CHN 373-000: Confucian Classics (Spring 2012)

Catalog Description: For more than two thousand years, a small set of texts associated with Confucius (551-479 BC) and his disciples formed the core of the Chinese educational curriculum. As a store of knowledge shared by all educated men and women, Confucian Classics shaped Chinese literati culture from late antiquity to the early 20th century. The goal of this course is to illustrate the diversity of the literary and cultural practices that evolved around this unique body of writings. The course is roughly divided into two parts. First, we will attempt to establish a framework for understanding the textual history and changing significance of the Classics throughout the premodern era. Drawing on a broad selection of primary sources (to be read in English translation), we will then examine how the canonized ideas were refracted in literary, philosophical, religious, and political discourse.