULAR CULTURE I

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Prerequisite(s): HIND 202 or permission of instructor

Description: Focus will vary each year depending on both the needs and interests of the students in the class, as well as contemporary issues. Readings range from classical to modern 20th century literature and poetry. Various arts forms, including theater and film, will be thematically related to the readings. This course is taught in Hindi. Cross-list: HIND 335.

Long Title: CHINESE LITERATURE AND ITS MOVIE ADAPTATIONS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course seeks to decode enchanting features of traditional Chinese poetry through examining the transformation of poetic genres, the interaction between poetic creation and political, social and cultural changes, and the close association of poetry with art. Thus, this course also serves to understand Chinese culture and history through poetic perspectives. All readings in English translation. Cross-list: CHIN 332.

Long Title: CHINESE IN CULTURAL DISCOURSES

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A study of Chinese in mostly Classical Chinese texts. Prose and poetry are examined for linguistic structure and cultural symbolism. Diachronic linguistic perspective and cultural comparison are adopted. Taught in English, but prior experience of two years of Chinese required. A required course for students in Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language. Cross-list: CHIN 331.

Long Title: TRADITIONAL CHINESE TALES AND SHORT STORIES

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Learning Chinese literature and culture through reading vernacular stories, fantastic tales, biographies, and philosophical parables. Discussion topics: literature and Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism; literature and history; self and other; fantastic world and reality; women as domestic aliens and aliens portrayed as women, etc. Readings are in English translation. Cross-list: CHIN 334.

Long Title: INTRODUCTION TO CLASSICAL CHINESE NOVELS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Examination of the basic characteristics of classical Chinese novels, primarily through six important works from the 16th to 18th centuries: Water Margin, Monkey, Golden Lotus, Scholars, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and Dream of the Red Chamber. Cross-list: CHIN 335, MDST 375.

Long Title: GENDER AND POLITICIZED RELIGION (ENRICHED VERSION)

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course examines the emergence of religion-based politics in various Asian countries-particularly Hindu and Muslim-focusing on the women participants in these movements as well as the movements' concern with gender roles in society. We will investigate, for instance, the extent to which women participants have been willing or able to reshape the central ideas of such movements. Credit may not be received for both ASIA 240 and ASIA 340. Cross-list: RELI 341, SWGS 340, Equivalency: ASIA 240. Mutually Exclusive: Cannot register for ASIA 340 if student has credit for ASIA 240.

Long Title: KOREAN LITERATURE AND CULTURE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Exploration of selections from modern Korean literature and Korean films. Includes background survey of Korean history, philosophy and religion. All texts and films in English translation. No previous knowledge of Korean required. Instructor Permission Required.Cross-list: HUMA 344, KORE 344.

Long Title: LINGUISTIC STRUCTURE OF KOREAN AND RELATED LANGUAGES IN EAST ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The course focuses on the origin of Korean and related languages. It explores the way the Korean language evolved and interacted with other East Asian Languages, including Chinese and Japanese. The sociolinguistic aspect of these languages will be studied, including the difference in male and female language used and the honorific systems. Cross-list: KORE 345, LING 345.

Long Title: KOREAN CULTURE AND SOCIETY THROUGH MULTIMEDIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will introduces important elements of Korean culture and society through readings and multimedia. Topics are in the areas of history, philosophy, and family life around the early 20th century to the present. Also, the class will explore the recent phenomenon of "Korean Wave" in East Asia. Korean background is unnecessary. Cross-list: KORE 346.

Long Title: HISTORY AND POLITICS OF CENTRAL ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This is an introduction to the history, culture, lands, peoples, and contemporary importance of Central Asia. Topics to be discussed include the Great Game, Sovietization, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the War on Terror, and the new Great Game, the race for resources between Russia, China, and the United States.

Long Title: TRANSNATIONAL CHINA: CHINA AND THE CHINESE DIASPORA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Exploration of the political, economic, and social forces changing the lives of nearly a quarter of humanity, the 1.4 billion people of Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and the diasporic Chinese communities of East and Southeast Asia. Topics include political and economic liberalization, nationalism and urban identity, privatization and consumerism, environmentalism and public goods, and the globalization of communication technologies and Chinese cultural media.

Long Title: THE ORIENTAL RENAISSANCE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will explore the European and American encounters with India from seventeenth-century France to twentieth-century America. Particular attention will be given to the translation of Sanskrit texts, the English, and German Romantic traditions, the depth psychology of C.G. Jung, and the American New Age. Cross-list: RELI 361.

Long Title: CHINESE PAINTING

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course examines Chinese painting from ancient times to the early twentieth century. Issues of examination include themes, styles, and functions of Chinese painting; the interrelationship between paintings and the intended viewers; regionalism; images and words; foreign elements in Chinese painting. Cross-list: HART 371.

Long Title: CHINESE ART AND VISUAL CULTURE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: In this course, we will study how various artistic styles developed in historical, social, and cultural contexts from the ancient period to the present day. Through the careful examination of architecture, calligraphy, painting, sculpture, ceramics, bronze, and film, students will gain a deeper understanding of Chinese art and visual culture. Cross-list: HART 372, MDST 373.

Long Title: ART & RELIGION IN CHINA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This introductory course examines the complex relationship between art and religion in China (4th - 19th centuries). Through an analysis of painting, sculpture, cave temples, steles, manuscripts, talismans, illustrated prints, and primary sources, we will explore the visual, religious, and cultural dimensions of Buddhism and Daoism, and the fluid nature of Chinese culture. Cross-list: HART 374, RELI 374.

Long Title: EAST & WEST: MEDIEVAL VISUAL CULTURE IN CHINA AND NORTHERN EUROPE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course explores a series of issues that are critically important for the medieval art of both China and northern Europe. Topics include materials and techniques; public and private art: commerce, technology and prints; art and motion; archaeology; paradise and hell; maps and space; the gaze; erotica; patronage; and multiculturalism. . Cross-list: HART 376, MDST 376.

Long Title: THE ASIAN AMERICAN EXPERIENCE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This interdisciplinary course will investigate the diverse cultural traditions and shared experiences of Asian Americans in the United States. by analyzing historical works, literary texts, and films, we will explore a range of topics including Asian immigration, gender roles, identity formation, and ethnic media. Cross-list: HIST 380.

Long Title: MEDIA: FOCUS ON MODERN JAPAN

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Survey of what makes Japanese media unique by analyzing trends from the Meiji Period to the present. Theoretical works of Western writers will be cross-culturally compared to those of Japanese writers to isolate similarities and differences of style and substance; focus on the organization of Japanese media and cultural traditions.

Long Title: ANALYZING MODERN JAPANESE SOCIETY THROUGH NOVELS

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: An analysis of modern Japanese thought and behavior through the works of present-day novelists. We will break each novel down into its component parts while studying the reasons for the protagonists' and other characters' actions, compared to those of a Western novel. This cross-cultural analysis goes to the heart of modern Japan's national character.

Long Title: MIGRATIONS AND DIASPORAS IN THE INDIAN OCEAN WORLD

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The Indian Ocean World presents an enormously varied arena of cultural exchange and interaction spanning coastal regions of Africa, the Middle East, South and Southeast Asia and Australia. Course introduces the region by examining societies and empires shaped by voyages of exploration, religious pilgrimages, trading diasporas and forced migration. Cross-list: HIST 389.

Long Title: WOMEN IN CHINESE LITERATURE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course examines women's roles in Chinese literature as writers, readers, and characters, focusing particularly on the tension between women's lived bodily experiences and the cultural experiences inscribed on the female body and how, in the process, women have contrarily gendered patriarchal culture into their own. It will also touch on Chinese women's incorporation of the Western Tradition. Cross-list: MDST 379, SWGS 399.

Long Title: INDEPENDENT STUDY

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Independent Study

Credit Hours: 1 TO 15

Description: Reading or research project to be determined by discussions between student(s) and faculty member(s). Department Permission Required.

Long Title: INDEPENDENT STUDY

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Independent Study

Credit Hours: 1 TO 15

Description: Reading or research project to be determined by discussions between student(s) and faculty member(s). Department Permission Required.

Long Title: INDEPENDENT STUDY

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Independent Study

Credit Hours: 1 TO 6

Description: Asian Studies Director's permission required to register.

Long Title: CINEMA IN INDIA: TRANSNATIONAL TRAJECTORIES OF MODERNITY

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 4

Description: The course will introduce students to the complex history of and theoretical issues related to cinemas in India, outside the cinematic practices known as Bollywood. It will attempt to demonstrate that cinema is symptomatic of the profoundly transnational nature of modernity itself and that it will help us revisit the South Asian cultural politics outside the dichotomies of national/transnational, post-national. Cross-list: FILM 412.

Long Title: THE ORIGINAL BEAUTY OF CHINESE LITERATURE

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The course will expose students to the best literary works created in the Chinese tradition, both classical and modern, and give them a general introduction to different genres, including poetry, fiction, drama, and philosophical essays. It will improve their language proficiency through reading original texts of Chinese literature. Cross-list: CHIN 422.

Long Title: MAGIC AND POPULAR RELIGION

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will examine the popular religion in the Middle East from Late Antiquity until the 19th century, focusing on healing practices, astrology, protection, amulets, seasoned/life-cycle rituals, and other popular beliefs common to Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Cross-list: RELI 441.

Long Title: BOUNDARIES LATER CHINESE ART

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This advanced class examines later Chinese art beyond the conventional dynastic, geographic, and media-based framework. We will discuss issues of boundaries and visualities, and review the historiographical and methodological issues involved in the study of Chinese art. Instructor Permission Required.

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Multi-disciplinary study of Asian countries an cultures as to a way to explain production, exchange, consumption and influence of energy on political, economic and social/cultural institutions, including energy security and energy policy formation and resource use theories. Assumes basic knowledge of history and politics of Asian societies and economies.

Long Title: COLONIAL MODERNITY IN EAST ASIA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: History of ideas, treaties, market and corporate strategies in imperialist and anti-imperialist movement in East Asia in 19th, 20th centuries. Uses theories of colonialism and specific case studies of fashion, architecture, mass media, urban planning, etc., to define colonial modernity transnationally. Three analytic essays and one research paper. Cross-list: HIST 490.

Long Title: GENDER HISTORIES OF MODERN CHINA

Department: Asian Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Seminar course, with some lectures, considers conceptual tools (gynotechnics, globalization, representation, etc.) in Late Imperial/20th Century China thru femininity-masculinity. Late Qing gender order through revolutionary eras Party state formation, Great Transformations of late 20th and early 21st centuries. Visual culture, film, primary texts, secondary histories readings. Cross-list: HIST 492, SWGS 492.