Simon Fraser University
Engaging the World

Course Outlines

Spring 2023 - HIST 367 D100

History of the People's Republic of China (4)

Class Number: 4894

Delivery Method: In Person

Overview

  • Course Times + Location:

    Jan 4 – Apr 11, 2023: Mon, 2:30–5:20 p.m.
    Burnaby

  • Prerequisites:

    45 units, including six units of lower division history.

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

Analyzes the history of the PRC from 1949 to present. Special emphasis on ideology, inequality, diversity, the Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, and economic reforms. Students with credit for HIST 256 may not take this course for further credit.

COURSE DETAILS:

This course examines the history of the People’s Republic of China from its founding in 1949 to present. We will not only look at major developments, such as the Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, and economic reforms, but also explore their relevance to different people. The PRC is complex because of diversities across ethnicity, gender, profession, region, and religion. Students will taste this historical complexity and get some clues to engage it through wrestling with primary sources as well as academic works written by historians from different generations.

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

By the end of this term, students are expected to: (1) better understand key struggles and transformations of China from 1949 to present; (2) look at present-day China from a historical perspective; (3) gain a sense of academic accumulation by reading works written by generations of historians; (4) read and analyze different kinds of sources by writing a primary source analysis; (5) engage in contentious historical debates by writing a historiographical essay; (6) improve in grasping the logic structure of an academic work.

Grading

  • Attendance and participation 10%
  • Weekly reading responses 10%
  • Quizzes 20%
  • Restoring the author’s outline 10%
  • Primary source analysis 25%
  • Historiographical essay 25%

NOTES:

No midterm and final exams.

Materials

REQUIRED READING:

Maurice Meisner, Mao’s China and After: A History of the People’s Republic, third edition (New York: The Free Press, 1999).

Chen Huiqin, Daughter of Good Fortune: A Twentieth-Century Chinese Peasant Memoir (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2015).

Other readings will be provided on Canvas.


REQUIRED READING NOTES:

Your personalized Course Material list, including digital and physical textbooks, are available through the SFU Bookstore website by simply entering your Computing ID at: shop.sfu.ca/course-materials/my-personalized-course-materials.

Registrar Notes:

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: YOUR WORK, YOUR SUCCESS

SFU’s Academic Integrity website http://www.sfu.ca/students/academicintegrity.html is filled with information on what is meant by academic dishonesty, where you can find resources to help with your studies and the consequences of cheating. Check out the site for more information and videos that help explain the issues in plain English.

Each student is responsible for his or her conduct as it affects the university community. Academic dishonesty, in whatever form, is ultimately destructive of the values of the university. Furthermore, it is unfair and discouraging to the majority of students who pursue their studies honestly. Scholarly integrity is required of all members of the university. http://www.sfu.ca/policies/gazette/student/s10-01.html