Department of Asian Studies

Asian Studies Courses

ARAB 452: Imagining Palestine, Yaqub,TR 3:30-4:45
The creation and maintenance of the idea of a modern-day Palestine has been one of the striking achievements of Palestinian imaginative work. This seminar will explore the notion of Palestine as it is presented in Palestinian writings, films, art, and folk practices. We will explore what Palestine is for the Palestinians, none of whom have lived in a Palestinian state and many of whom have spent more time in exile than in the land that has been known historically as Palestine; how Palestinian relationships to and expectations of Palestine may have changed over time; and how Palestinian portrayals of their dreamed-of homeland have affected our own perceptions of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and of the Arab World generally. A&S Non-Western/Comparative perspective.

ASIA 56: Writing Women in Modern China, Visser, TR 2:00-3:15
In “liberating” China from its traditional cultural practices, Chairman Mao denounced the oppression of women by famously declaring that “women hold up half the sky.” One of the Communist Party’s achievements was its elevation of women. As China embraces a new market economy, however, women may be losing ground. This seminar compares the rhetoric of equality between the sexes presented by late Qing, May Fourth, and communist thinkers to perspectives by women writers. We examine how several generations of women reconciled themselves to – and resisted – the expectations of women under Confucianism, Communism, and Capitalism in the twentieth century. The central questions governing this course are what do women wish to liberate themselves from, how do they enact this, and toward what end? How do we define liberation in relation to gender, and how does/do writing women give expression to these desires for freedom? LA, BN.

ASIA 89: India through the Lens of Master Filmmakers, Lothspeich, TR 11:00-12:15 & W 6:30-9:30
Many people know that India is famous for its extravagant Bollywood musicals with elaborate song-and-dance routines. But few know that there is also a tradition of great art films set in India! In this course students will have the opportunity to experience some of these art films by master filmmakers including Satyajit Ray, Guru Dutt, Ismail Merchant/James Ivory, and Deepa Mehta. We will use film as an entry to explore important themes in South Asian culture and history over the past 200 years. At the same time, we will utilize film theory to enhance our ability to 'read' the text of films. Some of the themes to be discussed in the course include Gandhi's nationalist movement, gender relations, Hindi-Urdu language debates, village life, the impact of modernity, and Hindu goddesses.

ASIA 147: Lost in Translation: Understanding Western Experience in East & Southeast Asia, Gold, TR 3:30-4:45
This course will examine the experiences, perceptions, and motivations of western travelers to East and Southeast Asia, focusing primarily on the present-day. There has been a long-standing fascination of the American public with books (Anna and the King of Siam, Shogun) and movies (The Last Samurai, Lost in Translation, Seven Years in Tibet) detailing the experiences of Westerners in Asia. The most common themes include images of the mysterious and exotic Orient; a land that is so vastly different as to be impenetrable to “western outsiders,” or a backwards place which is fundamentally changed by the western visitor who himself is embarking on a mission of self-discovery. How realistic or useful are these images? While they may make for good entertainment, in a more practical sense, do they accurately influence us in our own interactions with and perceptions about Asia? Through analyzing accounts in print and film, both fictional and non-fictional, historical and modern, we hope to gain a clearer perspective about travelers' experiences in Asia. Students will participate actively through class discussion, group projects, two exams, and a term paper. LA, BN, GL. [GC Non-Western/Comparative perspective; Cultural Diversity requirement.]

ASIA 150: Asia: An Introduction, Hewison, TR 11-12:15, recitation required W 1:00-1:50
Asia, seen in broad geographic terms, can be seen to stretch from the Red Sea in the west to Japan in the east and from Indonesia in the south to Mongolia, in the north. In cultural, religious, historical, economic and political terms, this vast region exhibits huge diversity. At the same time, the region has been challenged and influenced by a range of global forces that are critical for understanding the ways in which Asian societies have been shaped while still exhibiting a fascinating diversity as global meets local. This course seeks to introduce student to the forces that have shaped Asia – amongst others, imperialism, colonialism, orientalism, and neoliberalism – and to locate these within particular Asian responses and interactions.
COURSE OBJECTIVES: This course has 4 objectives. They encourage students to develop:
1. an introductory understanding of the social, cultural, linguistic, economic and political developments that have shaped Asian societies and states;
2. an awareness of a range of important intellectual debates and issues shaping contemporary Asia;
3. an enhanced ability to collect and sort relevant and reliable information and data regarding Asia; and
4. a developing ability to research topics and provide succinct and critical presentations of topics on Asia.
SS, BN, GL.

ASIA 490-001: The Mahabharata: Remembered, Reimagined, Performed, Lothspeich, TR 3:30-4:45
This course starts from the premise that India's great epic, the Mahabharata, is a living text, or more appropriately, a network of living texts, which are still read, witnessed, and experienced today in South Asia and beyond. We will begin with the classical tradition, engaging with the Sanskrit critical edition of the Mahabharata as well as several classical Sanskrit plays based on the epic—all in English translation, of course. Reading a convenient English abridgement of the Mahabharata will help students navigate these classical sources. In the latter half of the course, we will consider the legacy of the epic in modern India—in folk performances, on television and in film, and in twentieth-century literature by famous Indian writers. Some of the topics to be considered in the course include the meaning of dharma, the ethics of war, Krishna's battlefield sermon (The Bhagavad-Gita), epic heroines, epic loss and suffering, destiny and free will, and the significance of the Mahabharata to the contemporary world.
* This is a 3-credit course. When you enroll, you will have to specify the credit hours; make it 3.

ASIA 490-002: Japanese Popular Culture, Driscoll, M 6:00-8:30
This course will explore Japanese popular culture from 1980 – 2000. Students will be introduced to the major figures in global Japanese image culture like Shinji and Hello Kitty together with the most important social subjectivities in urban Japan (otaku; freeter; Goth Lolita). We will try to analyze these figures and subjectivities using the contemporary methodologies of postcolonial studies; queer theory; and Marxism. In other words, the class will focus on the shameless enjoyment of J-pop artifacts like toys and animation as we try to deconstruct our consumerist enjoyment of these commodities through the most exciting and challenging methodologies in contemporary theory. The class will be divided up into three sections: 1. Japanese animation and toys; 2. Contemporary Japanese literature; and, 3. History, Sociology, and Political Economy of postmodern and postcolonial Japan.
* This is a 3-credit course. When you enroll, you will have to specify the credit hours; make it 3.

ASIA 490-003: Israeli Cinema: Nation, Gender, & Ethnicity, Shemer, MW 3:00-4:15 and film screenings W 4:30-6:30
The official Zionist discourse of the past often foresaw the creation of an egalitarian immigrant society whose subjects’ exilic ethnicities and identities will give way to the Israeli melting pot collective. Israeli Cinema: Nation, Gender, and Ethnicity will examine the filmic construction of Israeli national identity. Problematizing “national cinema” will allow us to assess critically the suppression of challenging dilemmas in public discourse and, concomitantly, the relegation to the country’s socio-cultural margins certain subaltern groups in the process of forming a national identity in the early years of Israeli cinema. Specifically, we will study how filmic address of gender and ethnicity was subtended by the hegemonic Zionist-national ethos. Yet, with the recent emergence of identity politics, a phenomenon marked by the determination of various groups to vie for the power to represent and be present in the cultural and political public arena and to promote primarily their own causes, contemporary Israeli cinema has challenged those hitherto prevalent ideological creeds. The class will explore the modes of expression by which contemporary Israeli films often depict a multifaceted and conflicted nascent society where “Israeliness” and national identity become ever more elusive.
 Fifteen full-length films and several documentaries and shorts will be screened in class.
 All films have English subtitles.
 Knowledge of Hebrew or Arabic is not required.
Grading:
 Class presentation (10%)
 Reaction papers (15%)
 Term paper (20%)
 Critical film reviews (20%)
 Participation (15%)
 Final exam (20%)
* This is a 3-credit course. When you enroll, you will have to specify the credit hours; make it 3.

ASIA 691H: Senior Honors Thesis, Bardsley, MW 4:30-5:45, permission required
This seminar has been especially designed as a required course for students writing a senior honors thesis in the Department of Asian Studies. Students will learn about all aspects of writing a thesis including selecting a topic, finding sources, writing short funding proposals, using electronic tools for citation, and organizing chapters. We will also discuss the ethics, goals, and controversies involved in doing research on Asia in the U.S. and consider the various forms that academic writing can take. Weekly writing assignments as well as peer and instructor responses to students’ writing will ensure that students make steady progress on their thesis. Guest speakers will acquaint students with the many resources on campus that can aid them in their research as well as speak to contemporary issues in intellectual inquiry. This seminar will also prepare students to look ahead to campus presentations of their research in the spring and to publication opportunities. This seminar brings together a small group of highly motivated students who will share strategies, successes, challenges, and fun as they begin working on their first in-depth research project.

CHIN 252: Chinese Culture through Narrative, Henry, MWF 3:00-3:50
The object of the course is to show how Chinese historical legends define and transmit the values, concepts, figures of speech, and modes of behavior that constitute Chinese culture. The core material consists of forty or so historical narratives that collectively represent all phases of Chinese civilization prior to this century. The job of the student is to master this body of narrative, which means remembering the broad outlines of the stories and learning how to relate them to each other; in other words, finding ways of answering such questions as: What motifs occur again and again in the legends? How do the legends evolve over time? How do the values and concepts embodied in the legends evolve over time? The course material is all contained in class presentations and in two course anthologies: "Readings in Chinese Historical Legend," Vols. 1 and 2, available in the coursepack division of the textbook department. The course includes two short papers, two midterms, and a final examination. LA, WB, BN. [GC Non-Western/Comparative perspective].

CHIN 361: Chinese Traditional Theater, Hsiao, MW 4:00-5:15
This course surveys the history of Chinese traditional theater from its early days to modern period. The course material will include texts, dance, and music which are the essential features in traditional operatic theater. The traditional theater of China represents a crucial intersection of many elements within the culture. Theatrical texts include prose, poetry, and illustration, while performance is enlivened by music and dance. During the Ming era especially, drama culture reached beyond the theatre to embrace a huge constituency of readers, importantly influencing the development of the publishing industry. We thus need to draw together poetry, prose, criticism, music, dance, art, and history to develop a clear picture of traditional Chinese drama. In class we will examine performance footage, visual art and dramatic texts. Knowledge of the Chinese language is not a requirement. VP, WB, BN. [A&S Aesthetic perspective.]

HNRS 355: Arabs and the West: Myths and Realities, Amer, TR 2:00-3:15
This interdisciplinary course will question some of the most common Western (European and American) misconceptions of the Arab Islamic world, particularly the enduring association between Arabs and Muslims on the one hand and violence and eroticism on the other. We will focus in particular on the following questions: Why have images of the Oriental despot, the terrorist, the harem or the veil become such powerful modes of structuring the Arab Islamic world? What ideological and economic power structures have contributed to the development and persistence of such stereotypes throughout the centuries? What key literary, artistic and cultural works has the West produced to express both its attraction to and fear of the Orient? In addition to uncovering some of most persistent Western myths about the Arab world, we will examine some of the forgotten "realities" of Arabs and Muslims. We will discuss in particular some of the key contributions of the Arab Islamic world to Western civilization, and we will analyze a selection of literary and artistic compositions by Arab authors in response to Western stereotypes. Rather than uncovering a "clash of civilizations," these counter-narratives will provide us with an alternative literary history through which to view the great diversity of the Arab world and to appreciate the complex relations between the Arab world and the West today.
Note: This course is open to Honors students, and Asian Studies majors with departmental permission. It cannot be taken by students who have previously taken ASIA 51 or ASIA/INTS/FREN 451.
This course will count as a Humanities for Asian Studies interdisciplinary majors, and as a content course for Arabic majors.

JAPN 381: Women and Work in Japan, Bardsley, MW 3:00-4:15
This course explores the often contradictory meanings attached to “women’s work” in modern and contemporary Japan. Among the issues we examine are increasing opportunities in paid employment as well as barriers to promotion; leisure activities; sexuality, reproductive rights, and motherhood; feminist activism; immigration and international marriages; and women in Japanese politics. We also learn about how ideas of "women's work" have been variously shaped through Japanese law, United Nations initiatives, fashion magazines, novels, film and television, and manga comics. Presentations by guest speakers offer comparisons with women's work in the U.S. Students in this course can expect lots of reading and discussion. Your term research project will involve the preparation of an annotated bibliography on some aspect of women's lives in Japan. Past projects have focused on teachers, artists, poets, farmers, medical workers, and issues such as crime, retirement policies, parental leave, sexual violence, prostitution, consumer movements, youth fashion, and reproductive rights. The instructor, Jan Bardsley, developed this class as a study abroad course in Japan and has taught it several times at Carolina. BN, SS [A&S Non-Western/Comparative perspective].

JAPN 408-001: Japanese Journalism (4th year Japanese), Aratake, MW 3:00-4:15
This creative course uses many kinds of news items--newspapers, internet, TV news shows--to advance students' Japanese skills as they learn about contemporary events and issues in Japan. Conversation, writing exercises, and presentations give students lots of opportunity to speak Japanese and talk about what they are learning.

ART/ASIA 153: Introduction to South Asian Art, Ghosh, MW 1:00-1:50, recitation required
An introductory survey of the visual arts of Asia, including arts of India, China and Japan.
VP, WB, BN.

ART/ASIA 154: Introduction to Islamic Art, Anderson, TR 12:30-1:45, recitation required This course introduces medieval Islamic civilization through its rich and diverse art and architectural traditions. Following a chronological framework organized by political dynasty and region, we will begin with the seventh-century establishment of the early Islamic empire, which stretched from the Mediterranean to the borders of South Asia, and end with the sixteenth-century expansion of the so-called Gunpowder Empires in present-day Turkey, Iran, and South Asia. By the end of the course students will understand the general socio-historical contexts within which Islamicate art and architecture developed, know the major dynasties of the pre-modern Islamic lands, and be able to identify the canon of Islamic art and architecture. Course requirements include quizzes and three short papers. Basic art historical methods and writing, critical reading, and humanities research skills will be emphasized throughout the term. VP, WB, BN.

CMPL/ASIA 483: Cross-Currents in East-West Literature, Brodey, TR 12:30-1:45
Rudyard Kipling once wrote that “East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.” This course studies ways in which this statement is and is not true.
In this course we will look at ways in which Japanese culture has been represented in European and American literature, as well as how European and American culture has been represented in Japan. The readings will include novels, drama, short stories, a play, and an opera, all in English translation. We will familiarize ourselves with concepts of orientalism, occidentalism, and self-orientalism.
The First Part of the course will begin with Oliver Goldsmith’s Citizen of the World and John Long’s Madame Butterfly as examples of British and American forms of orientalism: not imitating specific Eastern texts, but instead using a generalized (and frequently historically inaccurate) conception of “the East” for literary and political purposes. We will also follow the trajectory of “Madame Butterfly” into David Hwang’s M. Butterfly and contemporary cinema.
Part Two features literary examples of Japanese interpretation and adaptation of Western literature, including pairings of Japanese and European texts: Natsume Sôseki’s Kokoro with J.W. Goethe’s Sorrows of Young Werther, Mori Ogai’s Maihime with Hans Christian Andersen’s The Steadfast Tin Soldier, as well as Jun’ichiro Tanizaki’s Naomi and Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion.
Part Three features a variety of transmutations, where influence is multi-directional, including Yukio Mishima’s “The Egg,” Kazuo Ishiguro’s An Artist of the Floating World, and Tanizaki’s Some Prefer Nettles.
Students will take a midterm exam, write a final research paper, and make one or two formal class presentations. LA, BN.

GEOG/ASIA 265: Eastern Asia, Palis, MWF 2:00-2:50
Spatial structure of population, urbanization, agriculture, industrialization, and regional links in China, Japan, and Korea.

HIST/ASIA 135: South Asian History to 1750, Saikia, TR 11:00-12:15
Social, cultural, and political history of the south Asian subcontinent (popularly known as the Indian subcontinent), from classical times to the pivotal encounter with the British. HS, WB, BN.

HIST/ASIA/PWAD 275: History of Iraq, Shields, TR 2:00-3:15, recitation required
History of Iraq from ancient times to the present.

HIST/ASIA 286: Samurai, Peasant, Merchant, and Outcaste: Japan Under the Tokugawa, 1550-1850, Botsman, MWF 10:00-10:50
This class offers an introduction to the history of the Japanese archipelago in the age of the Tokugawa shoguns (warrior lords). Sometimes referred to as Japan’s “early modern” era, it was in this period that samurai rule reached its highest level of sophistication, the workings of a dynamic commercial economy began to permeate all aspects of society, and much of what we now think of as “traditional” Japanese culture was created. This was the era, in other words, in which the foundations of modern Japanese society were laid. Yet, there are many aspects of Tokugawa history that cannot be understood in terms of what came later, and which are all the more fascinating because they have been radically transformed, discarded, or simply forgotten, by the modern world. Journeying along the great highways of the period to communities ranging in size from small villages to the largest cities in the pre-industrial world, students will be introduced to men and women from all stations of life, and encouraged to develop their own view of the structures, tensions, and events that shaped Japanese society over these three centuries. Specific topics will include: the bloody battles of the “warring states” period; the changing role of samurai in an era of peace; the persecution of Christianity; women’s place in society; the rise of great merchant houses, such as Mitsui and Sumitomo; the vibrant world of Tokugawa popular culture; crime and punishment under samurai rule; patterns of discrimination and the situation of social outcastes; peasant rebellion and resistance; and the rich legacy of social and political thought generated by Tokugawa-era thinkers. HS, WB, BN.

RELI/ASIA 180: Introduction to Islamic Civilization, Ernst, TR 11:00-12:15
A broad, comprehensive, and interdisciplinary introduction to the traditional civilization of the Muslim world. HS, WB, BN.

RELI/ASIA 583: Religion & Culture in Iran, 1500-present, Safi, TR 12:30-1:45
Iran from the rise of the Safavid empire to the Islamic Republic. Topics include Shi'ism, politics, intellectual and sectarian movements, encounters with colonialism, art and architecture, music, literature.
HS, WB, BN.

RELI/ASIA 681: Readings in Islamicate Literatures, Ernst, W 10:00-12:45
Prerequisite, permission of instructor. Study of selected religious, literary, and historical texts in Persian.

ANTH 578: Chinese Diaspora in the Asia Pacific, Nonini, TR 2:00-3:15
Examination of the histories, social organization and cultures of the Chinese diasporas in the Asia Pacific region, focusing on contemporary issues in the cultural politics and identities of "overseas Chinese."

ART 390-001: Art of East Asia, TR 3:30-4:45
Introduces history of art and architecture in premodern East Asia through five thematic topics: art of ritual, art of nirvana, art of narration, art of nature, and art of power. Each of these topics informs students of major forms and theories of artistic creation throughout history, while emphasizing the interaction, transmision, and adaptation of artistic production and consumption across East Asia.

ART 490-003: Visual Culture in Modern China, Lin, TR 9:00-11:50
This course investigates how modern China was constructed visually from the first Chinese Opium War (1839-42) to the present day. Students will study visual images not only as an important cultural production, but also one that is produced in an interaction between modern media, institutions, politics, and socio-cultural changes in modern China. A wide range of visual materials will be introduced with a focus on questions about the ways in which a Chinese identity was defined and redefined in the context of its own modernization.

ECON 463: International Economics, MWF 2:00-2:50
Prerequisite, ECON 360 or permission of instructor. This course examines the fundamental principles of international economics from the perspective of the private business firm. Rather than begin with abstract theory, the course will work with case studies of individual firms as they choose to (or are forced to) compete in an international marketplace. SS, GL.

ENGL 360: Contemporary Asian American Literature, Ho, TR 12:30-1:45
This course will provide an introduction to contemporary Asian American literature and theory and examine how Asian American literature fits into, yet extends beyond, the canon of American literature.

HIST 393-003, Cultural Encounters: Travel Writing from the 18th to 20th Centuries, King, T 2:00-4:50
This course will focus broadly on the theme of cultural encounters, as depicted in European and American travel writing from the 18th-20th centuries. Though our examples will be drawn from American and British travel writing on the Middle East, Asia and Africa in earlier centuries, the ideas we will explore in this seminar will resonate with intercultural dynamics in the present. The following questions will animate our course: How, why and in what modes have Westerners written about foreign lands and cultures? How does one’s situation and motivation for travel influence what one sees or records? Do accounts written by Western missionaries, adventurers, scientists or traders differ from each other? What about accounts written by women travelers? How have travel writings by Westerners shaped historical understandings of foreign people and places?
* Permission required; contact Wanda Wallace in the History office.

HIST 393-004, Gandhi and Non-Violence, Saikia, R 2:00-4:50
This course provides an introduction to Gandhi and the Gandhian political philosophy and practice of nonviolence in India’s freedom struggle against British colonialism The goal is to engage various genealogies of nonviolence and Gandhi’s practice of nonviolence politics for ending colonial rule in India and to establish an initial frame for understanding the historians’ craft by examining different approaches to Gandhi.
* Permission required; contact Wanda Wallace in the History office.

HIST 490-001, Research in Japanese History, Botsman, T 3:30-6:20
This class aims to provide students with an introduction to the challenges and pleasures of exploring Japanese history using Japanese reference works and original sources. At the beginning of the semester we will concentrate on learning how to use various kinds of basic reference works, including historical dictionaries, collections of historical maps, guides to place names, and language dictionaries that can help students read older Japanese materials. After this we will gradually move on to the more challenging task of reading historical documents in Japanese. By the end of the semester it is hoped that students will be ready to begin grappling with documents written in "Sōrō-bun", the so-called epistolary style, which is particularly important for studying the social history of Japan in the Tokugawa and Meiji periods. Students with interests in particular topics will also be encouraged to try and find materials to read that are relevant to those topics. Although the focus will be on history, the skills taught in the class will be useful for students interested in any aspect of Japan before 1945 and will help deepen student's appreciation of the richness of both Japanese language and society.
* This course will count as an advanced language course for the Japanese major or minor. .Prerequisite is JAPN 306 or instructor's permission.

SOCI 419: Sociology of the Islamic World, Kurzman, TR 2:00-3:15
This course examines the diversity and distinctiveness of Muslim societies around the world, with special attention to sociological issues of colonialism, ideological debates, religious authorities, civil society, gender, and transnational flows of people, products and ideas. This fall the course is scheduled to participate in on-line student-to-student discussions with universities in the Middle East.
SS, BN.