Weeks 9-16 of Class
Week 9
Tuesday, March 15: Kalidasa, prologue and acts 1-2, and Rasa aesthetic theory.
Thursday, March 17: Kalidasa, act 3-4; overview of Said’s Orientalism, as well as this review.
- Collab on Metaphors of Love in Act 3: What is the primary metaphor of love in act 3? And why?
Week 10
Tuesday, March 22: Kalidasa, act 5-6; Tagore, selections:
Thursday, March 24: Kalidasa, act 7; Hossain’s “Sultana’s Dream” and Lewton’s “Feminist Visions of Science and Utopia in Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain’s ‘Sultana’s Dream.’”
Week 11
Tuesday, March 29: Nguyen Du, Wikipedia plot summary, Author’s Opening Words, episodes 1-5 (roughly the first fifth, depending on edition); [CN: sex work and trafficking, rape, attempted suicide].
Tuesday, March 31: Nguyen Du, episodes 6-10; Kevin Nguyen’s “This Fucked Me Up: Ken Burns’s The Vietnam War.”
Week 12
Tuesday, April 5: Nguyen Du, episodes 11-15, Teresa Mei Chuc, all. [CN: war]
Thursday, April 7: Nguyen Du, episodes 16-20. No synchronous class. I’ll be traveling to the Shakespeare Association of America conference this week.
Asynch Collab: TBA
Week 13
Tuesday, April 12: Nguyen Du, episodes 21-25, Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, all. [CN: war]
Tuesday, April 14: Nguyen Du, episodes 26-29, Final Conclusion; Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, all. [CN: war]
Week 14
Tuesday, April 19: Chikamatsu, act 1; Shonagon’s The Pillow Book, selections. [CN: sex work and trafficking, suicide]; if you’d like to see a film adaptation of Chikamatsu’s play, check out Masahiro Shinoda’s 1969 film Double Suicide.
If you’d like to see the original 1926 edition of Asatarō Miyamori’s translations, you can find it here on Google Books.
Thursday, April 21: Chikamatsu, act 2; Kawakami’s Breasts and Eggs, selection, and Motoko Rich’s “A Novelist Breaks the Code of Being a Woman in Japan.” [CN: sex work and trafficking, suicide]
Week 15
Tuesday, April 26: Chikamatsu, act 3.
Thursday, April 28: No synchronous class meetings! Instead, book and attend a one-on-one Conference for our Second Unessay Projects. No Posts due today.
Second Unessay Projects due by the end of the day on Tuesday, May 3rd.
Finals, Week 16
Our final exam period will be Thursday, May 5, 11:00 – 1:30 PM via Teams (there will be no in-person component). We’ll be sharing our favorite projects from the semester and reflecting on the arc of the course. Individual reflections will be posted to WordPress, and I’ll ask you to talk through your Reflection during the Final Exam meeting. This is our final class conversation reflecting on the semester. (Treat each of the options below as Reflections posts; you may complete up to all three of these Reflections posts this week if you so choose. If you’d prefer not to talk during our Final Exam meeting, you can prepare an audio or video recording beforehand and put it in your post (60-90 seconds), or contact me for other presentation options.)
Before class, select one of the below. Your post should include either 150-200 words of text or 1-2 minutes of audio, and should link back to the project being discussed or the PSU Habits of Mind page.
#1: Present via a new Weekly Post (can involve audio) your favorite project from the semester that you completed.
#2: Present via a new Weekly Post (can involve audio) your fav project someone ELSE completed this semester
#3: In a new weekly Post, Reflect on the PSU Habit of Mind “Integrated Perspective” and what you’ve learned on that front this semester: what have you learned from class readings, discussions, and assignments about “ the recognition that individual beliefs, ideas, and values are influenced by personal experience as well as multiple contextual factors—cultural, historical political, etc.”?
During our Final Exam period, we’ll go around and bring up each person’s post in turn. You can choose to either talk through your post live via Teams, or to play your prerecorded video.
The deadline for all work and revisions is the of the day on Thursday, May 5 (11:59 PM).
Sprockets and Springes 