CHLIT 6610
Spring 2011
Cultural Criticism in China
Edward Gunn
Rockefeller 351
emg7@cornell.edu
Assignments for the week of (Thursday):
January 27:
Introduction
February 3: Redefining paradigms of modernity I.
READ: Introduction to Wang Hui, Zhongguo xiandai sixiang de xingqi 中国现代思想的兴起 (2004; 2nd
edition 2008), pp. 1-102.
February 10: Redefining paradigms of modernity II.
READ: Summation to Wang Hui, Zhongguo xiandai sixiang de xingqi 中国现代思想的兴起 (2004;
2008), pp. 1395-1492.
Additional Commentary: Philip Huang, "In Search of a Chinese Modernity: Wang Hui's The Rise of
Modern Chinese Thought," Modern China 34.3 (July 2008): 396-404; Ban Wang, "Discovering
Enlightenment in Chinese History: The Rise of Modern Chinese Thought, by Wang Hui," boundary 2
34:2 (2007): 217-38.
February 17: Christianity, Nietzsche and National Character.
READ: From Arthur Smith, Chinese Characteristics (1894); David Kelly, "The Highest Chinadom:
Nietzsche and the Chinese Mind, 1907-1989" in Graham Parkes, ed., Nietzsche and Asian Thought
(1991); Li Zehou 李泽厚, "Lüe lun Lu Xun sixiang de fazhan" 略论鲁迅思想的发展 in Zhongguo
jindai sixiang shi lun. 中国近代思想史论 1979.
Additional commentary:
Yue Daiyun 乐黛云, "Nicai yu zhongguo xiandai wenxue" 尼采与中国现
代文学, Beijing daxue xuebao 北京大学学报.
1980. 3.
February 24: Materialism and History.
READ: Liang Shuming 梁漱溟, Dongxi wenhua ji qi zhexue 东西文化及其哲学(1922), pp. 37-67, 199214;
Zhang Junmai 张君劢,
"Rensheng guan" 人生观; Chen Duxiu 陈独秀, "Kexue yu rensheng
guan xu" 科学与人生观序, and Hu Shi 胡适, "Kexue yu rensheng guan xu" 科学与人生观序 in Chen
Jiazhen 陈嘉榛, ed., Kexue yu rensheng guan 科学与人生观.
(1923).
Wang Lixi 王礼锡, "Zhongguo she hui shi lunzhan xumu" 中国社会史论战序幕; Hu Qiuyuan 胡秋原
,"Yaxiya shengchan fangshi yu zhuanzhizhuyi" 亚细亚生产方式与专制主义 in Wang Lixi, ed.,
Zhongguo shehui shi lunzhan 中国社会史论战. 4 vols. (1931-2).
Additional commentary: Guy S. Alitto, The Last Confucian: Liang Shuming and the Dilemma of
Modernity (1979); Benjamin Schwartz, "A Marxist Controversy on China," Far Eastern Quarterly. XIII.2
(Feb. 1954): 143-53; Arif Dirlik, Revolution and History: The Origins of Marxist Historiography in
China, 1919-37. (1978)
March 3:
From National Character to Class Character.
READ: Ai Siqi 艾思奇, "五四文化运动的特点" (1940) in Lun wenhua he yishu 论文化和艺术.
(1982); Liu Kang, "Hegemony and Cultural Revolution," New Literary History. 28.1 (Winter 1997).
Shih Shu-mei, The Lure of the Modern: Writing Modernism in Semicolonial China,
1917-37. pp. 1-45; 371-77.
Additional commentary: Joshua Fogel, "Ai Siqi: Professional Philosopher and Establishment
Intellectual" in Merle Goldman and Timothy Cheek, eds., China's Intellectuals and the State. (1987)
March 10:
Subjectivity and Art. I.
READ: Zhu Guangqian 朱光潜, Xifang meixue shi 西方美学史. (1979). Vol. 2, pp. 655-745.
Li Zehou
李泽厚, "Kangde zhexue yu jianli zhutixing lungang" 康德哲学与建立主体性论纲 (1981) in Zhexue
meixue wenxuan 哲学美学文选.
(1985).
March 17:
Subjectivity and Art. II.
READ: Liu Zaifu 刘再复, "Wenxue yanjiu ying yi ren wei siwei zhongxin" 文学研究应以人为思维中
心 in He Huoren 何火仁, ed., Dangqian wenxue zhutixing wenti lunzheng 当前文学主体性问题论争.
(1986); Liu Xiaobo 刘晓波, "Yu Li Zehou duihua--ganxing, geren, wode xuanze" 与李泽厚对话－感
性，个人，我的选择, Zhongguo 中国. (October 1986).
[Spring break; Association for Asian Studies Annual Meeting]
April 7:
Systems and Structures.
READ: Selections from Jin Guantao 金观涛, Zai lishi de biaoxiang beihou 在历史的表象背后. (1983);
Sun Longji 孙隆基, Zhongguo wenhua de shenceng jiegou 中国文化的深层结构. (1983); Su Xiaokang
苏晓康, et al. Heshang 河殇. (1988)
April 14:
The postmodern condition.
READ: Fredric Jameson, "Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism," New Left Review
No. 146 (1984): 53-92; "Literary Innovation and Modes of Production: A Commentary," Modern Chinese
Literature 1.1 (September 1984); Rey Chow, "Rereading Mandarin Ducks and Butterflies: A Response to
the Postmodern Condition," Cultural Critique, No. 5 (Winter 1986-7).
April 21:
Responses to poststructuralism.
READ: Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology (1967; 1976), pp. 74-93; Zhang Longxi, "The 'Tao' and the
'Logos': Notes on Derrida's Critique of Logocentrism," Critical Inquiry 11.3 (March 1985); Zheng Min
郑敏, "Wenhua, zhengzhi, yuyan sanzhe guanxi zhi wo jian," 文化政治语言三者关系之我见 Ershiyi
shiji shuangyuekan 二十一世纪双月刊 No. 29 (June 1995): 120-25;
Additional commentary: Zheng Min, "Shijimo de huigu: Hanyu yuyan biange yu Zhongguo xin shi
chuangzuo," 世纪末的回顾：汉语语言变革与中国新诗创作 Wenxue pinglun 文学评论 1993 (3).
April 28:
Feminism.
READ: Meng Yue 孟悦 and Dai Jinhua 戴锦华, Fuchu lishi dibiao 浮出历史地表.
(1989)
May 5:
READ:
"Qianyan" 前言
Feminism and Post-Colonialism.
Rey Chow, Woman and Chinese Modernity. (1991); Zhang Jingyuan 张京媛,
in Houzhimin lilun yu wenhua piping 后殖民理论与文化批评 (1999); Qiu Guifen 邱贵芬‚ "Faxian
Taiwan: Jiangou Taiwan houzhimin lunshu" 发现台湾：建构台湾后殖民论述 Zhong wai wen xue 中外
文学 21.2 (February 1992).
Additional Commentary: Homi K. Bhabha, "DissemiNation: time, narrative, and the margins of the
modern nation" in Nation and Narration. (1990); Mayfair Mei-hui Yang, "Mass Media and Transnational
Subjectivity in Shanghai: Notes on (Re)Cosmopolitanism in a Chinese Metropolis" in Aihwa Ong and
Donald Nonini, Ungrounded Empires: The Cultural politics of Modern Chinese Transnationalism.
(1997).