COLLOQUIUM ON MAJOR TEXTS: MIDDLE EAST/I

Readings in translation and discussion of texts of Middle Eastern and Indian origin. Readings may include the Quran, Islamic philosophy, Sufi poetry, the Upanishads, Buddhist sutras, the Bhagavad Gita, Indian epics and drama, and Gandhis Autobiography.

• T 9 a.m.-10:50 a.m.
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 4 points

COLLOQUIUM ON MAJOR TEXTS

This course explores the core classical literature in Chinese, Japanese and Korean Humanities. The main objective of the course is to discover the meanings that these literature offer, not just for the original audience or for the respective cultures, but for us. As such, it is not a survey or a lecture-based course. Rather than being taught what meanings are to be derived from the texts, we explore meanings together, informed by in-depth reading and thorough ongoing discussion.

• T 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Lili Xia
  Info
• 4 points

INTRO TO INDIAN CIVILIZATION

Introduction to Indian civilization with attention to both its unity and its diversity across the Indian subcontinent. Consideration of its origins, formative development, fundamental social institutions, religious thought and practice (Vedic, Buddhist, Jain, Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh), literary and artistic achievements, and modern challenges.

• TR 2:40 p.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Rohini S Shukla
  Info
• 4 points

ANCIENT NEAR EASTERN LITERATURE

This colloquium is a course on many influential texts of literature from Ancient Near Eastern cultures, including Sumerian, Egyptian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Hittite, Canaanite, and others. The emphasis is on investigating the literary traditions of each culture – the subject matter, form, methods, and symbolism– that distinguish them from one another and from later traditions of the Middle East. The course is not
a “civilization” course, nor is it a history class, although elements of culture and history will be mentioned as necessary. The course is intended to provide a facility with, and an awareness of, the content and context of ancient works of literature in translation from the Ancient Middle East.

Students in this course will gain a familiarity with the major cultures of the Ancient Middle East, the best known and most remarked upon stories, and the legacy of those works on some later traditions. The course is organized thematically in order to facilitate comparison to the materials in similar courses at Barnard and Columbia. The approach will be immediately familiar to students who have previously taken Asian Humanities (AMEC) or Literature-Humanities (Core), but the course does not require any previous experience with literature or the Ancient Near East and is open to everyone.

All assigned readings for the course will be in English. The course meets once a week and sessions are two hours long.

• T 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 4 points

INDEPENDENT STUDY

Prerequisites: Open to majors who have fulfilled basic major requirements or written permission of the staff member who will supervise the project. Specialized reading and research projects planned in consultation with members of the Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures teaching staff.

• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• Instructor: Nicholas A Bartlett
  CULPA: 5 Info
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 1-4 points

LOTUS SUTRA/E ASIAN BUDDHISM

• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 4 points

JAPANESE BUDDHIST VISUAL CULTR

This course explors the principal modes, media, and contexts of visual culture in Japanese Buddhist history. Through the analysis of selected case studies, the course examines of the modalities of perception, materiality, and reception that distinguish the form and function of visual media in Japanese Buddhist contexts. Students are expected to have completed preliminary coursework in relevant areas of East Asian history, religion, or art history.

• T 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 3 points

CHINA AND POLITICS OF DESIRE

A recent American newspaper headline announced that China has become “the most materialistic country the world.” Globally circulating narratives often interpret Chinese consumers’ demand for commodities as an attempt to fill a void left by the absence of the Maoist state, traditional religious life, and Western-style democracy. But things aren’t as simple as they appear. This course explores the intertwined questions of “Chinese” desire and the desire for China. Avoiding reductionist understandings of desire as either a universal natural human attribute or a particular Chinese cultural trait, we will track the production and management of desire within a complex global field. Drawing on ethnographies, films, short stories, and psychoanalytic and postcolonial theory, this course will explore the shifting figure of desire across the Maoist and post-Maoist eras by examining how academics, government officials, intellectuals, and artists have represented Chinese needs, wants and fantasies. From state leaders’ attempts to improve the “quality” of the country’s population to citizens’ dreams of home ownership, from sexualized desire to hunger for food, drugs and other commodities, we will attend to the continuities and disjunctures of recent Chinese history by tracking how desire in China has been conceptualized and refracted through local and global encounters.

• W 10:10 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: Nicholas A Bartlett
  CULPA: 5 Info
• 4 points

RESEARCH IN RELIGION II

Prerequisites: the instructors permission. Guided individual research.

• R 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 1-6 points