21H.560 | Fall 2004 | Undergraduate

Smashing the Iron Rice Bowl: Chinese East Asia

Course Description

This subject examines the experiences of ordinary Chinese people as they lived through the tumultuous changes of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We look at personal narratives, primary sources, films alongside a textbook to think about how individual and family lives connect with the broader processes of change …
This subject examines the experiences of ordinary Chinese people as they lived through the tumultuous changes of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We look at personal narratives, primary sources, films alongside a textbook to think about how individual and family lives connect with the broader processes of change in modern China. In the readings and discussions, you should focus on how major political events have an impact on the characters’ daily lives, and how the decisions they make cause large-scale social transformation.
Learning Resource Types
Written Assignments with Examples
Image of China passenger wheelbarrows.
China. Passenger wheelbarrows. (Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division. [reproduction number, LC-USZ62-113721 (b&w film copy neg.)])