Confucius and the Great Books of China

Catalog description

This course familiarizes students with the critical texts and intellectual cultures of Warring States and early imperial China. CHNS 418 / ASIA 418 / HIST 482 Confucius and the Great Books of China (3) This course exposes students to the key texts, thinkers, and ideas that form the foundation of the Chinese classics and classical period, providing an integral foundation for the study of Chinese history, culture, or literature. While the emphasis is on the texts and their main themes, the course will encourage historical engagement with the texts by placing them into a context of competing cultural, social, political trends. Readings may be grouped around categories of teachings such as Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism, or around thinkers such as "(Confucian) ritualists," "statesmen," "military strategists," "rebels," "recluses," and "spiritual leaders." Students will learn how each of these types of teachings and thinkers related to each other, as well as how they responded to the emergent, centralized political order of the day. This will help students better understand many of the recurrent intellectual, political, and religious themes that arise in later Chinese history as well.