Lectures: MW 1:25-250pm, 112 Houghton House
Office hours: M 3:00-4:00pm, 208 Houghton House; F 11:15am-12:15pm, Café; or by appointment

Course description:
How are the feminine and masculine represented in art? This seminar will consider the role of gender in Chinese painting, focusing on the Song and Yuan dynasties (spanning the tenth to fourteenth centuries). Topics will include the setting of figure paintings in gendered space, the coding of landscapes and bird-and-flower paintings as masculine or feminine, and ways that images of women (an often marginalized genre of Chinese art) help to construct ideas of both femininity and masculinity. Throughout, we will examine the differing roles of men and women as patrons, collectors, and painters. The course is cross-listed with Asian Languages & Cultures and Women's Studies. It addresses Goals 6 (an intellectually grounded foundation for the understanding of differences and inequalities of gender, race, and class) and 7 (knowledge of the multiplicity of world cultures).

Learning objectives:
One objective is for students to hone their writing skills. A second objective is to gain practical skills useful in any study of art history, including how to analyze and conduct in-depth research on paintings as well as how to make an effective oral presentation of that research. More conceptual learning objectives include understanding how paintings operate as historical artifacts that reveal current ideas on politics, religion, and society, as well as broader knowledge of the connections between Chinese art and literature and the roles of men and women in Chinese society in the middle imperial period.

Texts:

• Patricia Buckley Ebrey, The Inner Quarters: Marriage and the Lives of Chinese Women in the Sung Period (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993).
• Hui-shu Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency in Song Dynasty China (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2010).
• Susan Bush and Hsio-yen Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 2nd ed. (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2012). [This book is essentially identical to the 1st edition, published in 1985 by Harvard University Press.]
• Burton Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry: From Early Times to the Thirteenth Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984).
• Sylvan Barnet, ed., A Short Guide to Writing about Art, 10th ed. (New York: Longman, 2011)—recommended for students new to art history.

Weekly schedule:

Aug. 26 (M).    Overview of course.

Aug. 28 (W).    An outline of Song and Yuan history.

• Patricia Buckley Ebrey, The Cambridge Illustrated History of China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 136-89.

Sept. 2 (M).      Setting the terms: Western and Chinese theories of gender.

• Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard, “Introduction: The Expanding Discourse,” in The Expanding Discourse: Feminism and Art History, ed. Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard (New York: IconEditions, 1992), 1-25.
• Lisa Raphals, “Yin and Yang,” in Sharing the Light: Representations of Women and Virtue in Early China (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998), 139-68.

Sept. 4 (W).     Setting the terms: Western and Chinese theories of representation.
*RESPONSE PAPER due*

• M. H. Abrams, “Figurative Language,” “Imagery,” and “Motif and Theme,” in A Glossary of Literary Terms, 6th ed. (Fort Worth: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1993), 66-70, 86-87, 121.
• Martin J. Powers, “Discourses of Representation in Tenth and Eleventh Century China,” in The Art of Interpreting, ed. Susan C. Scott (University Park, Pa.: The Department of Art History, The Pennsylvania State University, 1995), 88-127.
• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 203-205.

Sept. 9 (M).      Research workshop.

Sept. 11 (W).   Presentation workshop.

Sept. 16 (M).    Male painters in the Song and Yuan.

• Wai-kam Ho, “Aspects of Chinese Painting from 1100 to 1350,” in Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting: The Collections of the Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, and The Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1980), xxv-xxx.
• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 89-93, 100-103, 129-34, 156-58, 187-90, 196-201, 255-56.

Sept. 18 (W).   Female painters in the Song and Yuan: textual accounts and surviving works.
*PRESENTATIONS*

• Marsha Weidner, “Women in the History of Chinese Painting,” in Views from Jade Terrace: Chinese Women Artists 1300-1912 (Indianapolis: Indianapolis Museum of Art, 1988), 12-29.
• James Robinson, catalogue entries 1 and 2, in Views from Jade Terrace, 66-70.

Sept. 23 (M).    Male patrons of the arts: Song dynasty emperors.

• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 134-38.
• Maggie Bickford, “Emperor Huizong and the Aesthetic of Agency,” Archives of Asian Art 53 (2002-2003): 71-104. <JSTOR>
• Julia Murray, “Sung Kao-tsung as Artist and Patron: The Theme of Dynastic Revival,” in Artists and Patrons: Some Social and Economic Aspects of Chinese Painting, ed. Chu-tsing Li (Lawrence, Kans.: Kress Foundation Department of Art History, University of Kansas; Kansas City, Mo.: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1989), 27-36.
• Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 169-92.

Sept. 25 (W).   Female patrons of the arts: Song dynasty empresses.

• Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 118-69, 192-238.

Sept. 30 (M).    Female collectors in the Song: two case studies.
*RESPONSE PAPER due*

• Stephen Owen, “The Snares of Memory,” Chapter 5 of Remembrances: The Experience of the Past in Classical Chinese Literature (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986), 80-98.
• Shen C. Y. Fu, “Princess Sengge Ragi: Collector of Painting and Calligraphy,” trans. Marsha Weidner, in Flowering in the Shadows: Women in the History of Chinese and Japanese Painting, ed. Marsha Weidner (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1990), 55-80.

Oct. 2 (W).       Male collectors in the Song and Yuan.

• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 98-100, 184-86, 191-96, 233-40, 256-62.
• Ankeney Weitz, “Art and Politics at the Mongol Court of China: Tugh Temür’s Collection of Chinese Paintings,” Artibus Asiae 64, no. 2 (2004): 243-80. <JSTOR>

Oct. 7 (M).       Gendered space in the Song.
*RESPONSE PAPER due*

• Ebrey, The Inner Quarters, 21-44.
• Raphals, “Nei-wai: Distinctions between Men and Women,” in Sharing the Light, 195-213.
• Irene S. Leung, “Romancing Captivity on the Frontier: The Cai Yan Story as Case Study,” chapter 2 of “The Frontier Imaginary in the Song Dynasty (960-1279): Revisiting Cai Yan’s Barbarian Captivity and Return” (Ph.D. diss., The University of Michigan, 2001), 57-97.

Oct. 9 (W).       Men on the road: landscape paintings and river scenes in the Song and Yuan.

• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 120-22, 141-56, 162-70.
• Richard Barnhart, “Figures in Landscape,” Archives of Asian Art 42 (1989): 62-70. <JSTOR>
• Peter C. Sturman, “The Donkey Rider as Icon: Li Cheng and Early Chinese Landscape Painting,” Artibus Asiae 55, no. 1/2 (1995): 43-97. <JSTOR>

[Fall Recess Oct. 12-15]

Oct. 16 (W).     Reclusion and homosociality: landscapes of scholars in the Song.
*RESEARCH PROJECT PROPOSAL due*

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 129-31, 134-36.
• Hans H. Frankel, “Man in His Relations with Other Men,” Chapter 3 of The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady: Interpretations of Chinese Poetry (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), 33-40.
• Martin J. Powers, “When Is a Landscape like a Body?” in Landscape, Culture, and Power in Chinese Society, ed. Wen-hsin Yeh (Berkeley, Calif.: Center for Chinese Studies, 1998), 1-22.
• Jerome Silbergeld, “Back to the Red Cliff: Reflections on the Narrative Mode in Early Literati Landscape Painting,” Ars Orientalis 25 (1995): 19-38. <JSTOR>

Oct. 21 (M).     Reclusion and homosociality: landscapes of scholars in the Yuan.
*RESPONSE PAPER due*

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 142-43.
• Burton Watson, “The Poetry of Reclusion,” Chapter 5 of Chinese Lyricism: Shih Poetry from the Second to the Twelfth Century, with Translations (New York: Columbia University Press, 1971), 68-89.
• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 262-70.

Oct. 23 (W).     Gender and images of nature.

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 19, 21, 54-66.
• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 125-29, 272-88.
• Robert E. Harrist, Jr., “Ch’ien Hsüan’s Pear Blossoms: The Tradition of Flower Painting and Poetry from Sung to Yüan,” Metropolitan Museum Journal 22 (1987): 53-70. <JSTOR>
• Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 140-46.

Oct. 28 (M).     Representations of gendered work.

• Ebrey, The Inner Quarters, 130-51.
• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 176, 245-46, 299-300, 304-306, 319.
• Francesca Bray, “Fabrics of Power: The Canonical Meaning of Women’s Work,” in Technology and Gender: Fabrics of Power in Late Imperial China (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press, 1997), 183-205.
• Roslyn Lee Hammers, Pictures of Tilling and Weaving: Art, Labor, and Technology in Song and Yuan China (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2011), 9-40.

Oct. 30 (W).     Marriage, motherhood, and women’s lives in textual sources.
*RESPONSE PAPER due*

• Ebrey, The Inner Quarters, 114-30, 152-87.
• Julia Ching, “Sung Philosophers on Women,” Monumenta Serica: Journal of Oriental Studies 42 (1994): 259-74.
• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 82-92, 102-103, 107-108, 112-13, 160, 171, 190, 215-16, 224, 226, 228-29, 281, 320, 341, 365, 371.

Nov. 4 (M).      Representations of marriage, motherhood, and female virtue in Song dynasty art.
*ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY due*

• Julia K. Murray, “Didactic Art for Women: The Ladies’ Classic of Filial Piety,” in Flowering in the Shadows: Women in the History of Chinese and Japanese Painting, ed. Marsha Weidner (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1990), 27-53.
• Martin J. Powers, “Love and Marriage in Song China: Tao Yuanming Comes Home,” Ars Orientalis 28 (1998): 51-62. <JSTOR>
• Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 106-108, 118-28, 149-59.
• Ellen Johnston Laing, “Auspicious Images of Children in China: Ninth to Thirteenth Century.” Orientations 27, no. 1 (January 1996): 47-52.

Nov. 6 (W).     Transgression and femininity: the history of female entertainers in the Song.

• Ebrey, The Inner Quarters, 217-54.
• Marsha L. Wagner, “Popular Tz’u Poetry in the Entertainment Quarters after 755,” Chapter 4 of The Lotus Boat: The Origins of Chinese “Tz’u” Poetry in T’ang Popular Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984), 79-103.
• Beverly Bossler, “Shifting Identities: Courtesans and Literati in Song China,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 62, no. 1 (2002): 5-37. <JSTOR>

Nov. 11 (M).    Representing transgression: female entertainers in art and literature.

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 193-94, 249-52, 279.
• Lara C. W. Blanchard, “A Scholar in the Company of Female Entertainers: Changing Notions of Integrity in Song to Ming Dynasty Painting,” NAN NÜ: Men, Women and Gender in China 9, no. 2 (2007): 189-246 (especially 219-31).
• Paul Rouzer, “Honor among the Roués,” in Articulated Ladies: Gender and the Male Community in Early Chinese Texts (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), 249-83.

Nov. 13 (W).   Loneliness and femininity: abandoned women.

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 77-78, 176, 358-59, 360-61, 363.
• Ellen Johnston Laing, “Chinese Palace-Style Poetry and the Depiction of A Palace Beauty,” Art Bulletin 72, no. 1 (March 1990): 284-95. <JSTOR>
• Anne M. Birrell, “The Dusty Mirror: Courtly Portraits of Woman in Southern Dynasties Love Poetry,” in Expressions of Self in Chinese Literature, ed. Robert E. Hegel and Richard C. Hessney (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985), 33-69.
• Hans H. Frankel, “Lonely Women,” Chapter 6 of The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady: Interpretations of Chinese Poetry (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), 56-61.

Nov. 18 (M).    The immortal figure.

• Watson, ed. and trans., The Columbia Book of Chinese Poetry, 49-52, 116-21.
• Hsio-yen Shih, “Poetry Illustration and the Works of Ku K’ai-chih,” in The Translation of Art: Essays on Chinese Painting and Poetry, ed. James C. Y. Watt (Hong Kong: Centre for Translation Projects, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1976), 6-29.
• Susan E. Nelson, “Tao Yuanming’s Sashes: Or, The Gendering of Immortality,” Ars Orientalis 29 (1999): 1-27. <JSTOR>
• Lee, Empresses, Art, and Agency, 109-17.
• Bush and Shih, comp. and ed., Early Chinese Texts on Painting, 105-109.

Nov. 20 (W).   Research presentations.

Nov. 25 (M).    Research presentations.

[Thanksgiving Recess Nov. 27-Dec. 1]

Dec. 2 (M).      Writing workshop.

Dec. 4 (W).      Research presentations and conclusions.

Course requirements:

1.         Class participation (25%).  This includes regular and punctual attendance (see attendance policy) and participating in discussions in class or on Canvas. I grade participation on a daily basis, as follows: A for speaking up in class or on the discussion board (even to ask a question or to answer one of my questions incorrectly), B for showing up to class but not speaking, C for not paying attention or coming in late, zero (0) for not coming to class at all.

2.         Response papers (25%).  Throughout the semester you will write five one-page papers responding to some of the readings. More details to follow.

3.         Presentation (15%), Sept. 18.  This will be a short presentation focusing on the ways that works of art can reflect a gendered perspective. More details to follow.

4.         Research project (35%), Dec. 4-Dec. 10.  This includes a short presentation (worth 10% of your course grade) and a longer research paper (roughly 15-20 pages, worth 25% of your course grade) on a topic concerning gender in Chinese painting between 960 and 1368. More details to follow.

Communications:
I am happy to meet with you outside of class during my office hours (see top of syllabus), or at another time that is convenient for you, in 208 Houghton House (or in the Café in the late morning on Fridays). The best way to reach me to set up an appointment is by e-mail, but please note that I regularly read e-mail only between 9:00am and 4:30pm. 

If I need to contact students, I generally will do so via HWS e-mail and through Announcements on Canvas (see Websites below). You should develop the habit of checking both regularly.

Attendance policy:
I consider attendance at lectures to be mandatory. Asian art history is a challenging subject; don’t make it impossible by skipping class! That said, if you have a reasonable excuse for missing a class, I expect you to notify me as soon as possible—preferably in advance—and to turn in a one-page essay on the topics covered on the day of your absence, within a week. Not doing so will directly impact your participation grade. If you are absent three times or more, you should be prepared for me to notify the Deans about your performance. I will be taking attendance regularly.

Attendance and religious holidays:
“The Colleges accept the responsibility of making available to each student who is absent from class because of religious obligations and practices an equivalent opportunity to make up any examination, study or work requirement missed.”
Please inform me in advance of any religious holidays when you will be out of class. I do my best to avoid religious holidays with regard to due dates, but there are times when that is impossible.  Please talk to me if you have any difficulties!

Format for written work:
One of the things you will learn in an art history class is the importance of presentation. This applies to your written work as well:

1. Type all work in a 12-point font.
2. Double-space.
3. Leave one-inch margins on all sides.
4. Number your pages.
5. Put your name on every page and the date on the first page.
6. Check that your spelling, grammar and punctuation are correct--these are crucial to effective communication of your ideas. I will lower your grade if you have excessive errors.
7. If you cite another source, use either parenthetical references or footnotes. (See A note about cheating and plagiarism below.) Make sure that you follow one of the documentation styles (ideally the one found in the Chicago Manual of Style (which is what art historians most typically use).
8. Include pictures with captions if appropriate.

You can submit written work via Canvas. Please upload a Microsoft Word document (.doc, .docx), Rich Text Format file (.rtf), or a Portable Document Format file (.pdf): these are the only formats that Canvas will accept. Alternatively, you can turn in a stapled hard copy to me during the class period. PLEASE NOTE:  I do not accept papers via e-mail.

A note about cheating and plagiarism:
I will not tolerate any form of academic dishonesty. Not only does it destroy the trust that I have in you to do your best, but also it is unfair to the other students, and obviously you will not learn anything if you resort to cheating. If I find that you have cheated on an assignment, you will receive a zero for the assignment and I will contact the Deans and/or the Committee on Standards about your case. I follow the recommendation of the Committee on Standards; if it also finds evidence of cheating or plagiarism, the recommendation is usually failure of the course at a minimum. See the Colleges’ Principle of Academic Integrity and General Academic Regulations (http://www.hws.edu/catalogue/policies.aspx) and the Handbook of Community Standards (http://www.hws.edu/studentlife/pdf/community_standards.pdf), pp. 38-40.

Now, just in case you are not clear about what plagiarism is: plagiarism is the use of someone else's words or ideas without giving that person credit. In application, this means that in your writing assignments, you need to cite your sources. When quoting directly from a text-say, five words or more in succession-you need to put those words in quotation marks and include a parenthetical reference or footnote citing the source. When rewriting a passage from a text in your own words, you don't need the quotation marks but you do still need the parenthetical reference or footnote. If you don't understand exactly what constitutes plagiarism, or how to use parenthetical references or footnotes, please ask me. I would prefer to explain what it is and how to avoid it before it happens rather than after.

Grading:
Presentations and the research paper will receive numerical grades. Class participation, discussion, and response papers will receive a check-plus (95), check (85), check-minus (75), or zero (0). Make-up written assignments, which count as part of your participation grade, will receive a check or a check-minus. If you are unsatisfied with a grade, please prepare a written statement explaining what grade you think you should have received and why, and submit it to me along with the assignment for review.

I mark down one-third of a letter grade (for example, from A to A-) for each calendar day that an assignment is late. If you think you will need an extension, you should talk to me as early as possible.

My grading scale is as follows:

A note about the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL):
At Hobart and William Smith Colleges, we encourage you to learn collaboratively and to seek the resources that will enable you to succeed. The Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) is one of those resources: CTL programs and staff help you engage with your learning, accomplish the tasks before you, enhance your thinking and skills, and empower you to do your best. Resources at CTL are many:  Study Mentors help you find your time and manage your responsibilities, Writing Fellows help you think well on paper, and professional staff members help you assess academic needs. 

I encourage you to explore these and other CTL resources designed to encourage your very best work. You can talk with me about these resources, visit the CTL office on the 2nd floor of the library to discuss options with the staff, or visit the CTL website at http://www.hws.edu/academics/ctl/index.aspx.

The CTL resources of most use for this class include Teaching Fellows, Writing Fellows, and Study Mentors. CTL works with the Art & Architecture Department to offer one resource that will be essential to your learning in this course, the Art History Teaching Fellows. The Teaching Fellows are accomplished art history majors and minors who are now paid to assist other students. They hold regular study hours Sunday-Thursday (I will post this term’s hours as soon as they are available). To get the most out of this resource, I recommend that all students in this course begin attending the Teaching Fellow hours next week and attend once or twice weekly (to study, to ask questions) throughout the semester.

Disability accommodations:
If you are a student with a disability for which you may need accommodations, you should self-identify and register for services with the Coordinator of Disability Services at the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL), and provide documentation of your disability. Disability-related accommodations and services generally will not be provided until the registration and documentation process is complete.  The guidelines for documenting disabilities can be found at the following website: http://www.hws.edu/disabilities.

Please direct questions about this process or Disability Services at HWS to David Silver, Coordinator of Disability Services, at x3351.

Websites:
There are two websites for this course: one at my homepage, http://people.hws.edu/blanchard/ARTH3403/; and one at Canvas, https://canvas.hws.edu/. This syllabus, paper and project assignments, and links to online resources for narrative in Asian art can be found at both. The Canvas site also has a course calendar, daily handouts, discussions, and an online gradebook.

To use Canvas, log in with your campus username and password. Once you have logged in, you should see, at the top left of the screen, a drop-down menu for courses you are enrolled in, as well as links to your assignments, grades, and calendar. At the top right, you should see links to your own Canvas inbox and your settings, as well as the Logout and Help links.

It is essential for you to get in the habit of logging into Canvas regularly, as one way I will communicate with the class is via Canvas announcements, and I will post assignments and other course materials there. If you click on the Settings link at the top right, you can set up Canvas to notify your e-mail or your cell phone about recent activity. I strongly recommend that you set Canvas to send you notifications of announcements ASAP. 

For further assistance with Canvas, click on the Help link at the top right, where “Search the Canvas Guides” is probably the most useful option. You should look for the relatively short Canvas Student Quickstart Guide (http://guides.instructure.com/m/8470), the more thorough Canvas Student Guide (http://guides.instructure.com/m/4212), and – for visually oriented people – the Canvas Video Guide (http://guides.instructure.com/m/4210).  Alternatively, contact the Help Desk of Instructional Technology at x4357 or helpdesk@hws.edu. The Help Desk is located in the Library on the first floor in the Rosensweig Learning Commons and is staffed by students as follows:

• until 1 a.m. Mondays through Thursdays
• until 11 p.m. on Fridays
• until 11 p.m. on Saturdays
• until 1 a.m. on Sundays