BHUM 12A05 - How Westerners and Chinese see each other: A historical Perspective

Much has been said about the cultural gap between China and the Western world. Even going further, some scholars have considered the Chinese moral values as a sort of “otherness” of the alleged “ Western values ”. In this course, I would like to challenge this opinion in providing students with a set of documents (texts, pictures) which illustrates the encounter between the European and Chinese civilizations at different periods of their history. In order to overcome Western-centrism and to contribute to a balanced history, sources will come from both places. We will particularly focus on the following points:

• Defining the identity and status of people involved in the encounter;
• Pinpointing the context of the encounter in terms of aims, interests, strategies, etc.
• Assessing the moral values and the practices that both sides mobilize and promote;
• Connecting these moral values and practices to the context of the encounter.

Diverse periods of time will be chosen as core moments of contact:

• When the European countries forced China to open to Western influence (19th century) while the Chinese had to discover this strange “Western World”
• When the Chinese intellectuals adopted European values in order to contribute to China rebirth (beginning of the 20th century), while the European had to deal with the sick man of Asia
• When China became a source of inspiration for European intellectuals (1960s and 1970s) while China was isolated from the rest of the world
• When China and Western countries are perceived both as a threat and as an opportunity by each other.

This course requires a strong participation of students. They are not allowed to do any other thing than to listen and to participate. Each session will start by a presentation of documents by students (mainly written documents but other types of documents could be used) followed by comments from other students.

1- Oral component 30%

• Presentation text 1 (first semester): maximum 20 minutes
• Presentation text 2 (second semester): maximum 20 minutes
• Comments 1: maximum 5 minutes
• Comments 2: Maximum 5 minutes
• Participation and engagement

2- Reasearch paper 40%

Choice for the paper topic : Week 3 Outline and bibliography : Week 5 Draft and reviewing : Week 8 Deadline to submit the paper: Week 10, with penalties for late submission (minus 1 point per day)

Format between 3000-3500 words spaces included - font 12 - Times New Roman or Arial - spacing 1.5 – documents, iconography and bibliography not included in the 3000-3500 words limit.

3 - Final exam 30%