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Antonette - self-strengtheners

David - reformers

Amanda - revolutionaries

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Hi Folks,
Here's the line up of contending ideas for our encounter on 10/13:

Self-Strengtheners

Jenn
Bin
Todd
Anastasia

Reformers

Crystal
Peggy
Betsy
Yasmin
Revolutionaries

Kayla
Jennifer
Allen
Miguel

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Thanks for all the new introductions! Welcome to all. I love that Catherine asked about your favorite teaching moments. Great examples. It's amazing that we have such a range of places, teaching roles, and backgrounds in our seminar. We're so happy that each of you is giving up time to learn more about and to come up with ways to teach about one of the world's most diverse and dynamic regions -- in 1800 and today!

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Todd, thanks for posting so many useful resources and teaching suggestions. I am sure many will find them helpful.

The challenge for all is to think of how these materials, ideas and questions might usefully fit into our own classes.

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East Asian societies saw population growth accompany industrialization, urbanization and reduced infant mortality. Higher productivity allowed that growth, but over time, urbanization, industrialization and education of women put the brakes on that trend. These patterns broadly fit those seen elsewhere, but with cultural preferences and new technology the gender disparity is distinctive.

Students may find it interesting to compare their own community with ones communities elsewhere and at different times. Even within US history, students are often surprised to see that many people in Massachusetts from the 17th-19th century married later than many societies at that time. Why was that? There are some great books and articles about the influence of inheritance patterns and other family strategies were at work.

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Thanks to Crystal, Jennifer Smith and everyone who has posted a self-intro thus far. We look forward to having everyone tell us a bit about yourself.

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Jennifer makes such a wonderful point about how groups of students can be so different. Same day, same general pool of students, yet classes vary. As she writes, it is never dull.

And of course, from year to year the context of lessons changes. The importance of East Asia in our lives is immense. It will be even more central for our students.

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Here's a prize winning food photo by Liao Jianhui from 2019:

BBC report: https://www.bbc.com/news/in-pictures-48092511

The 2021 prize winner for "Food for the Family" was Li Huaifeng. It was taken in 2016 in Shanxi province:

The Li photo and other finalists from across the world (my favorite is from Bangladesh): https://www.pinkladyfoodphotographeroftheyear.com/finalists-gallery-2021/

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Jennifer - thanks for sharing the recognition accorded Tim Anderson. Here's a food writer from the UK who won an award for her food writing which took her back to Japan: https://asiahousearts.org/student-wins-award-memory-leading-exponent-chinese-cuisine/ And here's a competition specifically for non-Japanese who demonstrate mastery and innovation in Japanese food: https://www.washoku-worldchallenge.jp/7th/en/ The photos are tough to take if you're hungry and love Japanese cuisine.

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Thanks to Catherine, Todd and Amanda for getting us started. I'm looking forward to meeting everyone next Wednesday. As many know, I head the USC U.S.-China Institute. I'm a historian and think that we all (myself included) know way too little about the role the past plays in the present. You certainly see the importance of the past in contemporary East Asia. You see it in institutions, norms and how people perceive our world. I love to travel and I'm always taking pictures, often with an eye to how they might help me illustrate a point. I enjoys movies, novels and exploring Los Angeles.

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For our 10/13 session, please prepare to take one of the following three sides.

Encounter: Can We Save the Empire? Should We Save the Empire?

The Qing Empire and its peoples face critical choices. Foreign powers have invaded, forcing us to permit them to live amongst us along our coast, promoting their beliefs, sullying our empire. Rebellions have raged in different places, driven by different forces but always challenging Qing rule and producing instability. How are we to cope? What can and should be done? For the purposes of this discussion, we’ll compress the period 1860-1910 and bring together groups that arose in different places and situations to discuss how to deal with the external and internal threats. What are the most pressing issues? How can they be dealt with? What changes are needed to ensure survival? Ci Xi, the Empress Dowager (Tz’u Hsi 慈禧, 1835-1908) will preside over the discussion.

Three groups will participate, each with their own assessment of our challenges and how best to cope with them.
Leaders of the groups:
Li Hongzhang (Li Hung-chang 李鴻章, 1823-1901)
Kang Youwei (K’ang Yu-wei 康有為, 1858-1927)
Qiu Jin (Ch’iu Chin 秋瑾, 1875-1907)

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Jennifer's introduced many great resources on fast food migrations. One of our students wrote this bit years ago about KFC, the birthday palace. https://china.usc.edu/kfc-birthday-palace  It is not as current as what is in today's lecture. For a bit more on the history of KFC in Japan, you might enjoy the 30 minute documentary made by John Nathan. It's available via YouTube. It shows employee training, etc. Again, rather dated, but captures the moment and -- reveals our American fascination with how others perceive or adapt things we find familar.

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As you know: The Economist magazine created its Big Mac Index in 1986 to help judge if a currency is over or under-valued. The thinking is that a Big Mac has the same ingridients from place to place, so that its price reflected the relative strength of a currency compared to the dollar or other standard. It's worth emphasizing that there are many critics of this measure, popular though it may be.
Go to: (choose the country/region to compare on the left) https://www.economist.com/big-mac-index

Here's what the Japanese Big Mac suggests in June 2021:

 

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Here's the EAA article Amy mentions: https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/waste-politics-in-asia-and-global-repercussions/

Here's a short video a USC student made with a student from Communication University of China on waste: https://china.usc.edu/global-exchange-program-2011-waste-not-want-not-geoff-marschall-and-crown-chen

Not focused on food waste, but related, is Josh Goldstein's new book on recycling in Beijing's past and present: https://china.usc.edu/joshua-goldstein-recycling-beijing

 

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Thanks to all for posting. Rachel, thanks for these wonderful images. The card game looks like fun and more informative than this one: https://gamewright.com/product/Sushi-Go  Here's one review: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/sushi-go-review/

The Sushi Bar game is here: https://jinenstore.com/products/okuno-karuta-ten-sushi-bar-matching-card-game Here's one take on how the game is played: https://simanaitissays.com/2015/02/09/sushi-game/

There is a jenga-like game with plastic sushi pieces. And, we didn't even explore the world of plastic Japanese food: https://www.tofugu.com/japan/sampuru/  And a company that sells the stuff: https://fakefoodjapan.com/
 

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