Course Description
Readings on and discussion of major issues in the history and historiography of Asia. Countries and periods of focus will vary from semester to semester.
Athena Title
COLL ASIAN HIST
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in HIST 7600
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
The course is designed to familiarize graduate students in history and other disciplines with the English-language literature on selected periods of the history of Japan, China, Korea or other parts of Asia to provide students with a solid framework for advanced study and/or teaching. Countries and periods of focus will vary from semester to semester and instructor to instructor. Students will read and discuss a representative range of historical works on the period and country of focus, and will prepare a major historiographical paper on topics of their own choosing, as well as other written assignments.
Topical Outline
Topics will vary with the focus of the course. A sample outline for a focus on premodern Japan would be: Origins of the Japanese Polity Sinification and the Ritsuryo State The Heian Court Shoen and Provincial Gov't in the Heian Period The Beginnings of the Warrior Class The Creation of the First Shogunate Kamakura Governance and the First "Warrior Age" The Fall of the First Shogunate The Muromachi Shogunate The Countryside During the Second "Feudal Age" Was It Feudalism? The Beginnings of the Early Modern Age