Shanghai: From Treaty Port to Global Metropolis

Catalog description

Since the late 19th century, Shanghai has emerged as the leading metropolis in China in many respects. It has served as the breeding grounds and model for the social, political, economic and cultural modernization, and urbanization of China over the century that followed. Through a combination of lectures, readings, film screenings, field trips, and research projects, this course explores the history of Shanghai and connects the colorful legacy of the treaty port era (1842-1943) with the re-emergence of Shanghai as a global metropolis since the 1990s. While focusing mainly on those two eras, which have been the subjects of the bulk of scholarship in the emerging field of 'Shanghai Studies,' we also examine the relatively neglected history of Shanghai prior to the 1840s, as well as the Mao Years of 1949-1976 when Shanghai became a bastion for the violent politics of the Cultural Revolution. 001258