* EAST 0320b / HIST 0430b, Tokyo  Daniel Botsman

Four centuries of Japan's history explored through the many incarnations, destructions, and rebirths of its foremost city. Focus on the solutions found by Tokyo's residents to the material and social challenges of concentrating such a large population in one place. Tensions between continuity and impermanence, authenticity and modernity, and social order and the culture of play. Enrollment limited to first-year students.   WR, HU
TTh 1:05pm-2:20pm

* EAST 0401b / HSAR 0016b, Chinese Painting and Culture  Quincy Ngan

This course focuses on important works of Chinese painting and major painters from the fourth century CE to the twentieth century. Through close readings of the pictorial contents and production contexts of such works of art, this course investigates the works’ formats, meanings, and innovations from social, historical, and art-historical perspectives. In this course, students become familiar with the traditional Chinese world and acquire the knowledge necessary to be an informed viewer of Chinese painting. Discussions of religion, folkloric beliefs, literature, relationships between men and women, the worship of mountains, the laments of scholars, and the tastes of emperors and wealthy merchants also allow students to understand the cultural roots of contemporary China.  Enrollment limited to first-year students.   HU
MW 2:35pm-3:50pm

EAST 2201b / EALL 2190b / HUMS 2140b / PHIL 1119b / RLST 1710b, Introduction to Chinese Philosophy  Lucas Bender

This course represents an introduction to the most important philosophical thinkers and texts in Chinese history, ranging from roughly 500 BC–1500 AD. Topics include ethics, political philosophy, epistemology, and ontology. We discuss the basic works of Confucian and Daoist philosophers during the Warring States and early imperial eras, the continuation of these traditions in early medieval “dark learning,” Buddhist philosophy (in its original Indian context, the early period of its spread to China, and in mature Chinese Buddhist schools such as Chan/Zen), and Neo-Confucian philosophy. The course emphasizes readings in the original texts of the thinkers and traditions in question (all in English translation). No knowledge of Chinese or previous contact with Chinese philosophy required.  HU  0 Course cr
MW 10:30am-11:20am

EAST 2202a / CHNS 2000a / EALL 2000a / HUMS 4527a, The Chinese Tradition  Staff

An introduction to the literature, culture, and thought of premodern China, from the beginnings of the written record to the turn of the twentieth century. Close study of textual and visual primary sources, with attention to their historical and cultural backdrops. Students enrolled in CHNS 200 join a weekly Mandarin-language discussion section. No knowledge of Chinese required for students enrolled in EALL 200. Students enrolled in CHNS 200 must have L5 proficiency in Mandarin or permission of the course instructor.  HU  0 Course cr
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EAST 2302b / HIST 1407b, The Making of Japan's Great Peace, 1550–1850  Fabian Drixler

Examination of how, after centuries of war in Japan and overseas, the Tokugawa shogunate built a peace that lasted more than 200 years. Japan's urban revolution, the eradication of Christianity, the Japanese discovery of Europe, and the question of whether Tokugawa Japan is a rare example of a complex and populous society that achieved ecological sustainability.  HU  0 Course cr
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EAST 2403b / HSAR 3305b, Time in Chinese Art  Quincy Ngan

This class explores the theme of “time” in Chinese art from the traditional to the contemporary period. Drawing upon scholarship on Chinese philosophical understanding of time and clockworks, this course explores how art made manifest notions of the future, past, and present, the passage of time, ksana, aeons, eternity and deadlines. This class also investigates manipulations of time—how the unique format, artistic ideas and medium and materials of Chinese art helped to pause, rewind, compress and shorten time. Observing such temporalities, we analyze narrative murals and handscrolls, “this life” v. afterlife in funeral art, paintings of immortality, the significance of bronze corrosion in antiquarianism, uses of the past in traditional Chinese painting and contemporary art, the future and agelessness in movies and digital art, the materiality and nostalgia of old photography and time-based artworks, as well as the history of People’s Republic of China as presented at the Tian’anmen Square.  HU  0 Course cr
MW 10:30am-11:20am

* EAST 2521a / PLSC 2433a, Japanese Politics and Foreign Policy  Charles McClean

This class introduces students to 13 important puzzles about contemporary Japanese politics and foreign policy, discusses various ways in which scholars have attempted to solve these puzzles, and suggests pathways for future research. Together, we seek to explain policy outcomes across a wide range of topics, including constitutional revision, defense, economic growth, energy, gender, immigration, income inequality, population aging, territorial disputes, and trade. In the process, we learn (1) the important actors in Japanese politics (e.g., voters, politicians, parties, bureaucrats, and firms); (2) the positions that different actors take with respect to various policies, as well as the sources of these policy preferences; and (3) how political institutions block or enhance the representation of these actors’ interests.  SO
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

EAST 2721a / GLBL 3303a / SOCY 1702a, Inequality and Social Change in China  Emma Zang

This course offers an introduction to major social and economic issues in contemporary China. It provides a survey of the ongoing reforms and the Chinese society in transition with a focus on selected policy issues. In most weeks, the first session is reserved for a lecture by the instructor or a guest lecturer, and the second session is reserved for student-led discussions of pre-circulated questions.  SO
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* EAST 3121a / ANTH 1813a, Contemporary Japan and the Ghosts of Modernity  Yukiko Koga

This course introduces students to contemporary Japan, examining how its defeat in the Second World War and loss of empire in 1945 continue to shape Japanese culture and society. Looking especially at the sphere of cultural production, it focuses on the question of what it means to be modern as expressed through the tension between resurgent neonationalism and the aspiration to internationalize. The course charts how the legacy of Japan’s imperial failure plays a significant role in its search for renewal and identity since 1945. How, it asks, does the experience of catastrophic failure—and failure to account for that failure—play into continued aspirations for modernity today? How does Japanese society wrestle with modernity’s two faces: its promise for progress and its history of catastrophic violence? The course follows the trajectory of Japan’s postwar nation-state development after the dissolution of empire, from its resurrection out of the ashes after defeat, to its identity as a US ally and economic superpower during the Cold War, to decades of recession since the 1990s and the search for new relations with its neighbors and new reckonings with its own imperial violence and postwar inactions against the background of rising neonationalism.  HU, SO
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 3122a / ANTH 4824a / ANTH 5824a, Politics of Memory  Yukiko Koga

This course explores the role of memory as a social, cultural, and political force in contemporary society. How societies remember difficult pasts has become a contested site for negotiating the present. Through the lens of memory, we examine complex roles that our relationships to difficult pasts play in navigating issues we face today. This course explores this politics of memory that takes place in the realm of popular culture and public space. The class asks such questions as: How do you represent difficult and contested pasts? What does it mean to enable long-silenced victims’ voices to be heard? What are the consequences of re-narrating the past by highlighting past injuries and trauma? Does memory work heal or open wounds of a society and a nation? Through examples drawn from the Holocaust, the atomic bombing in Hiroshima, the Vietnam War, genocide in Indonesia and massacres in Lebanon, to debates on confederacy statues, slavery, and lynching in the US, this course approaches these questions through an anthropological exploration of concepts such as memory, trauma, mourning, silence, voice, testimony, and victimhood.  HU, SO
M 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 3204b / EALL 2050b / EVST 2205 / HSAR 4477b / HUMS 1810b, The Culture of Landscape in China  Pauline Lin

An introduction to Chinese philosophical, poetic, and visual explorations of landscape and the changing relationship between human beings and nature. Through texts, archaeological materials, visual and material culture, and garden designs from the 2nd c. BCE to modern times, we learn about the Chinese conception of the world, relationship to and experiences in nature, and shaping of the land through agriculture, imperial parks, and garden designs. We conclude with contemporary environmental issues confronting China, and how contemporary parks can help regenerate our ecosystem.  HU
F 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 3222a / EALL 3000a, Sinological Methods  Pauline Lin

A research course designed for graduate and advanced undergraduate students working on early, imperial or modern China in preparation for their theses. Students use their own research topic as a focus to explore and utilize the wealth of primary sources and tools available in China, Japan, and the West. As a group, we learn about the history of Chinese book collecting, classification of knowledge, the compilation of the encyclopedia Gujin tushu jicheng and the canon Siku quanshu, as well as the darker aspects of censorship from ancient times to the present. For native speakers of Chinese, the course includes secondary literature in English and instruction in professional writing in English about China. Other topics include Chinese bibliographies, bibliophiles’ notes, specialized dictionaries, maps and geographical gazetteers, textual editions, genealogies and biographical sources, archaeological and visual materials, major Chinese encyclopedias, compendia, and databases, and evaluating variations and reliability, The course is supplemented by materials from the Beinecke rare books collection. Prerequisite: CHNS 171 or equivalent. Formerly CHNS 202.   HU
F 9:25am-11:20am

* EAST 3250a / CPLT 3003a / EALL 2880a / RSEE 316 / RSEE 3316a / RUSS 3316a, Socialist '80s: Aesthetics of Reform in China and the Soviet Union  Jinyi Chu

This course offers an interdisciplinary introduction to the study of the complex cultural and political paradigms of late socialism from a transnational perspective by focusing on the literature, cinema, and popular culture of the Soviet Union and China in 1980s. How were intellectual and everyday life in the Soviet Union and China distinct from and similar to that of the West of the same era? How do we parse “the cultural logic of late socialism?” What can today’s America learn from it? Examining two major socialist cultures together in a global context, this course queries the ethnographic, ideological, and socio-economic constituents of late socialism. Students analyze cultural materials in the context of Soviet and Chinese history. Along the way, we explore themes of identity, nationalism, globalization, capitalism, and the Cold War. Students with knowledge of Russian and Chinese are encouraged to read in original languages. All readings are available in English.   WR, HU
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 3322b / HIST 3402b, Korea and the Japanese Empire in Critical Contexts  Hannah Shepherd

This course addresses critical moments of contact, conflict, and connection in the modern histories of Korea and Japan. Each week our discussion and readings focus on a specific event, before looking at the wider contexts involved and historical debates they have produced. This is not a comparative study of the histories of the different countries, but a chance to focus on themes—nationalism, colonial oppression, collaboration, war, identity—which continue to shape both relations between Japan, South Korea and North Korea, and the work of historians today.  WR, HU
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* EAST 3603a / RLST 3265a, Buddhism Through Storytelling and Narratives  Marta Sanvido

This seminar explores how stories have shaped Buddhist traditions from India to Japan, while also engaging contemporary examples from North American Buddhism. Together, we will examine how narratives function as vehicles for teaching, ethical reflection, and religious practice. Students will develop tools for interpreting a wide range of genres—including hagiographies, miracle tales, visual narratives, women’s stories, autobiographies, and autofiction—across diverse Buddhist traditions and historical periods. Students interested in working with Japanese-language materials are encouraged to contact the instructor directly.  HU
Th 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 3621a / EALL 2960a / RLST 1210a, Religion and Culture in Korea  Hwansoo Kim

Introduction to Shamanism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism, Christianity, and new religions in Korea from ancient times to the present. Examination of religious traditions in close relationships with social, economic, political, and cultural environments in Korean society. Examination of religious tensions, philosophical arguments, and ethical issues that indigenous and foreign religions in Korea have engaged throughout history to maximize their influence in Korean society.   HU
Th 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 4220a / EALL 234, Japanese Detective Fiction  Luciana Sanga

This class offers an overview of modern Japanese literature with a focus on detective fiction. Through detective fiction we can examine key concepts in literature such as narrative voice, point of view, genre, modernism and postmodernism, and learn about debates in Japanese literature, the distinction between highbrow and popular fiction, and the relation between Japanese literature and translated fiction. Detective fiction also allows for the exploration of key issues in Japanese history and society such as consumerism, colonialism, class, gender, and sexuality. Readings include a wide range of texts by canonical and popular writers, as well as theoretical texts on genre and detective fiction. All texts are available in English and no prior knowledge of Japanese or Japan is needed.  HU
F 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 4602a / RLST 2290a, Good Life, Care, and Ethics in Buddhism  Marta Sanvido

In this course, we will explore ethical issues in Buddhism across a wide range of contexts and time periods. Together, we will examine how Buddhism addresses fundamental moral and ethical questions, such as: How should I behave? What are the implications of my actions? What is good and bad? How can we bridge the gap between knowing what is right and acting accordingly? The course is divided into two parts. In the first part, we will explore foundational topics in Buddhist ethics, focusing on themes such as retribution, precepts, the Bodhisattva’s path, meditation, and the role of feelings. The second part centers on Buddhism’s responses to contemporary ethical issues, including abortion, gender, race, and environmental ethics. This course integrates both the theory and practice of ethics. The structure and assignments are designed to help you engage with theoretical systems that may differ from those you are familiar with, while also applying these abstract ideas to reflect on the relationship between theory and practice.  HU
Th 9:25am-11:20am

* EAST 4720a / ER&M 1611a / SOCY 3425a, Migration in East Asia and Beyond  Angela McClean

Over the past few decades, East Asia has become a new destination region for migrants, the phenomenon of which is continuing to cause fierce public and political discussions on national identity and immigration and integration policies. This course explores various types, debates, and industries of migration in contemporary East Asia. While we focus largely on Japan and South Korea, we also have an opportunity to discuss migrant experiences in other popular destination and origin countries in Asia including China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Taiwan. Starting with the major theories and concepts in international migration, we examine East Asian migration regimes, connections between migration and high- and low-skilled labor, gender, co-ethnics, and families, as well as state, public, and civil society responses to migration.  SO
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

* EAST 4721a / SOCY 3470a, Power, Exclusion and Resistance in South Korea  Angela McClean

South Korea is often perceived as a socially and culturally homogeneous country, yet – like any society – it encompasses a complex landscape of diversity and experiences of exclusion. This course examines the processes of political and social exclusion in South Korea, analyzing the systematic forces, such as patriarchy, nationalism, racism, and capitalism, that produce marginalization. It also explores how populations affected by such forces, including women, migrants, and LGBTQ+ communities, navigate and contest their impacts. Ultimately, this course challenges students to critically inspect how power operates in Korean society by exploring the experiences of exclusion and marginalization, as well as the possibilities and limits of resistance. While the primary focus is on contemporary issues, the course also considers their historical roots, using theoretical readings and case studies to explore both past and present dynamics.  SO
Th 9:25am-11:20am

* EAST 4722b / SOCY 3402b, Politics and Society in South Korea  Angela McClean

In this course, students are introduced to twelve major themes that illuminate the politics and society of contemporary South Korea. Each theme takes up a complex issue or phenomenon that has shaped or continues to shape South Korea today, ranging from its rapid economic transformation and democratic consolidation to relations with North Korea, social inequality, and demographic “crisis.” Each week’s topic is framed as a set of puzzles that guide critical inquiry and interpretation. Through lectures, readings, and discussions, students explore diverse scholarly approaches to these puzzles and gain a comprehensive perspective on the complexities of South Korean politics and society.  SO
W 9:25am-11:20am

* EAST 4890a or b, Independent Study  Lucas Bender

For students with advanced Chinese, Japanese, or Korean language skills who wish to pursue a close study of the East Asia region, not otherwise covered by departmental offerings. May be used for research, a special project, or a substantial research paper under faculty supervision. A term paper or its equivalent and regular meetings with an adviser are required. Ordinarily only one term may be offered toward the major or for credit toward the degree. Permission to enroll requires submission of a detailed project proposal, signed by the adviser, by the end of the first week of classes and its approval by the director of undergraduate studies.
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EAST 4900a or b, One-Term Senior Essay  Lucas Bender

Preparation of a one-term senior essay under the guidance of a faculty adviser. Students must receive the prior agreement of the director of undergraduate studies and of the faculty member who will serve as the senior essay adviser. Students must arrange to meet with that adviser on a regular basis throughout the term.
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* EAST 4910a and EAST 4920b, Senior Research Project  Lucas Bender

Two-term directed research project under the supervision of a ladder faculty member. Students should write essays using materials in East Asian languages when possible. Essays should be based on primary material, whether in an East Asian language or English. Summary of secondary material is not acceptable. Credit for EAST 491 only on completion of EAST 492.  ½ Course cr per term
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