Hong Kong

This course explores the dynamics of modern society by looking at the manifold styles and life in modern culture. It examines questions on what underlies styles, how choices in life are made, and how cultural spaces are closed and created. We live in a time with so many options available to us about how to craft ourselves, yet at times we must make choices under constraints not of our own making. Therefore, central to our endeavor is considering the interplay of structure and agency. The course asks questions such as, are we able to lead the kinds of lifestyles we want to, and why or why not? How do certain lifestyles become naturalized and universalized? Some of us layer various lifestyles that might, at closer inspection, be in tension with one another: how do we reconcile those? Identity formation and consumption in specific cultural contexts are major themes in this class. We will draw from interdisciplinary readings to explore the relationship between them, inquiring how facets of identity such as class, gender and sexuality, race, age, and nationality are shaped through what people buy and the spaces (actual and virtual) we inhabit. Ideas about authenticity and essentialism will be examined as we look at how modern lifestyles serve as a way to experience individuality and inclusion in a community. Through theoretical and ethnographic readings we will study other concepts such as globalization, commodity fetishism, ethical consumption, and modernity.

This course is an upper elementary reading and writing course in Putonghua.

This course aims at enhancing students’ communicative competence, specifically targeting at speaking, reading and writing.  Students will be exposed to Chinese society and culture through a greater variety of topical discussions and different audiovisual media include films (movies), television, and Vlog.