Study information

Making A New China: Ideas, Networks and the Intelligentsia: Sources

Module titleMaking A New China: Ideas, Networks and the Intelligentsia: Sources
Module codeHIH3320
Academic year2020/1
Credits30
Module staff

(Convenor)

Duration: Term123
Duration: Weeks

11

11

Number students taking module (anticipated)

16

Module description

How did China transform from the Great Qing Empire to the Chinese Republic? What prompted China’s entry into modernity and what hindered it? Has China lost its cultural distinctiveness in pursuit of becoming a modern nation-state? This module attempts to offer answers to these questions by inviting you to study a group of men and women whose lives and deaths were tightly connected with the fate of the ‘new China’ – the Chinese intelligentsia active between the 1860s and the 1960s. These men and women forged diverse ideas and networks which demonstrate the complex social, political, cultural and ideological components of Chinese nation-building. This module aims to introduce you to a range of sources in translation, which are available in digitised or published form. No knowledge of a foreign language is required.

Module aims - intentions of the module

Together with its co-requisite, the module will introduce you to the thoughts and networks of Chinese intellectuals, considering their roles in the making of modern China. Drawing on published and translated source collections as well as a growing number of online digital archives, the module will make use of many personal documents such as contemporary diaries, letters, autobiographies and memoirs, as well as the published pamphlets, speeches, lectures, journal articles, and essays of Chinese intellectuals. The module will also introduce you to some rare documents collected and translated by the module convenor. Visual materials such as photographs, films, and documentaries will also be carefully analysed to deepen your understanding of the historical context.

Through working with the extensive primary source collections available for this module, you will develop a range of research, analytical, interpretative, and communication skills that can be applied in further academic studies or in graduate careers.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 1. A detailed knowledge of the different sources available for the study of the complex ideas and networks of Chinese intellectuals in a century of change from the 1860s to the 1960s, including a specialist knowledge of the sources which you focus on in seminar presentations and written work.
  • 2. Ability to analyse the complex diversity of the sources studied.

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 3. Ability to analyse closely original sources and to assess their reliability as historical evidence. Ability to focus on and comprehend complex texts
  • 4. Ability to understand and deploy relevant historical terminology in a comprehensible manner.
  • 5. Ability to follow the origin, development, and legacy of the activism of the Chinese intelligentsia in the making of modern China.

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 6. Independent and autonomous study and group work, including presentation of material for group discussion.
  • 7. Ability to digest, select and organise material to produce, to a deadline, a coherent and cogent argument,
  • 8. Ability to present complex arguments orally

Syllabus plan

While the content may vary from year to year, it is envisioned that it will cover some or all of the following topics:

The first part of the module focuses on the evolution of various ideologies of Chinese nation-building; the following main themes and topics will be covered:

1)     Remoulding China:

  • Confucianism and the ideal of imperial reform
  • Constitutionalism and the ideal of a Chinese constitutional monarchy
  • The 1911 Revolution and the ideal of a Chinese Republic

2)     Enlightening China:

  • May Fourth and the ideal of ‘Chinese enlightenment’
  • Anarchism, Marxism, and the ideal of a new world
  • Federalism and the ideal of a Chinese federation
  • Feminism and the ideal of women’s emancipation

3)     Revolutionising China:

  • Sun Yat-sen and the ideal of Nationalist Revolution
  • Mao Zedong and the ideal of Communist Revolution

The second part of the module focuses on how Chinese intellectuals forged networks to promote their ideas; the following main themes and topics will be covered:

1)     Urban spaces and personal networks

  • Native-place bonds and local connections
  • Study abroad and overseas networks
  • Intellectual genealogy and global ties

2)     Political linkages and cross-party networking:

  • Leaning to the left?
  • The ‘middle of the road’?
  • Gender matters? Elite women and their organisations

3)     Denying ‘self’ and ‘the intellectual’:

  • Yan’an intellectuals
  • The new intellectual or the disappearance of the intellectual?

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Scheduled Learning and Teaching ActivitiesGuided independent studyPlacement / study abroad
442560

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

CategoryHours of study timeDescription
Scheduled learning and teaching 4422 x 2 hour seminars.
Guided independent study256Reading and preparation for seminars, coursework and presentations.

Formative assessment

Form of assessmentSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Seminar discussionOngoing through course.1-6, 8Oral from tutor and fellow students.

Summative assessment (% of credit)

CourseworkWritten examsPractical exams
70030

Details of summative assessment

Form of assessment% of creditSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Portfolio702 assignments totalling 4000 words1-7Oral and written.
Individual Presentation3025 minutes1-8Oral and written.

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Original form of assessmentForm of re-assessmentILOs re-assessedTimescale for re-assessment
Portfolio assignmentPortfolio assignment1-7Referral/deferral period
PresentationWritten transcript (2500 words)1-8Referral/deferral period

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

Published Primary Sources:

  • Sources of Chinese Tradition: Volume 1: From Earliest Times to 1600 (Columbia University Press, 2013)
  • Sources of Chinese Tradition: Volume 2: From 1600 Through the Twentieth Century (Columbia University Press, 1999)
  • The Search for Modern China: A Documentary Collection (Incorporated, 2013)
  • China’s Response to the West: A Documentary Survey 1839-1923 (Harvard University Press, 1979)
  • A Hu Shi Reader: An Advanced Reading Text for Modern Chinese (Yale University, 1990)
  • English Writings of Hu Shih Volume 1&2 (Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2013) 
  • Chen Duxiu's Last Articles and Letters, 1937-1942 (University of Hawaii Press, 1998)
  • Prophets Unarmed: Chinese Trotskyists in Revolution, War, Jail, and the Return from Limbo (BRILL, 2014)
  • Women in Republican China: A Sourcebook (Routledge, 2015)
  • The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory (Columbia University Press, 2013)
  • I Myself Am a Woman: Selected Writings of Ding Ling (Beacon Press, 1989)
  • Wang Shiwei and Wild Lilies: Rectification and Purges in the Chinese Communist Party, 1942-1944 (M.E. Sharpe, 1993)

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

Key words search

Enlightenment, modern China, nationalism, revolution, tradition, the intellectual, network

Credit value30
Module ECTS

15

Module pre-requisites

At least 90 credits of History at Level 1 and/or Level 2.

Module co-requisites

HIH3321

NQF level (module)

6

Available as distance learning?

No

Origin date

15/02/2017

Last revision date

20/08/2020