All courses numbered 500 and above are graduate courses.
Undergraduates need to submit a course permit to enroll.
HIST 630 The Chinese in Eurasian History
Taught as schedule allows (consult the Course Directory)
An examination of the gradual development of the Chinese in the larger Eurasian context, with an emphasis on people rather than state structures (though these will be considered). Topics will include the origins of the people who are today Chinese (we will look at the most recent DNA studies), the development of the Chinese language, and the evolution of patterns of settlement and material culture from the late neolithic, again using the most recent scholarship. Other topics will include the formation of family structures, patterns of social interaction, values and religions, and patterns of state formation. Emphasis will be on interactions, e.g. with the earliest horse nomads, with the Turkiic civilizations, with the Tibetans and with the Manchus,, and the ways in which these affected both people and state structures. Initial attention will be devoted to the period from about 1200 BCE to 1900 CE, examined thematically, but later the course will turn to the dramatic changes that began with the abdication of the last dynasty, the Qing, in 1912 and the ensuing attempt to create a polity that was both "Chinese" and entirely "new."
