Freshman Seminar: Harems and Court Cultures – Preliminary syllabus
Fall Semester 2014 Thursdays 3:30-6:00
Instructor: Leslie Peirce, History Department Office: King Juan Carlos Center 604
Course description: Everyone knows the stereotype of harems, but this course studies them as an
important historical phenomenon widespread in time and space. Although sometimes merely sexual
objects or vehicles for biological reproduction, women living in “harems” and royal courts typically
enjoyed a society of their own that was often highly developed culturally. They might, moreover,
wield considerable power—political, economic, artistic.
While this course focuses principally on females, it is almost as much about males, for
example, their own gendered spaces and cultures and their relationships with harem and court
women. Intermediaries also figure in our study— individuals and groups who owed their existence
to the need for communication liaisons between male and female zones, among them cadres of
eunuchs.
In short, studying harems and court cultures informs us about social formations,
expressions of political power, shifting conceptions of gender and sexuality, and the ways in which
women’s separation and seclusion from males has been used in history to distinguish elites from
ordinary people. The course focuses principally on the Middle East in premodern times but includes
extensive comparison with European and East Asian court and harem cultures.
The principal work of the course consists of reading (and discussion of readings in class) and
writing (short essays on the readings, research papers, spontaneous writing in class). Other emphases
include visual study (images, spatial configurations of gender in domestic and imperial structures,
museum visits) and the acquisition of research skills (working together with a library specialist).
The readings for this course include scholarly books and articles that study harems and court
cultures in different times and places, autobiographies, a modern novel, and literary texts (poetry and
prose selections). Here are some of the books we will read, in whole or part.
A. Walthall, ed., Servants of the dynasty: Palace women in world history (U. California, 2008)
R. Lal, Domesticity and power in the early Mughal world (Cambridge U., 2005)
D.S. Brookes, The concubine, the princess, and the teacher: Voices from the Ottoman harem (U. Texas, 2008)
L. Peirce, The imperial harem: Women and sovereignty in the Ottoman empire (Oxford, 1993)
K. Ringrose, The perfect servant: Eunuchs & the social construction of gender in Byzantium (Chicago, 2003)
Tariq Ali, The Book of Saladin (Verso, 1998)
Requirements and grading:
Contributing to class discussion
15 %
Short research paper (due 10/2)
10 %
Writing of various kinds
30 %
Quizzes (no exams)
15 %
Final project
30 %
The final project focuses on a topic of your choice. The work will take place in stages: preliminary
exploration/research & a brief statement of the project, a draft version, and the final product.