The culture and intellectual history of Early China
In this course we have explored the culture and intellectual history of Early China from multiple perspectives. Our sources have included both traditional texts of the Chinese literary tradition and recently excavated manuscripts, and while the first half of the course emphasized humanities texts of philosophy, literature, and history, the latter half of the course focused on more technical areas of knowledge such as law, medicine, agriculture, and divination. For your
final paper project, use following topic:
1. Early Chinese Laws
Compare your understanding of that topic based on readings from the first half of the course with the understanding you derive from the more technical texts. For example, you could consider references to the law in the Analects and in the writings
of the Legalists (Lord Shang, Hanfeizi, Li Si) and compare their theories about the role of law in society with analysis of the Han Dynasty legal statutes excavated at Zhangjiashan.
Note: This assignment requires close reading but not outside research. It is sufficient to use the readings from the course syllabus, and when you do use them, they should be cited appropriately.
Below is also the notice from the instructor.
About writing:
write with care. Proofread for typo, misused expressions and grammatic errors.
Write with the text. Do not tell a story completely irrelevant or without any explicit reference to the assigned readings.
Write analytically. Break down the lines, concepts and questions, and offer critical thinking on the topics with reference to historical or intellectual contexts.
Comparison: plain comparison makes no sense. Try to construct connections and explain contradictions between different texts and explain the implication. Commonality, similarity, differences without explanation won't work.
Differentiate secondary literature from original sources, and make clear when quoting other scholars’ opinions. make clear what’s the content of the ideas from the texts and what’s your analysis. Do not square quote without explaining the texts.
Clear organization and structure: central argument made clear in first paragraph; sub-argument made clear in the statement sentence at the beginning of each paragraph; clear and proper use of linking expressions showing the relationships between sentences and ideas; do not include more than one idea in each paragraph; do not add new ideas in the concluding paragraph that are not explained and analyzed in the main body.