Asian Languages and Cultures Classes

This course serves as both an introduction to the interdisciplinary program in Asian Studies and an introduction to some of the religious and philosophical traditions of both South and East Asia. We will have a number of guest lectures from Asian Studies faculty, and consider Hindu and Buddhist traditions in South India as well as Confucian, Daoist and Buddhist traditions in East Asia. In both settings we will examine the aftermath of nineteenth and twentieth century encounters with Western colonial powers and analyze the thought of Gandhi and Mao Zedong.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Buddhism is increasingly well-known in the USA, but what is it, and how does Buddhism encourage people to organize and think about their lives? Organized on the basis of the Eightfold Noble Path, with a focus of 'morals, the Buddhist psychology of mind, and meditation,'  this course offers an introduction to the personalities, teachings, and institutions of Buddhism. Beginning in India at the time of the Buddha, this course focuses on Theravada Buddhism, asking students to think historically, philosophically, and anthropologically. Many Friday sessions will be dedicated to an exploration of the variety of Buddhist meditative techniques.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course introduces the cultures and societies of China, Japan and Korea from the earliest times to the present day. Primarily an introductory course for beginners in East Asian civilization, this course considers a variety of significant themes in religious, political, economic, social and cultural developments in the region.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Japanese is considered to be a gendered language in the sense that women and men speak differently from each other. Male characters in Japanese animation often use "boku" or "ore" to refer to themselves, while female characters often use "watashi" or "atashi." When translated into Japanese, Hermione Granger (a female character in the Harry Potter series) ends sentences with soft-sounding forms, while Harry Potter and his best friend Ron use more assertive forms. Do these fictional representations reflect reality? How are certain forms associated with femininity or masculinity? Do speakers of Japanese conform to the norm or rebel against it? These are some of the questions discussed in this course. Students will have opportunities to learn about the history of gendered language, discover different methodologies in data collections, and find out about current discourse on language and gender.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course examines the art and visual culture of China from the Neolithic era to the twenty-first century. Lectures and readings will teach methods of formal visual analysis as well as provide the opportunity for students to think critically about how scholars write the artistic history of the region. Through this class, students will engage with a broad array of media, from jade carvings, Buddhist cave painting, architecture, calligraphy and monumental landscape paintings to ceramics, imperial palaces, and contemporary installations. While examining the intended meanings and functions of these objects and spaces, we will discuss the varied contexts and value systems that have informed visual production in China.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts

Course Materials

This course introduces the basic issues and concepts of Asian American Studies. We begin by looking at the birth of Asian American Studies as a field in response to student protests in the late 1960s. We then proceed to an overview of Asian American history beginning with U.S. imperialism in Asia and moving up to the present moment. For the remainder of the course we’ll focus on particular topics such as: the model minority myth; anti-Asian violence; multiracial Asian American identity; and Asian American activism. The approach of this course is interdisciplinary; it draws on theoretical and methodological insights from academic disciplines such as history, ethnic studies, and sociology.

General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course surveys the history of Japanese film from the "golden age" of Japanese cinema to the contemporary transnational genre of anime. While introducing methodologies of film analysis and interpretation, it develops knowledge of how major works of Japanese film and animation have expressed and critiqued issues of modern Japanese society. In doing this, we trace the development of two related archetypes: the middle-class salaryman and the adolescent girl (shojo). These figures - as well as their incarnations as cyberpunks and mecha-warriors, sex workers and teen rebels - help us explore Japanese film's engagement with the strictures of middle-class society, the constrained status of women, fantasy and escapism, sexuality and desire. Weekly screenings and discussion will be supplemented by readings in film theory and cultural criticism. Directors include Ozu Yasujiro, Akira Kurosawa, Oshima Nagisa, Miyazaki Hayao, Anno Hideaki, and Hosoda Mamoru. No prior knowledge of Japanese required.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course is an overview of China on the silver screen. Adopting the "nation" as its primary structuring device, the course examines how Chinese films represented the national identity, national issues, and the national past. The topics under discussion include how women's virtues became emblems of a nation that strived for modernity in the early 20th century; how films were politically appropriated for socialist purposes; how the revolutionary past was cinematically constructed, remembered and critiqued in the post-Mao era; how the national legacy and tradition were consciously or unconsciously re-created and revised as a spectacle to meet the curious gaze of the global market; and how Taiwan and Hong Kong cinema constantly reflected cultural and national identities. The course starts from the silent film period and extends to the fifth generation directors, underground filmmaking, and the revival of the martial arts genre in greater China. Feature films from mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong will be screened and discussed. Secondary articles and books are also assigned in conjunction with the films. The course is organized thematically and moves chronologically. No prior knowledge of China or Chinese is required.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course introduces students to the art and visual culture of Japan from the late nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth century, a period of Japanese history marked by dramatic cultural, political, and social change.  The class focuses primarily on the visual arts from the 1850s to 1945, a time when modernism and modernity were seen (by some) as empowering and (by others) as a threat to foundations of national identity; we will also consider artistic practices in the postwar era to understand the "crisis of the modern" that developed in the first decades after the war as artists struggled to find their individual and national voices. Drawing on a diverse array of artistic forms and visual media, including painting, prints, sculpture, architecture, anime (Japanese cartoons), film, photography, advertising design, and manga (Japanese comics), we explore themes such as trauma, nationalism, imperialism, fascism, protest, hybridity, fantasy, embodiment, and performativity. Students will be asked to consider critically how these works operated as a part of international flows in art, design, and consumerism as well as how they contributed to evolving modern identities in Japan.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts

Course Materials

A study of the culture and society of China from earliest times to the eighteenth century, when the impact of the West was strongly felt. The course will feature themes in Chinese history, including the birth of the Great Philosophers, the story of the Great Wall, the making and sustaining of the imperial system, the Silk Road and international trade and cultural exchange, the emergence of Chinese Buddhism and Neo-Confucianism, Genghis Kahn and his Eurasian Empire, the splendid literary and artistic achievements, the Opium War and its impact on modern China. Lecture/discussion format.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

A study of leading institutions and movements of nineteenth- and twentieth-century China. Major emphases include the impact of Western imperialism, the transformation of peasant society through revolution, the rise of Mao Tse-Tung, and the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Special attention will be given to U.S.-China relations.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course aims to investigate the complex relationship between language and identity. Language plays a significant role in conveying one’s identity, as do other semiotic means such as clothing. By exploring scholarship that considers language as it relates to identity, students will discover how speakers/writers use their agency in expressing their identity and how identity emerges as a social and cultural phenomenon. They will learn about multiple interrelated factors that affect how speakers/writers view and use language such as race, ethnicity, nationality, and multilingualism in Japanese, Asian American, and other communities, and conduct research using authentic linguistic data. No knowledge of Japanese is required.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

The Uyghur are Central Asian Turkic Muslims residing in a minority autonomous region called Xinjiang in northwest China, which many of its natives prefer to call East Turkestan. Conflicts between the Uyghur and the Chinese state have turned into suppression and resistance over the past few decades, calling into question issues of sovereignty, human rights, minoritized identity, and social justice. This course introduces Uyghur culture, history, language, and art with an interdisciplinary focus. It addresses topics such as indigenous nationalism, representation, Islamophobia, racism, and mass incarceration, while also taking a critical look at discourses of pluralism, terrorism, and the “Silk Road.” We will listen closely to major genres of traditional and modern Uyghur music, and may be involved in a small-scale performance of an early modern Uyghur drama. There is no prerequisite; no prior knowledge of music, Uyghur or Turkic languages, or Chinese is assumed.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:

Course Materials

This course provides interdisciplinary textual and visual materials to examine historical and contemporary processes through which to understand everyday politics in South Asia, with a deep focus on how macropolitics affect the scale of the local, the body, and the community. Course materials are based on studies of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. In these varied spaces in South Asia, students will engage with materials that focus particularly on, and from, the margins, frontiers, and borderlands of these contemporary states. Students will learn from academic writing, documentary photography, and film to understand how South Asia is not a fixed place or a timeless regional entity. Rather, drawing on Doreen Massey’s “a global sense of place”, students will learn about South Asia through the lens of relationality, transnational flows, and local-global connections of humans and non-humans. In addition, the course focuses on transnational homes and representations for South Asians in the diaspora. We are placed quite well to engage with the sizable South Asian community in the Twin Cities. Course topics include development, memory, colonialism, nation, bureaucracy, indigeneity, youth, religion, gender, political ecology, urban life, mobility, diaspora.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course examines the art, architecture, and visual culture of Japan, spanning a broad temporal frame from the ancient Neolithic era to our own contemporary moment.  We will discuss a diverse array of art and architecture from ancient Jomon pottery, Shinto shrines, and print media to Buddhist sculpture, painting practices during World War II, anime (cartoons) and manga (comics). In addition to learning methods of formal visual analysis, students will gain insight into how these works articulated complex artistic, social, economic, political, and religious trends. Through this course, students will develop skills to reflect critically on the production of narratives of Japanese culture, while considering concepts such as tradition, hybridity, value, authority, authenticity, sexuality, commodity flows, nationalism, and militarism.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts

Course Materials

Akujo, or bad woman, has been a constant presence in cultural texts throughout history, and Japan is no exception. And they are bad, indeed. A woman burns her lover alive after turning into a serpent, another woman changes men into animals for no apparent reason, and yet another woman blows her breath onto men and freezes them to death. Beyond the evil acts and dastardly powers, however, it is the transgression of socially constructed gender boundaries that work to vilify these women from the start. In this course, we will investigate female villains from medieval folklore to anime, paying close attention to how these characters are portrayed, and what their portrayals reveal. By closely examining the traits that make these women “bad,” we will investigate to whom these characters pose a threat and what is really at stake. No prior knowledge of Japanese is necessary.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Reading Plays guides students in close readings of dramatic literature, in particular of plays that are typically left out of the traditional theatrical canon. Students will learn about the socio-historical context of each play, and in-class exercises will introduce them to the foundation of script analysis: they will examine the play's given circumstances, dialogue, dramatic action, characters, and style. Students will read a new play every week; assignments include weekly in-class writing exercises and short critical papers. Some playwrights we may explore are: Ayad Akhtar, Jaclyn Backhaus, Christopher Chen, Mashuq Mushtaq Deen, Prince Gomolvilas, David Henry Hwang, Naomi Iizuka, Rajiv Joseph, Hansol Jung, Haruna Lee, Kimber Lee, Young Jean Lee, Qui Nguyen, Jiehae Park, Lloyd Suh, Kristina Wong, Lauren Yee, and Chay Yew.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Internationalism OR U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Fine arts

Course Materials

Asian Americans are often overlooked in the study of religion in the U.S., and yet the impact of Asian religious practices can be seen at every turn: yoga studios, mindfulness meditation, “zen” aesthetics of minimalism, and so on. What do we make of the gap between how Asian religions are practiced in Asian American communities and how these traditions have been reinterpreted by predominantly white, educated, middle class adherents? How do Asian American Christians negotiate their identities in the context of non-Asian Christian churches or the intergenerational tensions within their own ethnic churches? The approach of this course is interdisciplinary (and sometimes counterdisciplinary); it draws on theoretical and methodological insights from ethnic studies, religious studies, history, and sociology. Topics include: race and the racialization of Asian Americans; the politics of cultural and religious exchange; the commodification of Asian religious practices; and issues of assimilation and hybridity within Asian American Christian traditions.

General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

Whether the twenty-first century will be dominated by the "rising Asia" has spurred recurring debates in policy and academic circles. But what is Asia? How can we understand this diverse region where more than half of the world's population resides? In this course, we will first deconstruct the idea of Asia as a cartographic entity to excavate the layered social-cultural meaning and geographical diversity of the "Asias." We will also place the "Asias" in a global context to reveal how contemporary Asia anchors the changing world political economy and cultural imaginations outside the West. We will begin with important theoretical debates on (East) Asian development that prevailed in the 1980s and 1990s, including discussions about the colonial past, the path-dependency of development and uneven industrialization, regional disparities and mega-urbanization. We will then use these debates as the foundation to explore the contemporary globalizing Asia. What are the important connections between Asian countries, and with other parts of the world? What are the roles of the "Asias" in international governance and geo-politics? Can China replace the United States as the dominant geo-economic power? These are the questions we will explore in this course.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WP
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

Japan's rapid industrialization in the latter part of the nineteenth century, and its phenomenal rise as the number two economic power in the world after the devastation wrought by World War II, have led many scholars to declare Japan a model worthy of emulation by all "developing" nations. After an examination of feudal Japan, this course probes the nature and course of Japan's "amazing transformation" and analyzes the consequences of its strengths as a nation-state. Considerable study of Japanese art, literature, and religion will be undertaken and American attitudes toward the Japanese and their history will also be examined.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This discussion-based course is entirely focused on Bruce Lee, the actor and leading martial arts icon of the 20th century. Using American Studies and Critical Race Studies frames to examine the construction of racialized and gendered bodies, we will discuss Bruce Lee in terms of his biography, identities, politics, philosophy, and filmography. We will take time to appreciate the entertainment value and athleticism that Bruce Lee brought to his work, but we will also learn to distinguish the commercialized, commodified Bruce Lee (from t-shirts to posters to action figures) from the serious historical figure who symbolized the spirit of cultural independence and political sovereignty around the world. Among the required books and movies: The Tao of Jeet Kune Do, and "Way of the Dragon" (1972).

General Education Requirements:
U.S. Identities and Differences

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

In 1966, sociologist William Peterson published an article in the New York Times titled, “Success Story, Japanese-American Style,” which praised Japanese Americans, their family structure, and their culture for achieving education and financial success despite having been incarcerated en masse during World War II. This marks the first articulation of model minority myth, which stereotypes Asian American as being successful, hardworking, law-abiding, and dutiful, relative to other minoritized groups. So, how did Japanese Americans go from being perceived as enemy spies to the original “model minority”? This course will examine the history and experience of Japanese Americans from the mid-nineteenth century to the present, with an eye toward Japanese American activism and resistance. Topics will include: U.S. imperialism in Asia; the effects of incarceration during World War II; Japanese Americans in Hawai’i; Japanese American organizing against Islamophobia and the mass incarceration of migrants at the border; and Japanese American solidarity with the civil rights movement and reparations for African Americans.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:

Course Materials

When Jesuit missionaries first entered China in the 16th century, what did the Chinese people they met think of these strange, celibate men from the “Far West”? What prompted Jesuits to travel across the globe to live and die among foreigners in the first place? What shared values cemented the first friendships between Chinese and Europeans? And on what issues did Chinese and Europeans disagree or struggle to gain one another's trust? Students in this seminar will study an array of literary, religious, cartographical, and visual materials from China and Europe in the period between 1500-1800, reflect on their own interactions with cultural "others," and collaborate to curate a museum-style exhibit. No knowledge of Chinese required.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course will delve into the roles and the many role models, of recognized and unrecognized identities that are learned, projected, imagined, scripted, and performed from the late 19th century to the present in various cultures in the West and East, including the southern hemispheres. These roles include, but are in no way are limited: to the familial roles such as mother, daughter, sister; to occupational roles such as housewife, maid, and dominatrix; to fictional or imaginative -- but also aspirational – roles, such as are found in myths and fairytales, fashion, fetish, and other imagined or fictional modes of existence. We will study visual and textual images from three positions: 1) Discursive: using visual and narrative “texts” of roles – such as Lolita or New Woman -- of both “real” and fictional source —such as advertising, magazines and art; 2) Performative: in particular, the performative cultures of fetish, cosplay, fashion, and other fanbased costume communities; and finally, 3) Intersectionality: using categories of sexual and gendered identities in examining sexual, gendered, racial, and class distinctions through of women through the violence, isolation, religious demands, and rape cultures – identity politics under contemporary critical investigation; through the tactics of visual analysis, textual research, and individual and community discussion. We will also use interviews with women from various countries and cultures as key tactics to inform our exploration.

General Education Requirements:

Distribution Requirements:

Course Materials

Since the last century, Asia has experienced rapid urbanization. It is now home to over half of the world's most populated cities. By 2010, the urban population in the Asia-Pacific region has surpassed the population of the United States and the European Union combined. In this course, we will focus on cities in East, Southeast and South Asia. We will first contextualize the rapid urbanization in the region's changing political economy, and identify urban issues that are unique to this region. We will further explore different theoretical approaches to understand Asian cities; several of them challenge mainstream urban theories rooted in the experiences of West European and North American cities. Upon the completion of this course, students will acquire substantive knowledge on contemporary trends of urban development in Asia, and develop familiarity with related ongoing theoretical debates. In addition, students will conduct individual research projects to develop deeper and more concrete understanding of the contemporary urbanization processes in Asia.

General Education Requirements:
Writing WA
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Social science

Course Materials

This course's main goal is to introduce evidence of the major crimes and atrocities during World War II in East Asia such as the Nanjing Massacre, biochemical warfare (Unit 731), the military sexual slavery ("comfort women") system, the forced labor system, and inhumane treatment of POWs. The course will also help students understand the contemporary geo-political and socio-economic forces that affect how East Asians and Westerners collectively remember and reconstruct World War II.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials

This course develops a critical awareness of the practice of Chinese-English translation as a cross-cultural dialogue. It critically examines major concepts and issues such as equivalence, faithfulness, invisibility, etc., and evaluates their larger cultural and ideological implications. Students will learn theories of translation and do hands-on practice in translation. Prerequisite: CHIN 305 or equivalent.

General Education Requirements:
Internationalism

Distribution Requirements:
Humanities

Course Materials