Ira Sarma, Ludwig Maximilians Universität
Hans Kuehner, Ludwig Maximilians Universität

Course description:

India and China represent two of the oldest civilizations of the world. Most historians agree that these two empires were at least until the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in technological, economic, and other respects more advanced than Western societies. It was only after the development of science and industry in the West that they succumbed to the superior military power of the new Western nation states and fell prey to imperialism. In modern times, the concept of the nation and nationalism were seen in both countries as central vehicles for their fight against foreign domination and colonialism. While the history of Indian nationalism has to be seen primarily as part of the process of decolonisation, in China, the establishment of a modern nation-state was seen as precondition for economic, social and cultural development. Today, the people in these countries are confronted with anonymous markets that commercialise, erode or transform traditional contexts of life and social relations as well as religious beliefs. At the same time, the so-called socialist system in China has been discredited. As a reaction to these processes, we find that beliefs in the myths of nationhood are, sometimes intentionally and in the service of political ends, being resuscitated, so that today we find even greater attachment to the myths of national authenticity. Thus, the process of globalisation has led to a resurgence of cultural and political nationalism (and sometimes religious fundamentalism) as well as to a change of their function.

The aim of the course is to examine how these two ancient civilisations tried to come to terms with a changing world where Western power and Western values were perceived as increasingly asserting themselves. The part of the course dealing with China will focus on the manifestations of nationalism in the context of the new phase of globalisation in the last decades of the twentieth century. In order to understand its motive forces and functions, it will be necessary to put these contemporary phenomena in a theoretical and historical context. The course will therefore in the first place introduce recent theories and views of nationalism, and then, before turning to the contemporary scene, examine the emergence of the new concepts of nation and nationalism in the last decades of the nineteenth and the first decades of the twentieth century. The part of the course dealing with India will first try to elucidate the nature of the British imperial presence against which nationalism was created. The timeframe we look at thus concentrates on the period from the mid 1700s to 1947 when Independence created not one but two independent nation-states, India and Pakistan. In order to comprehend the idea of the „Indian nation“ we therefore have to touch upon various aspects of Indo-Islamic culture, including language issues, Muslim separatism and the new Hindutva nationalism of the 1990s.

The course will be held as a seminar. Discussions will be based on selected texts (a reader will be provided) and on short individual or group papers on central ideas and developments. It will also include the examination of some fictional texts and feature films which have the nation as their central theme.

Evaluation:

participation and papers presented in class 50 %
mid-term exam 20 %
final exam 30 %

week 1:1 Introduction – The rise of nationalism in the West, and modern concepts of the nation and nationalism.

week 1:2 China – Tianxia : Traditional Chinese views of the world and the decline of Imperial China in the 19 th century.

week 2:1 China – Reform within tradition: Efforts to „make the state rich and the military strong“.

week 2:2 China – A „fundamentalist“ response to the Western intrusion: The Boxer uprising.

week 3:1 China – Creating a „new citizen“, myths of the nation and national history.

week 3:2 China – Sun Yat-sen and the nationalist revolution

week 4:1 China – Movements for a common language for all Chinese and a new national literature.

week 4:2 India – An introduction to India: facts and fiction; the idea of India

week 5:1 India – India before the British: Indo-Islamic culture

week 5:2 India – Culture of Colonialism and Indian Responses

week 6:1 India – 1857: Mutiny or National Uprising? (Transition from Company Raj to Crown Raj)

week 6:2 India – Culture of Colonialism II: the 19 th century (The Indien National Congress, reform movements)

week 7:1 India – Emergence of Indian Nationalism (national symbols, religious revival and Swadeshi nationalism)

week 7:2 China – Attacks on tradition and the „Chinese National Character“.

week 8:1 China – Nationalism in the civil wars between the National Party (Guomindang) and the Communist Party (Gongchandang) and in the war against Japan.

week 8:2 China – „Cultural revolution“ and the quest for identity in the 1980s.

week 9:1 China – Critical reexamination of national culture and tradition: The TV series „Deathsong of a River“ ( Heshang ).

week 9:2 China – Popular and cultural nationalism in the Nineties.

week 10:1 India – Gandhi ( Hind Swaraj ); screening of Richard Attenborough's feature film Gandhi

week 10:2 India – National Identity and National Language (The Hindi-Urdu Controversy, Tagore and Bankimchandra, Vande Mataram)

week 11:1 India – Politics of Partition & Communalism (Muslim Separatism, Two-Nations-Theory, National Heroes)

week 11:2 India – 1947 and Beyond (The Constitution of India, Unity in Diversity?, Mass Migration)

week 12:1 India – New Nationalism: Ayodhya and beyond (Hindutva in the 1990s, new media & new symbols)

week 12:2 Final exam

Required reading:

James Townsend, „Chinese Nationalism“, in Jonathan Unger (ed.), Chinese Nationalism, pp. 1-30.

Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism.

John K. Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution 1800-1985 .

Bose, Sugata & Ayesha Jalal, Modern South Asia; History, Culture, Political Economy , London & New York 1998. (recommended as introductory reading)

Ludden, David (ed.), Contesting the Nation. Religion, Community, and the Politics of Democracy in India , Philadelphia 1996

Secondary Reading:

Jonathan Spence, The Gate of Heavenly Peace.

Prasenjit Duara, Rescuing History from the Nation. Questioning Narratives of Modern China.

John De Francis, Nationalism and Language Reform in China .

Charlotte Furth, The Limits of Change. Essays on Conservative Alternatives in Republican China.

Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism .

Frank Dikötter, The Discourse of Race in Modern China.

Eric J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality.

Peter Hays Gries, China's New Nationalism.

Bhabha, Homi K., Nation and Narration , London 1990 (chapters to be assigned)

Desai, A.R., Social Background of Indian Nationalism , Bombay 1966 (chapters to be assigned)

Additional texts will be provided in course packs (CP).

Weekly Reading:

week 1:1

•  Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, chs. 1, 4, 5.

•  Eric J. Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, reality, ch. 1.

•  Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, chs. 1, 2.

week 1:2

•  John K. Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution , chs. 2, 5, 6.

•  John K. Fairbank, The Chinese World Order , pp. 1-14 and 20-33.

•  Mandates and letter of Emperor Qianlong to King George III, in Harley Farnsworth MacNair, Modern Chinese History, Selected Readings.

week 2:1

•  John K. Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution, chs. 7, 8

•  Various Documents in Ssu-yü Teng, John K. Fairbank (eds.), China's Response to the West, pp. 30-36, 50-55, 164-174, and MacNair, 578-580.

week 2:2

•  Victor Purcell, The Boxer Uprising , chs. 2, 3.

•  Paul Cohen, „The Contested Past. The Boxers as History and Myth.“, in Journal of Asian Studies 1992, 51.1, pp. 82-113 .

•  Documents in Teng/Fairbank, pp. 187-193.

week 3:1

•  Lung-kee Sun, The Chinese National Character. From Nationhood to Individuality, ch.1.

•  Document in Teng, Fairbank, pp. 220-223.

•  Ying-shi Yü, „Changing Conceptions of National History in Twentieth Century China“, in Erik Lönnroth et al. (eds.), Conceptions of National History, pp. 155-174.

•  Charlotte Furth (ed.), The Limits of Change. Essays on Conservative Alternatives in Republican China, pp. 90-112 and 113-150.

week 3:2

•  John K. Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution , ch. 9.

•  Jonathan Spence, The Gate of Heavenly Peace, ch. 2, 3.

•  Tsou Jung, The Revolutionary Army. (1903)

•  Sun Yat-sen, in Teng, Fairbank, pp. 227-229, and in Julie Lee Wei et al. (eds.), Prescriptions for Saving China, pp. 29-36, and 41-50.

week 4:1

•  Vera Schwarz, The Chinese Enlightenment. Intellectuals and the May Fourth Movement of 1919, chs. 1, 2, 3.

•  John DeFrancis, Nationalism and Language Reform in China , chs. 1, 2.

•  Hu Shi and Chen Duxiu on Literary Revolution, in Kirk Denton(ed.), Modern Chinese Literary Thought, pp. 123-145.

week 4:2

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapter 1

•  Additional chapter to be assigned

week 5:1

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapters 2-5

•  Additional chapter to be assigned

week 5:2

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapters 6 & 7

•  Macaulay, Thomas Babington, Minute on Education (1835) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1833macaulay-india.html (CP)

week 6:1

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapter 9

•  Additional chapter to be assigned

week 6:2

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapter 10

•  Sumit Sarkar, Modern India , pp. 1-11, 65-100

week 7:1

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapters 11 & 12

•  Chapter on the paintings of Ravi Verma to be assigned

week 7:2

•  Jonathan Spence, The Gate of Heavenly Peace, chs. 4, 5

•  Lu Xun, „Preface to Call to Arms “ , in Lu Xun, Selected Works 1, pp. 33-38.

•  Lu Xun, „Kong Yiji“, in Lu Xun, Selected Works 1, pp. 52-57.

•  Lu Xun, „The True Story of Ah Q“, in Lu Xun, Selected Works 1, pp. 102-154.

•  Lydia H. Liu, Translingual Practice., Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity – China, 1900-1937, ch. 2.

week 8:1

•  Lucien Bianco, Origins of the Chinese Revolution, 1915-1949, chs. 3, 4, 5, 6.

•  Xiao Jun, Village in August.

•  Hsiao Hung, The Field of Life and Death.

•  Lydia H. Liu, „The Female Body and Nationalist Discourse: Manchuria in Xiao Hong's Field of Life and Death“, in Angela Zito, Tani E. Barlow (eds.), Body, Subject and Power in China , pp. 157-177.

week 8:2

•  Simon Leys, Chinese Shadows, 128-144.

•  Geremie Barmé, In the Red. Contemporary Chinese Culture , ch. 5.

•  Leo Ou-fan Lee, „The Crisis of Culture“, in Anthony C. Kane (ed.), China Briefing, pp. 83-128 .

week 9:1

•  Su Xiaokang and Wang Luxiang, Deathsong of a River: A Reader's Guide.

•  Human Rights Watch/Asia, vol. 6, no.2 (11 March 1994, appendix).

week 9:2

•  Arthur Waldron, „Representing China: The Great Wall and Cultural Nationalism in the Twentieth Century“, in Befu Harumi (ed.), Nationalism in East Asia. Representation and Identity , pp. 36-60.

•  Geremie Barmé, „To Screw Foreigners is Patriotic: China's Avant-Garde Nationalists“, in Jonathan Unger, pp. 183-208.

•  Reviews of China Can Say No , in Journal of Contemporary China, 1997.6/14, pp. 153-165.

•  Peter Hays Gries, China's New Nationalism, pp. 116-134.

week 10:1

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia, chapters 13 & 14

•  Rushdie, Salman, ‘Attenborough's Gandhi', in: Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 , New York 1991. pp. 102-106. (CP)

•  Gandhi, Mohandas, Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule (1908) chps 1-4, 6, 9, 10, 17, 20 (CP)

•  Mondal, Anshuman, Nationalism and Post-Colonial Identity, Culture and ideology in India and Egypt , London & New York 2003, pp. 71-103 (chapter 4)

week 10:2

•  King, Christopher R., One Language, Two Scripts. The Hindi Movement in Nineteenth Century North India , Bombay 1994 (CP, pages to be assigned)

•  Cohn, Bernard S., ‘The Command of Language and the Language of Command', in: Guha, Ranajit (ed.), Subaltern Studies IV , New Delhi 1985

•  Chatterjee, Bankimchandra, Vande Mataram (CP)

•  Quayum, Mohammad A., ‘Tagore and Nationalism', in: Journal of Commonwealth Literature , vol. 39 (2), 2004, pp. 1-6.

•  Nandy, Ashis, Rabindranath Tagore and the Politics of Self . Delhi; Oxford 1994. (pp. to be assigned)

week 11:1

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asian , chps 15 & 16

•  The 2-Nation Theory and Partition, a Historical Overview http://members.tripod.com/~INDIA_RESOURCE/hist-2nation.html (CP)
Sadaat Hasan Manto, Toba Tek Singh (short story) (CP)

•  Grass, Günther, Zunge Zeigen , p. 1 (engl. transl. ‘Show Your Tongue', New York 1988)

•  Chapter on Subhas Chandra Bose to be assigned

week 11:2

•  Bose and Jalal, Modern South Asia , chps 17 -20

•  Rushdie, Salman, ‘The Riddle of Midnight: India, August 1987' , in: Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 , New York 1991, pp. 26-33.

•  Nehru, Jawaharlal, Tryst with Destiny , speech August 15, 1947 http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1947nehru1.html (CP)

•  Ahmad, Aijaz, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures , London 1992. (CP, pages to be assigned)

•  Rushdie, Salman, ‘Imaginary Homelands', in: Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 , New York 1991, pp. 9-21.

week 12:1

•  Website http://www.HinduUnity.org

•  Brosius, Christiane, ‘Of Nasty Pictures and “Nice Guys”', in: Sarai Reader 2004 , http://www.sarai.net/journal/reader4.html (CP)

•  The Constitution of India, articles 1-28, 51A (CP)

•  BJP election manifesto chapters 1-3, 7, 10 and the "Freedom Charter"
http://www.bjp.org/manifes/chap3.htm (CP)