Week 8: Tang short stories

Oct. 24 – Oct. 30

Unless otherwise noted, all assignments and tasks are due by 11:59PM. I strongly suggest you keep a healthy life-work balance and make sure to get enough sleep. Check the “best-before dates” policy in the syllabus.

Monday
  • □ Look ahead at the readings and tasks for this week, and plan in when you will do them.
  • – This prevents last minute panic, and means you can make the most of our time together in class.
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  • □ Plan for your mid-term check in: appointments available this week.
  • – Check out availability and book an appointment using the appointments page (marked as “Mid-term”). Book your appointment now, and change slots if your schedule changes. That’s better than needing to scramble because our schedules don’t align. Meet in my office (Ettinger 300A), unless you request to meet on Discord.
  • – Why? Even if you don’t need a mid-term grade, it’s good to see where we are at the mid-semester point, and how you can make the second half count. Things we will discuss: what are you doing well? how are you working towards your goals/objectives for this course? how can we work better together to get you towards those goals in the second half of the semester? how is the relative freedom of the assignments allowing you to see things differently, either about (Chinese) history, or about you as a student/writer/researcher?
          • Look back at your Start of Semester reflection and goals, and your First Reflection to help you ponder these questions; think about goals (new, or adjusted goals) for the second half. Do not come to this conversation without preparation!
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  • □ Feedback on your fellow students’ posts
  • – Read through and use Hypothes.is (Group HST107) to comment on your fellow students’ posts: everybody likes some encouragement! Here is a random selection of three posts. If two or more posts are the same, or one is your own, just refresh the page for a different set. It’s all random, it’s all good!
  • – Post 1:
  • – Post 2:
  • – Post 3:
Tuesday
  • □ Please complete before class: Fill out the form with your top three preferred roles: Google Form –> Use your Muhlenberg email. Add notes about the skills you can bring and/or would like to hone in this project.
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  • □ Prepare before class: Readings:
  • Background info: Already before the Tang dynasty, scholars were collecting stories that they felt were history, but not worthy of inclusion in the official historical record. They created a new category of “records of the strange” (zhiguai) or “traditions of the marvellous” (chuanqi). (for examples of zhiguai, look back to Gan Bao’s stories) To us, these are fantastical stories with a strong supernatural element, but to the Chinese at the time these stories inhabited a strange space between history and anecdote, and they were not seen as (completely) fiction. Many of the Tang stories explore inter-species relations, and strange worlds; here are two of the most famous stories which bring the protagonist into a different realm, where they live happy lives, but something is “off”.
  • Textbook: Goldman-Brown, Julian: “Explaining the Extraordinary and the Creation of Fiction.” In China’s Magical Creatures. https://open.muhlenberg.pub/chinasmagicalcreatures/chapter/creation-of-fiction/
  • – Next Pick one of the two options. Both are fiction, written during the Tang dynasty (618-907). Reading question: What is the ideal of “the good life” in Tang dynasty China, according to your stories?
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  • □ OPTION A: Shen Jiji. “The World in a Pillow”. In An Anthology of Translations: Classical Chinese Literature. Vol. 1: From Antiquity to the Tang Dynasty. Edited by John Minford and Joseph S. M. Lau. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000. 1021-24. (PDF)
    • A young and ambitious but poor scholar complains about his fate, and dreams about high office. A passing Taoist priest seems to give him the breakthrough he needs…
  • □ OPTION B Li Gongzuo. “An Account of the Governor of the Southern Branch”. In Tang Dynasty Tales: A Guided Reader. Edited by William H. Nienhauser Jr, 131-187. Singapore: World Scientific Publishing Co, 2010. (PDF)
    • A low-ranked army officer marries a princess, and his life takes a new turn. But not all is what it seems to be…
  • Note: there are plenty more Tang stories and anecdotes available in translation, many of them with a supernatural or other magic-realist twist.
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  • □  More background:
  • – Slides about the Tang dynasty for self-study, lots of images
  • – Schneewind, Sarah. An Outline History of East Asia to 1200. Third edition. Open Textbook Library. Oakland, California: eScholarship, 2021. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9d699767
    • – Parts of Chapters 7 and 8 (About Tang China); skip the bits about Silla, Nara/Heian
Wednesday
  • □ Catch up, and/or prepare for Thursday!
Thursday
  • □ Look through the textbook with an eye on making improvements. What would you like to change, delete, add, merge? Use hypothes.is or add to the Google doc with suggestions
    • – “Blue sky thinking” allowed: aim big, we may not quite make that idea come through, but it will spark another idea, that brings us closer to something we can realize: e.g. we don’t have time do a good podcast or video series, but hey… is there one out there we can add as background/additional materials about Chinese history, with the right license?
  • □ Meeting: Ettinger 204, 3.30PM
Friday
  • □ Catch up with any missing tasks or help a fellow student! Check in the Discord chat.
Saturday
  • □ Rest day
Sunday
  • □ Get your Weekly Report (aka “5-15”) in tonight as a blog post in category HST107. Thanks!
  • Note that from this week on, your report will include work you and your team do on the Pressbooks project!

Where to get help:

  • Tea Room on Discord:
    • open anytime for you
    • I will be hosting Tue 2PM-3PM; Wed. 11AM-12PM, or at other times by appointment via Google Calendar. You can also find me in my office during Tea Room times.
    • Private room for confidential chat available on request.
  • Discord Channel #hst107 and the (anonymous) Padlet (both also useful for chatting, sharing fun stuff)
  • DLAs: Digital Learning Assistants: schedule coming soon!
  • Writing Center: Sunday-Wednesday: 3:30 – 5:30 pm and 7-11 pm; Thursday: 3:30 – 5:30 pm and 7-9 pm; drop in or make an appointment
  • Trexler Library Course Subject Guide: our own dedicated subject guide for the course 
  • Safety on/around campus: report an incident