G387/G200 Contemporary China (internet sections)

Diana Lin
Spring 2007

Office: Tamarack F12
Phone: 980 6981
My website: http://www.iun.edu/~hisdcl
Email: dchenlin@iun.edu
Office hours: MW: 9:15-10am, 11:20am-2:20pm or by appointment

Maps of China

Bibliography

Objective

This course covers China from 1949 to the present, including its cultural, social, political, economic, developments.  It focuses on China's transition from a revolutionary, Communist regime that was preoccupied with political movements to gradual transition to a market economy, with consequent social, cultural, economic, and political changes.  It will also pay special attention to the issues facilitating and hampering recent Chinese economic and political reforms, and offer some tentative discussions of the future.

Required Readings:

The following required readings are available at the IUN bookstore.

Chen, Ruoxi. The Execution of Mayor Yin and Other Stories from the Great Cultural Revolution.  Indiana University Press, 2004.

Terrill, Ross. The New Chinese Empire and What It Means for the United States. Basic Books, 2003.

Yang, Rae. Spider Eaters. University of California Press, 1997.

The following WILL BE available from Eris, the IUN Library electronic reserve, by February 2, 2007.  Eris is accessible through this link.

xcerpts from Popular China by Perry Link

Excerpts from Streetlife China by Michael Dutton.

Course Requirements
 

Requirements include

• Weekly writing assignments: There are two types of writing assignments for each week:

  1.      One or two essay questions (indicated as "essays") that are to be typed and double spaced, about one page for each question, attached to your Oncourse email to me.  They are due on Sunday night.

  2.    Short Discussion forum questions that you need to post on the discussion forum.  I will post the discussion forum questions on the Discussion forum at the beginning of each week for you to answer.   For both Oncourse email and discussion forum questions, you need to log onto Oncourse with your IUN email ID and password, and click on the "In Touch" icon.  There you will find both Oncourse email and Discussion Forum (note, with the latter you can both post and view all discussion postings).  They are due on Sunday night.

• Two take-home papers, each 10-12 pages, typed, double spaced.  The papers need citations. 

• Those who take the course at the 200 level will use the two built-in paper topics, respectively, using the required readings plus one outside reading for each paper. 

• Those who take the course at the 300 level will use the first built-in paper topic but need to find a second paper topic on their own, based on themes covered in class.  They are required to use both in-class readings and outside sources for their second paper.  And they are required to discuss their prospective paper topic with the instructor no later than the 13th week.  The paper proposal counts as part of the final grade.

• Each student is also required to do a 3-4 page book review on a monograph on contemporary China.  Book title needs to be pre-approved of by instructor.

Method of grading: all grades are assigned in percentages, which will be tabulated at the end of the semester and converted to letter grades. The averages of your take-home papers and of your weekly writing assignments will be taken to represent the grades for your take-home paper and weekly writing assignment. The conversion is as follows: 93-100: A; 90-92.9: A-; 85-89.9: B+; 80-  84.9: B; 75-79.9: B-; 70-74.9: C+; 65-69.9: C; 60-64.9: C-; 55-59.9: D+; 50-54.9: D; 45-49.9: D-; 44 and below: F.

The grade distribution is as follows: 

For those taking the course at the 200 level:

Essay Homework: 20 per cent
Discussion forum postings: 10 per cent
Book review: 5 per cent
First take-home paper: 30 per cent
Second take-home paper: 35 per cent

For those taking the course at the 300 level:

Essay Homework: 20 per cent
Discussion forum postings: 10 per cent
Presentation of second paper topic on campus: 5 per cent
Book review: 5 per cent
Take-home papers: 30 per cent each

All grades will be shown in your Online Gradebook, accessible via Oncourse, under "Tools". You need to have an IUN ID and password to access Oncourse. If you do not have an IUN email account, you can set up one here at https://itaccounts.iu.edu/.

Class schedule

Please note that additional online readings and notes may be posted on a weekly basis. Please check this web page regularly to get the updated readings.

Creating "Socialist Democracy"

Week 1 (Jan.8-14)

Introduction.

Brief overview of modern Chinese history. Terrill, chap.4. Notes.

Discussion question 1: Comment on Terrill's argument of the continuity between imperial rule and modern Chinese governments. Which aspects of Terrill's arguments do you find most interesting/provocative?

Week 2 (Jan.15-21)

Creating "socialist consciousness:" through mass campaigns. Yang, chaps.1, 2, 5, 6. Online reading: Early Campaigns in the 1950s. Notes.

Discussion question 2: What were the campaigns for and what kind of changes do you think the Communist regime wanted to produce in China?

Week 3 (Jan.22-28)

1. Mobilize the masses to catch up with the West. Yang, chaps.7, 8, & 11. Online reading: the Great Leap Forward. Notes
Discussion question 3: Discuss the contradictions in China's modernizational program.

2. Educating the socialist youth. Yang, chap.12. Online reading: Moral education. Notes
Discussion question 4: generalize what general characteristics did the heros have and what qualities did the Communist Party expect the Chinese youth to inculcate in themselves?

Week 4 (Jan.29-Feb.4)

1. The new socialist woman. Yang, chap.9. Online reading: Women in China. Notes.
OutlineDiscussion question 5: How would you rate gender equality in socialist China. Was it the same as equal rights demanded by women in the U.S.?

Conflicts within the Communist Party and the Cultural Revolution.

2. The Cultural Revolution: the Red Guards. Yang, chaps.13 & 15. Online reading: The Cultural Revolution. Notes.
Discussion question 6: How do you understand the Cultural Revolution from the Red Guards' point of view?

Week 5 (Feb.5-11)

1. Stories of the CR. Chen, "The Execution of Mayor Yin." Notes
Discussion question 7: Use this specific example to describe the different motivations and goals of those who were involved in the CR.

2. Communist Party members and the CR. Chen, "Ren Xiulan." Notes.
Discussion question 8: What did it signify when CR led to massive persecutions of the Chinese communists, the backbone of Chinese Communism that the CR was set out to perpetuate?

Week 6 (Feb.12-18)

1. Integrating the rural and urban social classes. Yang, chaps.16-19. Optional reading: Chen, "Night duty." Online reading: Reeducating the youth in the countryside. Notes
Discussion question 9: Contrast the Communist goal of integrating the rural and urban areas and how political practices like the cadre's school succeeded in achieving that.

2. The Lin Biao incident and the waning of the Cultural Revolution. Chen, "The Big Fish," and "Nixon's Press Corps." Notes.
Discussion question 10: How did Communist China start to open up to the outside world from these two stories?

Week 7 (Feb.19-25)

1. Conflicting interpretations of socialism and the cult of Mao. Terrill, chap.5. Online reading: Mao's Cult. Notes
Discussion question 11: Comment on Terrill's evaluation of Mao. How much do you think Mao was responsible for the events in the Cultural Revolution?

China's Socialist Economy

2 The work unit. Dutton, pp.42-61. Notes.

Discussion question 12: How do you think working for a unit differed from working for an American corporation?

Week 8 (Feb.26-Mar.4) First take-home examination due on Feb.28. Paper topic: Discuss the goals of the Communist government in the first 25 years of rule and evaluate how they were implemented.

1. The household registration system. Dutton, 81-103.  Notes.

Discussion question 13: Comment on the household registration system and its recent changes.

The post-1978 economic reform:market economy and its impact on Chinese society.

2. China's decision to reform. Online reading.

Discussion question 14: Compare the changes after 1978 with previous readings on the Great Leap Forward and Moral Education, and comment on some significant differences from the past.  Were the changes for the better or worse?

Week 9 (Mar.5-11)

Video on reform: Xiao's Long March. (Room 223, Raintree Hall, Oct.24, 10-11:15am)

The connection between the work unit and tradition, and changes in the work unit. Dutton, 203-227. For a view of the traditional Chinese siheyuan, and traditional housing layout as well as the interior of the courtyard, refer to this part of the University of Washington website on Traditional Chinese Homes   Notes
Discussion question 15: How did the market economy change the traditional Chinese social structure?

Week 10 (Mar.12-18) spring break

Week 11 (Mar.19-25)

1. Market economy,corruption, and social protest. Notes Images of the Tiananmen Incident. Tiananmen Square. The Gate and the Square (video clips and images)
Discussion question 16: Did market economy lead to greater corruption or was corruption inherent in the socialist regulated economic system?

2 Market economy and women. Link, chaps.3, 6. Notes
Discussion question 17: Did women's status improve in the market economy compared with the earlier socialist years?

Week 12 (Mar.26-Apr.1)

1. Market economy and rural migrants. Link, chap.12. Notes Links to information about Chinese migrant workers
Discussion question 18: How do you evaluate the issue of rural migration: is that a successful solution to the perennial rural/urban gap?

2. Video on rural Chinese poverty: To Live is Better than to Die: AIDS in China. (Room 223, Raintree Hall, Nov.9, 10-11:15am) Treatment of AIDS victims in Henan Province. The AIDS village today.

Week 13 (Apr.2-8)

1. The Chinese state and Chinese views on democracy. Terrill, chap.6; Notes.
  Reading on SARS and Chinese government response to it.
Discussion question 19: Discuss the trend of political development in post-Mao China.

2. Video on the rural development of Chinese democracy: The Secret of My Success.  (Room 223, Raintree Hall, Nov.16, 10-11:15am)

Week 14 (Apr.9-15)

1 The Greater China (China and Taiwan). Terrill, chap.8. Online reading.
Discussion question 20: Comment on Terrill's description of China's Taiwan policy.

2. China's energy resources and environmental concerns. Video: Great Wall Across the Yangtze. (Room 223, Raintree Hall, Nov.23, 10-11:15am)

Week 15 (Apr.16-21))

1. China, its western frontier, and Central Asia. Terrill, chap.9. Video on Chinese ethnicities: Nation of Diversity. (Room 223, Raintree Hall, Nov.28, 10-11:15am) Notes.

Discussion question 21: Comment on the scenarios Terrill visualized for Tibet and Xinjiang.  How would dealing with the independent movement in these regions affect Chinese domestic and foreign policies?

2. Chinese foreign policy and relation to its politics. Terrill, chap.11 Notes.

Additional readings on Chinese politics: Bush's Visit to China, and Disputes Over Intellectual Property.

Discussion question 22: Comment on two or three aspects of Terrill's study of Chinese foreign policy in comparison with U.S. foreign policy.

Week 16 (Apr.22-28)

1. The future of Chinese politics and foreign policy. Terrill, chap.12 Notes. Article on Chinese government's treatment of pollution of the Songhua River.

Discussion question 23: Discuss how the future of China as predicted by Terrill may affect the U.S. and the rest of the world.

Week 17

May 1

Second paper due on Tuesday May 1. Paper topic: Discuss the nature of the changes in Communist China since 1978 and evaluate how successfully/unsuccessfully these changes have met the goals of the Communist government in its first 25 years of rule.

Book review due by email attachment through Oncourse on May 1.