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CLASS SCHEDULE
Introduction
Discourses of history
Elections
Austronesian
Elections
Early Colonialism
Qing Society
Japanese Takeover
Baseball
2-28
Little China
Democratization
Environment
Museums
Religion
Family and Marriage
Local and National
National and Global
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TAIWAN: CULTURE, SOCIETY, HISTORY
WINTER QUARTER 2016
Thomson 215, MF 1:30-3:20
Instructor: Stevan Harrell
Office hours: Make an appointment; I'm flexible.
Phone: 543-9608 (But I'm hardly ever there)
e-mail: stevehar@uw.edu
Class Description
This class is about layers of Taiwan: ethnic, historical, political, cultural. We will begin with a brief overview of the island, its geography and peoples, and what history means to present-day society and politics. Then we will have a look at the elections of January 16, both before and after. After that, we will look more closely at the history from pre-colonization, to the early period of Dutch, Zheng, and Qing regimes, through the periods of Japanese and Guomindang colonial rule, to the evolution of democracy. Toward the end, we will look at aspects of present-day society, looking at environmentalism, museums, religion, marriage and the family, and the relationship between local, national, and global. By the end of the course, you should have a good idea of what Taiwan is like and be able to discuss issues about Taiwan in an intelligent and rational manner.
Format of the Course
This is a seminar, and participation consists of three activities for each day:
- Do the readings, all of which are linked to this website
- Write a 200-400 word comment on the readings, due by 8:00 a.m. the morning of class. You must write every comment in order to pass the class. Comments will be graded from 1 to 5 points, based on knowledge, logic, and expression. Since most of you are native speakers of Chinese, you can write up to half the comments in Chinese, but you must write the others in English, because the UW degree you are studying for assumes a command of written English. You don't need to worry about little grammatical particulars, but you must be able to express yourself in English in a comprehensible way.
- Come to class and participate in the discussion. We will use English or Chinese at the instructor's discretion, or we can mix them. You must participate in all but two discussions in order to pass the class
Your grade for the class will be determined by the quality of your posts. I might add or subtract a small amount for extraordinarily good or bad contributions to the discussion.
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