Lecture 1: Introduction to China's History

0:55

although the journey to the west is a

0:57

historical journey uh taken during the

1:00

Tong dynasty to India to retrieve

1:02

Buddhist sutras and all of that um but

1:04

starting in like the southern song

1:07

dynasty don't worry you'll know all of

1:09

these dynasties pretty soon we cover all

1:11

of them this semester starting in about

1:13

like I'd say the 11th century this

1:15

figure of a monkey uh as kind of the the

1:18

the sort of accompany the the the

1:20

accompany of this main t uh you know

1:23

monk character came to the foreground

1:26

and his character evolved over the

1:27

centuries and I think one of the reasons

1:29

why he's so beloved in China is he's

1:32

like this fearless person right he's he

1:34

laughs in the face of danger because

1:36

he's like a monkey right so it makes him

1:39

very beloved and makes him like sort of

1:40

very interesting um he's also kind of a

1:44

force of chaos in a sense uh is that he

1:47

literally makes a mess of heaven even uh

1:50

he gets in trouble with the Jade Emperor

1:51

all of these really great stories, but

1:53

in that sort of his sort of causing

1:56

chaos where he goes, he forces truth to

1:58

come to the surface. He's got the power

2:00

to see evil where evil is sort of

2:02

latently present. Uh so you can see

2:05

here, I just thought I'd say a few words

2:07

about him. There's a there's a big

2:09

debate in Chinese history about where

2:12

monkey comes from. where the character

2:14

of Sumukong comes from. Hooser, the

2:16

great early 20th century intellectual.

2:19

You don't have to know him exactly, but

2:21

he's a big name. He actually envisioned

2:23

that monkey may have come from the

2:25

Ramayana, from the character of Hanuman,

2:29

the sort of protector of King Rama. Uh,

2:32

and there are there is a serious theory

2:34

that that is actually the origin of his

2:36

character. Lucin disagreed with that

2:39

theory. Actually the other big 20th

2:41

century great writer of Chinese history

2:43

had another theory. You can see over the

2:45

centuries this is from a very early

2:46

edition of the novel. This is from the

2:49

uh summer palace in Beijing. Right? So

2:52

the literally depictions from the novel

2:54

like sused you know uh big you know

2:57

artistic uh scenes in late imperial

3:00

China. Uh this is from a temple in

3:02

Vietnam and you can see here this is

3:04

monkey and shrines right. So he enters

3:07

religion, popular religion and of course

3:09

big opera, right? Opera for performances

3:11

of Journey of the West, the character of

3:13

Monkey and all of that. So I thought

3:15

that I would just say just really if

3:17

you've been thinking about this video

3:18

game or you want to go check out this

3:20

video game at the beginning here, he's

3:22

been beloved across generations. Every

3:24

era sort of reinvisions him. You know,

3:27

this is Princess Iron Fan. This is a

3:29

story from Journey of the West.

3:30

Incredible. This is China's first

3:32

animated film, 1941, made in Shanghai

3:35

during World War II. And it's kind of

3:37

like Monkey at that time. You think

3:39

about the War of Resistance against

3:41

Japan, right? All of the symbolism with

3:43

that. Somebody mentioned that they saw

3:45

the 1986. Oh, where's my 1986? There's

3:47

my 1986. Journey to the West. This a big

3:49

TV series. You can get it all on YouTube

3:51

for free. Really fun. This actor who

3:54

plays Monkey is really incredible. Like

3:56

he's comes from like an oporatic

3:58

tradition. He really carries that forth.

4:00

Late editions of Monkey, recent editions

4:02

of Monkey have kind of shown him to be

4:04

like hyper masculine and muscular and

4:06

everything like that. It's actually not

4:08

necessarily how he's been portrayed

4:10

historically, but again, it tells us

4:12

something about how his character

4:14

evolves over time. All right, that is

4:16

the sort of prelude. Now, let's actually

4:18

get into dynastic China. This is

4:20

probably how you thought I would begin

4:21

the class, which makes total sense,

4:23

right? Forbidden City. Some of you went

4:25

to Beijing this summer. Some of you have

4:27

been to Beijing, I'm sure. This is like,

4:30

you know, the tragedy with the Forbidden

4:32

City is once you see this palace, you

4:33

can't go visit any other palace. They

4:35

all just look so silly in comparison to

4:38

this Versailles. I mean, forget about

4:40

it. It looks like a house. [music] I

4:41

mean, seriously, this I mean, it's the

4:43

largest palace structure in the world.

4:45

It's I've been I've visited probably

4:48

five times over my lifetime, and every

4:51

time it's different.

4:53

When you go in the summer, there's not a

4:56

lot of shade. You get killed by the sun

4:59

in the crowds. I went on an academic

5:01

sort of with an academic delegation this

5:03

summer. So, we went to all these like

5:04

secret places and that was really,

5:06

really fun. But this is a place you

5:08

absolutely have to visit. There's so

5:09

much of Chinese history [music] in this

5:11

palace in the center of Beijing. And

5:13

I'll just say actually one funny thing

5:15

about it is this palace was so nice that

5:17

when the Mans [music] invaded China in

5:19

the 17th century, they said, "We'll keep

5:21

the palace." They moved right in. How

5:24

often does that happen when somebody

5:25

invades say we'll keep the White House?

5:26

No, no, I we could do better than the

5:28

White House. They kept this one. Okay.

5:30

Okay. So, this is actually a Ming

5:32

Dynasty palace that was used right up

5:35

until the early 20th [music] century.

5:36

Today, a museum. Okay. All right. I

5:39

thought I was thinking about like how do

5:41

you even introduce this subject? Right.

5:43

This is like it's I love this subject.

5:45

I'm sure you got that from my email.

5:46

Okay. Uh I I I'm so excited to share

5:50

about this subject with you. And I

5:52

realize there's never a good way to get

5:55

into this subject because it's so big.

5:57

It's so much to cover. But I'll just

5:58

say, let's look at a map right here.

6:01

Okay, this is, as you could imagine,

6:02

Beijing, right? This is the Forbidden

6:05

City. This is the palace. I think this

6:06

map is from about the 1950s or something

6:08

like that. And there's these three quote

6:11

unquote high to the to the left, right,

6:14

to the to the western side of the

6:16

Forbidden City, right? Anybody know what

6:19

those three high are? with those three

6:21

lakes. Anybody have you anybody visited?

6:24

Have you been to Bay High Park? It's

6:27

okay. It's okay. Let me just tell you

6:29

there are three lakes there. Okay. The

6:32

top lake is the northern lake. Okay.

6:35

That was an imperial garden and that is

6:38

today a public park. You can access that

6:40

one. The second one and the last one are

6:43

the middle lake in the southern lake.

6:46

That's Jong Nan High. Have you Have you

6:49

ever heard of Jong Nan High? That's

6:50

where the head of the communist party

6:53

is. That's basically where the nominally

6:55

the Cinping lives and everything like

6:57

it's kind of like the White House and

6:58

the Kremlin together. Okay. Very very

7:00

big place. Those two lakes are not open

7:03

to the public. That area is like the

7:05

compound of the I think you know the

7:07

center of the party's power structure

7:09

basically. So there's so much right just

7:11

in this little how many kilometers of

7:13

space. Okay. China history from th

7:16

hundreds of years ago all the way up to

7:18

history going on today. Right? So the

7:22

thing I love about this term is that the

7:25

word high means sea, ocean or lake. In

7:31

Mongol actually this distinction you can

7:34

imagine why is not really made between

7:36

ocean and a big body of water. And sort

7:38

of some Chinese dialects over the

7:40

centuries adopted that or also had that.

7:43

So you can kind of see here I I think

7:46

and I know this might be sort of a

7:48

little corny to say but I want to just

7:50

say it here at the very beginning and

7:51

I'll just say it once. It's like Chinese

7:54

history is like a sea or an ocean. Okay.

7:56

That's it's big. It's how do I say it?

8:00

It's vast. It's beautiful and it's

8:01

difficult. It can be dangerous. Right?

8:03

Of course I'll talk about how history

8:05

can be dangerous in just a second but

8:07

it's not like perhaps other kinds of

8:10

history you've studied thus far. Um,

8:12

I'll just say that, you know, I started

8:14

studying it however many like almost 20

8:15

years ago. I will be a student of it for

8:18

the rest of my life. I'll never be able

8:19

to master this, right? It's not

8:22

something you master. It's just too much

8:24

stuff. Okay? But that's the thing. This

8:27

class, what I can do is I'll take you to

8:30

the ocean and I'll say in that first

8:32

time you see the ocean, right? Think

8:33

about that. Think about where you were,

8:35

especially if you didn't grow up near

8:36

the sea, right? The first time you saw

8:37

the ocean, you say, "Wow, that's a

8:39

beautiful site." Or, "Wow, that's so

8:40

interesting. Look at the waves.

8:41

Whatever. Whatever. Whatever. That's

8:43

what this class can do. It's like we're

8:45

I'm going to show you across time, okay?

8:48

From the Joe dynasty, from the origins

8:50

of writing in China, which is Chong

8:51

Dynasty, but whatever. Han dynasty, the

8:54

medieval period, all the way up to the

8:56

early modern era. I'll show you

8:58

something about every era that I think

9:00

is interesting, okay? That I think

9:02

you'll appreciate. And then it's up to

9:04

you to go from there, okay? So, so I'll

9:06

take you to the sea. You can swim

9:08

however you want to you however far you

9:11

want to swim. I'm still swimming. Okay.

9:13

So that's what we're going to do. This

9:15

is okay. Dynastic China 2024. Okay. So

9:18

let me say something at the outset here.

9:22

What I'll do today is I'll introduce

9:23

Chinese history in the broadest possible

9:25

terms. How do we think about it? Some

9:27

key terms. We'll go over the syllabus,

9:28

the requirements for the class, and then

9:30

I'll talk we'll I'll give you a

9:31

geographical tour of China, which is

9:34

really fun. Actually, it's really fun

9:35

just to go talk about food and here's

9:37

this province and here's this province.

9:39

The rest of the class won't be like

9:40

that, but you do need to know the

9:41

geography of China. There will be a quiz

9:43

in a couple of weeks. Okay, this is the

9:44

forbidden city that we were just talking

9:46

about. And you can see here, this is

9:48

this is I think the largest single hall

9:51

within the palace complex. This Taiuen,

9:54

the hall of supreme harmony. Okay, this

9:56

a Ming dynasty structure. That's don't

9:59

get overwhelmed. Uh that's like let's

10:01

say a 15th century structure. Okay. Uh,

10:03

and this is basically where the emperor

10:05

had major audiences. Weddings were held

10:07

here. Enthronements were held here. And

10:10

you can see it's right here. It's right,

10:12

it's kind of like in the almost looks

10:13

like the center. It's like right in that

10:15

central access. Okay, that's where it

10:18

is. There's another place and it's not

10:19

like a famous place. The place of

10:21

everlasting spring. This chun.

10:24

Okay, it's in the back. It's right over

10:26

there. I highlighted it right there. I

10:28

bring out these two sort of parts of the

10:31

palace to you because in a way they kind

10:34

of represent two tides of Chinese

10:37

history or two ways of thinking about

10:39

Chinese history. Okay, there's junction,

10:42

right? Official history. What is

10:45

official history? Now, when you think

10:47

about history in China, don't just

10:48

think, oh, I'm sitting down. I'm

10:49

thinking about history. Oh, that's so

10:51

fun. No sh refers to a k a kind of

10:55

writing. It's a genre of writing. There

10:58

are officially 24 official histories

11:01

across China, Chinese history. The

11:04

dynasty that follows the previous

11:07

dynasty writes the official history of

11:08

its predecessor. Okay. Ironically, we do

11:12

not yet have an official history of

11:14

theQing dynasty, the last dynasty.

11:16

That's an ongoing big football project

11:19

of of a game of, you know, tension

11:21

within China today. Okay. How to write

11:23

that history of the last dynasty. but

11:25

quoteunquote we have 24 um that's this

11:28

official history you know emperors

11:31

dynasties battles natural disasters

11:32

recorded by state authorities okay but

11:36

then there's something else okay that's

11:38

not all we look at that's not all we

11:41

talk about there's also this kind of

11:42

idea in Chinese of yes wild history

11:47

that's outside things that happened in

11:50

the past that are not in those official

11:52

histories but are still worthy of

11:54

talking about that are still worthy of

11:55

remembering. Okay. And that's like

11:57

folklore, families, women, popular tales

11:59

not recorded by state authorities. And

12:02

you know, so you one way you can think

12:06

about Chinese history is that it's the

12:08

tension between these two things. Okay?

12:10

It's like also going back to the sea

12:12

metaphor, high tide and low tide,

12:14

whatever you want to say. Okay? There's

12:15

the stuff that's officially recorded. On

12:17

this day, the emperor said this, but

12:19

then there's all this unofficial stuff

12:21

that we piece together and say what was

12:22

really going on. Okay, this what is so

12:26

great about Chinese history is that you

12:28

actually don't need a textbook. There

12:29

are so many sources. There's art,

12:31

there's so much writing, there's private

12:34

writing, there's writing by scholars,

12:36

there's debates, there's so much you can

12:38

look into. But take a look at again that

12:41

sort of palace. What I said is that

12:44

looking at itself at the palace, it kind

12:46

of tells you a story about Chinese

12:47

history. This is that sort of like

12:49

juncture type of place. The things that

12:52

happened in the hall of supreme harmony

12:53

are recorded in official type of

12:55

histories. But the stuff that happens in

12:57

the rear of the palace, this is the

12:59

hogong. That's where the imperial family

13:02

lived. Okay? That's actually where they

13:05

lived. They didn't live in the front of

13:06

the palace. This is a that's an

13:07

expression in Chinese. Hogong, the back

13:08

of the palace. That's the imperial

13:10

family. That's where they actually

13:11

lived. And that's where all of By the

13:13

way, if you watch Chinese dramas, family

13:14

dramas, they're all about that. Okay?

13:16

Nobody really cares about this, but

13:18

they're all about that, right? What's

13:19

going on? the the romance, right? All

13:22

this stuff, you know? Yeah, sure. Wild

13:24

history has a lot more to it than just

13:26

that, okay? I'm not endorsing any drama,

13:28

by the way. Uh but but but it's a way to

13:31

think about it. This is an incredible

13:33

hall. We will return to it in the last

13:35

class of the semester because in this

13:38

palace of everlasting spring and the

13:40

rear of the palace, on its walls are

13:42

depicted murals of the probably the

13:45

greatest novel of Chinese history, Hong

13:47

Mong, A Dream of the Red Chamber. images

13:50

from that novel uh were painted on the

13:53

walls of this kind of residential

13:56

complex for the imperial family uh you

13:58

know one of the consorts in the 19th

14:00

century that sort of uh p that that

14:04

those scenes or that novel is all about

14:05

a family in decline right so it's

14:08

actually I've always thought it's

14:09

extremely moving and thoughtprovoking to

14:11

think that the emperor that the imperial

14:14

family has these images on that wall

14:17

okay all right So let's talk about why

14:20

would you even take this class? Okay,

14:23

why talk about dynastic history? Why get

14:25

into it? Well, the the answer could be

14:28

because like China's a really important

14:30

place today, right? I think it's going

14:31

to have the largest economy in the

14:33

world, whatever. It has the second

14:34

largest population. It's an important

14:36

place. There's a lot of interesting

14:37

technological developments going on with

14:39

that, you know, all of that stuff. My

14:41

favorite of which are these like robots

14:44

that I'm sure if you've been to China

14:46

recently, I'm sure you've encountered

14:48

these. If you stay in a hotel and you

14:50

get takeout,

14:52

somebody brings it to the hotel front

14:54

desk and then this this Gichi red this

14:56

robot sends it to your room so you don't

14:59

have to actually talk to any human

15:00

beings. Okay, this was a this was a

15:03

thing that came in during COVID, I

15:05

think, and now it's just like standard

15:07

across the country. So, I mean, you

15:09

could set you get medicine, you get all

15:10

this stuff like that, but it was like my

15:12

first night in China this summer. I was

15:14

I arrived at like 1:00 a.m. for a

15:16

conference and then this like I got a

15:18

phone call and this it was like a

15:21

robotic voice and it said, "I'm here."

15:22

And I'm like, "What's going on?" And

15:24

then, "Please open the door." And I open

15:26

the door. It's one of these. And they

15:27

go, "Please press this button." And I

15:29

press the button and then it's like and

15:30

then there was this like rice and like

15:32

all this food, right? And it's like

15:34

they're walking all over these hotels,

15:36

right? And they even say like, "Please

15:37

excuse me. I need to get to the

15:39

elevator." So, it's I don't know why we

15:41

don't have them yet, right? And and and

15:43

and if any budding anthropologists in

15:45

the room, there's so much to study about

15:47

these these robots, right? About how

15:50

humans interact with them and such like

15:51

that. But yes. Okay. So, I understand

15:54

the current scene of China is worth

15:56

paying attention to is is is relevant,

15:58

is important. Okay. But then we get back

16:00

to this question, why study dynastic

16:02

China? One reason, okay, is that if you

16:06

spend time in China and you talk to

16:09

people in China, people in China talk

16:10

about their history all the time. Okay,

16:13

from from the top leadership all the way

16:15

down to everyday people, people driving

16:17

cabs that you'll meet, you know, just in

16:19

day-to-day life. Okay, history really

16:21

matters in this place. Okay, it's the

16:24

way that people talk about issues in the

16:26

present. Um, it also is really

16:30

contentious, right? I just mentioned to

16:31

you this kind of like question of the

16:33

official Ching history. There's been an

16:35

ongoing project to write the official

16:37

Ching history in theory since the days

16:40

of like Mao and Joe and Lie. It started

16:43

and then it stopped because of the

16:44

cultural revolution and then it got

16:45

started again in recent years and now

16:47

it's kind of again controversial. How do

16:49

you officially record that history? That

16:51

should tell you something. There's all

16:53

of these debates. There's all these

16:54

tensions that go on within China about

16:56

how to understand what happened in

16:59

dynastic China. Okay, we don't pay

17:02

attention to Well, the Wall Street

17:03

Journal did a cover of it. Okay, but

17:06

that kind of signals its importance,

17:08

right? So, I do not think in any way

17:12

that this class, Dynastic China, is less

17:14

relevant or less practical than modern

17:17

China. I'd say if you had to pick, take

17:19

this one. Forget about modern China.

17:22

Okay. the 20th century. It's a tough

17:25

century. This we cover a lot more

17:27

centuries here. Okay. So, you get more

17:29

bang for your buck. Okay. But they're

17:31

both good. I mean, they're, you know,

17:32

take it take it in 2026. Yeah. Okay. Um,

17:36

so now let me tell you another reason

17:39

kind of building on what I was just

17:40

talking about is that people in China

17:44

like to talk about their history. They

17:46

have a long there's a long recorded

17:47

history in China. So, that means there's

17:49

a lot to talk about. There's a lot to

17:51

debate and there's a lot to analyze. I'm

17:53

sure many of you may be familiar with

17:55

this opening sentence. Has anybody read

17:59

Sanguani, Romance of the Three Kingdoms?

18:02

I think m Professor Dung has a class on

18:04

Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Some of

18:06

you might be taking it or want to take

18:07

it. You should you should take it. It's

18:09

an interesting This is another one of

18:11

those two those great novels. Okay, we

18:14

talked about Journey to the West a

18:15

little bit earlier. This is Romance of

18:17

the Three Kingdoms and there's a this

18:19

opening lines of it right this

18:24

writes there's a saying there's a saying

18:26

in our country that

18:29

you know long divided it must unite long

18:31

united it must divide think about that

18:34

for just a second and then let me show

18:36

you this quote okay by Mark Elvin 1973

18:40

the Chinese empire is the major

18:42

exception in the preodern world to what

18:44

would appear to be the rule that units

18:46

of territorial and demographic extent

18:48

comparable to China are not stable

18:50

entities over long periods of time. So

18:54

one of the things where you say why look

18:56

at it, why study it? Why think about it

18:59

is because actually this kind of does

19:01

seem to happen, okay, that there are

19:04

periods of division where everything

19:05

falls apart, okay, and it looks like,

19:08

okay, this is going to be Italy and this

19:10

is going to be France and this is going

19:11

to be Switzerland and then all of a

19:13

sudden it comes back. Rome comes back.

19:16

Okay, Rome comes back and it keeps

19:18

coming back and you're like, why? Right?

19:21

What's going on? Right? And people, you

19:23

know, across the centuries noticed this,

19:26

right? It was like a thing they they

19:28

noticed and talked about it or even

19:29

anticipated. That's not to overstate

19:33

continuity in Chinese history. I don't

19:35

want you to think, oh yeah, 20,000 years

19:37

ago that was China and China today it's

19:38

like the it's not the same. It's very

19:41

different. Tons of things happen. Tons

19:43

of things change. But this conversation

19:46

that we're talking about right here is

19:47

very old, right? So I think Chinese

19:50

history is good for training your mind

19:52

about how to think about big difficult

19:54

questions. You have a ton of data. You

19:56

have a ton of information. You can think

19:58

on different scales. When people do

20:00

climate history, what's the first place

20:01

they look to? They look to China, right?

20:04

Because China wrote about its climate

20:05

for people in China wrote about climate

20:07

for like thousand at least 2,000 plus

20:10

years, right? All all sort of

20:12

meteorological phenomenon, comets, etc.

20:15

All of these records are in those

20:17

histories that I was talking about, you

20:18

know? So, it's really, really great to

20:21

think about history, right? If you

20:23

haven't taken another history course

20:25

here before, this is a great

20:26

introduction. Even if you don't want to

20:28

continue with China, right? You want to

20:30

go and do England, take this class and

20:31

then go think about England, take this

20:33

class and then go think about India.

20:34

Okay? You can you can do all of that

20:36

stuff. Okay? History is ancient, but

20:39

it's an ongoing conversation and really

20:41

uh filled with nearly endless

20:42

perspectives. And here's the key point.

20:44

this class about eavesdropping into that

20:45

conversation. This goes back to that

20:47

image that I was given to you. I take

20:48

you to the ocean, you swim. Okay, you

20:51

eavesdrop into the conversation. This is

20:53

a huge conversation. Lots of people are

20:55

going to say stuff. Lots of You're going

20:57

to have dowists. You're going to have

20:58

Buddhists. You're going to have

20:59

Confucians. You're going to have

21:00

Confucians who hate other Confucians. Uh

21:02

you're going to have terrible emperors.

21:05

You're gonna have some decent emperors,

21:07

but really bad emperors, too, right? You

21:10

know, you'd have everything, right? And

21:12

the it all comes together as people over

21:15

the centuries try to make sense of it

21:17

right and that's that ongoing

21:19

conversation that conversation continues

21:20

in China to today. So you get a little

21:23

in this class you get to eaves drop on

21:24

it right think about it a little bit

21:25

okay so here are the class goals and

21:28

aspirations okay first of all let me

21:30

tell you what the game plan is and it's

21:32

like a really intimidating slide so just

21:34

buckle up okay there you go so so

21:37

basically that's the game plan okay not

21:39

this part okay so not this this part's

21:42

modern China okay so that's the thing I

21:44

take two classes one does this and then

21:46

one does this okay so so uh look what I

21:51

can tell you is I'm a historian

21:53

primarily of this era, right? The Ming

21:56

andQing dynasties, the last two imperial

21:59

dynasties. That's my specialty. That's

22:00

what I love. But the thing is is that

22:03

because this is the class you're taking

22:05

at MIT that is dynastic Chinese history.

22:08

I feel I I have to give every era its

22:10

due. So, I really try I really go out of

22:13

my way even though I'm not like the

22:16

biggest fan of the Han dynasty, you

22:19

know, like I'm I don't I I love the Tong

22:22

Dynasty as a sort of like a historian

22:25

who works on another period, but I will

22:27

give you what I think is the essentials

22:29

to know about that era. Every period

22:31

that we cover, I try to get you, you

22:33

know, that those kernels, right, that

22:35

say, "Oh, wow, that's really

22:36

interesting. I didn't know that before."

22:38

So that when you look at this by the end

22:40

of the semester, you'll say, "I know

22:42

what happened pretty much across this

22:44

whole time span, right? I know

22:46

something. I can say something about

22:48

it." Okay? And then that way you go off

22:52

in your winter holiday and you can have

22:54

great conversations with your parents,

22:57

right? Or friends or you can travel and

22:59

you can visit places and say, "I know

23:01

what that is. I know when that was

23:02

built. I know what I know what's going

23:04

on here." Okay. All right. So class,

23:06

goals and aspirations,

23:08

learn something about China. 20% of

23:10

humanity. This is a good aspiration. We

23:13

should learn something about China,

23:14

right? Especially in the United States,

23:16

right? I mean, it's credible. I have to

23:18

say it. Okay. Learn something about

23:19

history. Okay. So there's two things

23:21

here. This is a class about China. It's

23:24

also a class about history. Okay? Of

23:27

course, these things can overlap, right?

23:29

But history is a discipline. It's a way

23:31

of thinking. Okay? We have certain ideas

23:34

in history. primary sources. Secondary

23:37

sources. Okay, this is a secondary

23:40

source. This is a secondary source.

23:42

These are not primary sources. Primary

23:44

sources referring to the original

23:46

sources that were written in the

23:49

original language by people at the time.

23:52

Okay? Those are the premiums in history.

23:54

Okay? But of course, we as historians,

23:57

we write textbooks. We write books,

23:59

right? So just realize history is not in

24:01

a textbook. Okay? Textbooks are like the

24:04

least. We historians look down on

24:07

textbooks, okay? We we don't like

24:10

textbooks, right? Because with

24:12

textbooks, you have to edit, you have to

24:13

take out, you have to do that. Go back

24:15

to the originals. Make your own

24:17

textbook, right? That's what we're going

24:19

to do in this class. Okay? So, that's

24:22

that's what I want you to think about

24:23

history. I don't want to turn you into a

24:25

walk encyclopedia. Sort of I do

24:27

actually. Uh that would be nice, but to

24:29

equip you to approach related issues.

24:31

One of the things I say, and I'll just

24:32

tell you right up here, yeah, it's a

24:34

it's a contentheavy class, right?

24:36

Because I sort of I don't know if it's

24:38

oldfashioned or what, but like I think

24:40

you just need to know it, right? I think

24:43

you need to know it. You need to leave

24:44

this class in command of knowledge.

24:48

Okay? And one of the things that you

24:50

will realize, you might think, oh, this

24:51

is a lot. I, you know, why do we have to

24:53

know all this stuff? When you go to

24:55

China, you will realize that people that

24:59

you encounter in everyday life know so

25:02

much about history. Okay? They blow they

25:05

will blow away the average American

25:08

about what they can say about history

25:09

that happened 2,000 years ago. Even if

25:11

it's wrong, even if it's wrong, okay?

25:14

Even if it's just like kind of like

25:16

romanticized or whatever, but they talk

25:18

about it. They know it. So, you got to

25:20

know it. Okay? That's the That's the

25:22

thing, okay? And it's not, and let me

25:24

just emphasize here why you should take

25:26

it, why I think you should take this

25:28

class, why I think maybe this weekend

25:30

you should convince your friends to take

25:31

this class, okay? Is that it's not

25:34

something you can just pick up like with

25:36

a book. Like so many people think with

25:39

history, oh yeah, I'll I'll over the

25:42

summer I'll read a book and catch up.

25:45

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You

25:47

don't. With computer science, with

25:48

physics, you don't just read a book over

25:50

the weekend and become an expert. Okay,

25:53

Chinese history is one of those fields

25:54

where you got to take a class in it. You

25:56

actually you got to drill it. You got to

25:58

know it. You got to think about it from

26:00

all these different angles and then you

26:01

can say you know something about it.

26:03

Okay, it's not actually something that

26:05

you just pick up with osmosis. Okay. Or

26:07

what you can pick up by osmosis by

26:09

reading Wikipedia and sort of bad

26:10

history, right? But that's what we're

26:12

going to try. We're going to try to do

26:14

something better than that in this

26:15

class. Yeah. Okay. Okay. And this

26:17

knowledge will stay with you. I always I

26:19

always say that. I always say that,

26:20

right? 50 years from now, let's say 30,

26:24

you graduate from MIT, you're talking to

26:26

your relatives or your children or

26:28

whatever it is. What are you going to

26:29

talk to them about? You're going to talk

26:31

to them about this class. You're going

26:33

to say, "Hey, you know, the three

26:34

kingdoms, I know something about that

26:36

because this is the type of thing that

26:37

people want to talk about, not whatever

26:39

Python or whatever, right? Like, you

26:41

know, it's like it's not it's not a

26:42

table of conversation, right? This is

26:44

this is I guarantee you I guarantee you

26:47

a holiday break of great conversations

26:49

after this class." a minimum. Okay. So,

26:53

why do I like Chinese history? Oh, wow.

26:55

Where to begin? Okay. Well, I went to

26:57

China for the first time in like right

26:59

around the right before the Beijing

27:00

Olympics. And that was me many years

27:02

ago. You can say I changed a little bit,

27:04

maybe a little bit. That's me in Taiwan.

27:06

I think I'm in a Yonga Dawang, which is

27:08

like a breakfast place. And I love it.

27:10

Right. I go like you get the you get the

27:12

dojang, the the the soy, it's soy beans,

27:15

sort of a milk substance with yo, this

27:18

fried doughnut. It's like heaven. You

27:19

know what I mean? It costs like $2,

27:21

right? And it's just like it's

27:22

incredible. Huge lines, right? Um, so

27:26

that was me. And then, okay, food. So,

27:28

it's not just about the food, but we but

27:30

we can talk about food. I don't think I

27:32

have to convince most of you. China's

27:35

got really good food, right? It's got a

27:36

ton of different types of food. Okay.

27:38

Uh, the US Chinese food has gotten

27:40

better in my lifetime, but it's still

27:42

it's that's right. It's was starting at

27:44

zero. So I mean so so the thing is is

27:47

that it is better but it good Chinese

27:49

food in the US tends to be expensive in

27:51

China you just get so much right you

27:53

have so many options everything like

27:55

that we can talk about food I have

27:57

another class called nature and

27:58

environment in China we do a whole week

28:00

on food so if you really want to talk

28:02

about food maybe consider that class but

28:04

we'll do a little bit of food here okay

28:06

uh and then this is me playing ma jang

28:08

right so what I'm trying to say what I'm

28:10

trying to say is that you get in right

28:13

when you go to a place and Maybe it

28:15

won't be China for you. It could be

28:16

Japan or it could be Mongolia. It could

28:18

be Russia. It could be

28:20

Italy. You know, something's going to

28:22

grab you. It might not be the coliseum.

28:25

It might be just like everyday life, you

28:27

know, drinking espresso, you know, in a

28:29

Florentine afternoon. And you go, I just

28:32

love this. I really love this. And then

28:34

you go, I want to learn the language,

28:36

and I I want to I want to understand

28:38

what happened here. And I want to

28:40

understand what happened here in the

28:41

19th century. I want to understand what

28:42

happened here 2,000 years ago. Okay, I

28:44

want this to happen to you. It doesn't

28:46

have to be China. It can be, right? It

28:48

could be Mexico. It could be any place,

28:49

but someplace that you weren't born in

28:51

and then you go there and you go, "Wow,

28:52

I really want to understand this place."

28:54

That's a wonderful part of the human

28:55

experience. I hope you all have it.

28:57

Okay? But that kind of happened to me in

28:59

China. Okay? And it wasn't one moment,

29:01

right? It was many meals. It was many

29:03

gambling sessions. It was it was it was

29:06

it was this is me on the many years ago

29:09

probably going to Tibet. I can't

29:11

remember, but it was on one of those

29:13

sleeper trains, you know, back in the

29:14

day. I have to say I have become like a

29:17

middle-aged Chinese person in the sense

29:19

of because I've been in China now for

29:22

the like the past 20 years and I've seen

29:24

all this change. So, I remember like,

29:26

oh, the green trains that went super

29:28

slow and like you had to stay on them

29:29

for like overnight. Like the train I

29:32

took the train from Beijing to Shanghai.

29:33

The first time I took it, it was like I

29:35

was standing. It was I was eating

29:37

instant noodles praying that they

29:39

wouldn't like tip over in a very crowded

29:42

car because we didn't even have there

29:44

weren't even tickets left for a bed,

29:46

right? I mean, and now it's like, oh,

29:48

it's it's business class highspeed rail

29:50

all the way, right? I mean, it takes

29:52

four what five hours? Five hours, right?

29:54

Five hours now, right? It's totally

29:56

changed, right? But there were a lot of

29:58

fun experiences on Chinese trains back

30:00

in the day. you talk to Chinese parents

30:02

or you talk to people of a certain

30:03

generation, they will have stories for

30:05

you about taking long, long train rides

30:06

in China. Uh, and the whole generation

30:09

who grew up in the culture revolution

30:10

have these especially. Yeah. Uh, and

30:12

then I've gone back. Oh yeah, I wrote a

30:14

book. I was there this summer talking

30:16

about my book. Right. And then, oh yeah,

30:18

the last thing I want to say. So, I got

30:21

into it. I continue to go back. I can't

30:23

tell you the number of times I've been

30:24

there. I probably live there, you know,

30:26

for a few years overall, but it's like

30:29

more every year I go for a few months.

30:31

This summer I went for, you know, a

30:33

month and a half or something like that.

30:35

The one thing that I say that really

30:37

really has struck me in terms of changes

30:40

when I first went to China, hey, how you

30:42

doing? When I first went to China, you

30:44

know, the coffee was terrible. Uh, and

30:46

it and for somebody addicted to

30:48

caffeine,

30:50

uh, it was brutal. And I had to drink a

30:53

ton of tea to make up for it, right? And

30:55

it's just like too much tea. You know

30:57

what I'm saying? Uh, but I love tea,

30:59

don't get me wrong. Coffee is now way

31:01

better. Okay, coffee I and I actually

31:04

tweeted about this like when I got back.

31:06

Coffee in China is now better than

31:08

coffee in the United States. I come back

31:09

here and I'm like, this I'm just so

31:11

disappointed. The thing is is that what

31:14

China has actually accidentally

31:16

perfected and I say is in you can also

31:18

find this in Thailand. You also find

31:19

this now in Korean cafes is nondairy

31:23

espresso drinks. And it's just it it's a

31:25

world that like Starbucks is just out to

31:27

lunch. They're not getting this. You

31:29

take espresso, you create an Americano

31:32

with sparkling water and you add lemon.

31:35

Incredible. Grapefruit. Incredible. Liy,

31:39

whatever. like all of these they call

31:41

Chongi Cafe, right? trying me cafe like

31:44

creative Americanos and I and I say like

31:47

why don't you take this global you know

31:49

this is this is the next thing I mean

31:51

this is the next bubble tea for sure but

31:54

it's like I I think that there's an

31:55

interesting thing of like they feel like

31:57

oh but maybe it's we're not doing it

31:59

right like the Italians enough with the

32:01

Italians enough with the cappuccinos we

32:04

got to go to the next phase it's all

32:06

these milky drinks it tires you out

32:09

right this is like the absolute pickup

32:12

low calorie too. Love it. So, check out

32:15

coffee in China next time you're there.

32:17

Okay, that's been an interesting change.

32:18

All right, let's talk about syllabus.

32:19

All right, so I just have like a bunch

32:21

of I usually I used to do a printout

32:23

syllabus, but then MIT students told me

32:25

that like nobody does that anymore. So,

32:28

then I felt like a historian, but in a

32:30

bad way. So, I said like, okay, let's

32:33

just put it all online, right? So, uh no

32:35

prerequisites. You're all welcome to

32:37

enroll. You can bring guests. Just let

32:40

me know. You can bring your parents.

32:41

Some people bring their parents, right?

32:42

If they're visiting, right? They want

32:43

to, you know, again, what are you going

32:45

to bring your computer science classes?

32:46

Come on. Right? You want to bring them

32:48

here, right? Okay, that's fine. Just let

32:49

me know that they're coming. Okay? Uh

32:51

it's Chinese. Chinese is not a

32:53

prerequisite. Some of you are doing a

32:55

Chinese minor. Okay? That's fine. And

32:58

for all of the primary sources that I

33:00

give you this semester, I'll try to give

33:02

you the Chinese original if you want to

33:04

look at it. If you're learning Chinese,

33:06

take challenge yourself. Take a look at

33:08

it. Right? You don't have to look at it,

33:10

but you can. So that's an option. If you

33:12

want to do the minor for this class, you

33:14

should be looking at those. Okay. Um, so

33:18

that looks good. Study guides. Okay. So

33:20

the thing is is that when I first taught

33:23

this class, it was like essays and then

33:25

I was like, I'm done with essays. I had

33:27

a I had a historical evolution at MIT

33:30

and I realized if you teach the class on

33:31

Chinese history, you got to offer an

33:33

exam. For those of you who know about

33:35

Chinese history, you know how important

33:36

exams are in Chinese history. you'll

33:38

realize, yeah, you you need an exam. So,

33:40

I just do midterm. We're going to have a

33:42

final. Don't worry. The average of the

33:44

midterm last year, it about every year

33:47

tends to be about a 90. Most of the

33:49

students who take the class, let's just

33:51

be frank here, modern China, we get 40

33:53

or 50 maybe. Mo many many people get

33:56

A's, A minuses, A pluses, whatever. Uh

33:59

some people will get B's, the occasional

34:02

C. If you get below a B, you're trying.

34:05

Okay. uh you if you get in the B range

34:08

uh it's it's you know what I mean to say

34:11

here is if you put the work in you put

34:13

the effort in there shouldn't be a huge

34:15

issue okay with getting the grade that

34:18

you want okay uh it is a challenge you

34:21

do have to study all right you do have

34:22

to study and some people will bomb the

34:24

midterm some people and everything like

34:26

that and that's that's okay it's not the

34:27

end of the world we'll figure it out

34:29

I'll show you the group here's the

34:30

grading rubric we'll talk about this

34:32

okay so first things attendance let's

34:35

say let to say something about

34:36

attendance right up at the front. There

34:38

are two excused absences over the course

34:40

of the semester. You come in, you scan

34:42

the QR code. That's how we know that

34:44

you're in class. Okay? You have two

34:46

excused absences. Just let us know.

34:48

Okay? I realize some of you want to take

34:50

this class and you have a conflict with

34:53

another class. That's a partial

34:55

conflict. Not a complete conflict, but a

34:57

partial conflict. If you have a partial

34:59

conflict and you can come to 50% of

35:02

these classes, then the Linda, the TA

35:06

and I will make an an arrangement for

35:08

you. You can come. We will not take you

35:10

down if you have a class conflict that

35:12

you show us your schedule and you show

35:13

us I have this conflict at this time and

35:15

we'll give you two extra writing

35:17

assignments over the course of the

35:18

semester. And that way we just take the

35:20

question off the off the table. So you

35:21

can but if you want that arrangement,

35:24

you got to let us know in the next week

35:25

or so, okay? Because we need to know

35:27

that. All right. So, we're happy if to

35:30

accommodate, but otherwise we're really

35:32

hoping everybody will be here, you know,

35:33

most of the time. Okay. Um, so there's

35:37

so in terms of writing, the major

35:39

writing that you will do over the course

35:41

of the semester is your discussion

35:42

responses. I'll tell you about what I

35:44

expect from those discussion responses

35:46

in just a second. There are 10 of them.

35:48

Each of them is worth two points. If you

35:51

do a decent job on them that you get the

35:53

two points, right? That's as simple as

35:55

that. You can do it late. It's worth one

35:57

point if it's late. Okay, that's just

35:58

it's just we every time like in every

36:01

semester somebody comes and says I'm I'm

36:03

didn't do any of them. I didn't know

36:05

that, you know, they were required or

36:07

something like that. Okay, just letting

36:09

you know we will accept it late. That's

36:10

what it's worth if it's late. Okay,

36:12

there's a geography quiz. All of the

36:15

quizzes and the tests with the exception

36:17

of the final, okay, there will be a

36:20

retake and it's open to everybody. Okay.

36:24

So, what that means is you come in, you

36:25

do the geography quiz. If it didn't go

36:27

well, you can take it again and I'll

36:29

just take the highest score. If you

36:31

can't make it the day of the geography

36:32

quiz because you have to take an absence

36:34

or you have one of those conflicts that

36:35

I just mentioned, that's fine. There

36:37

will be one retake. Okay? Same with the

36:40

classical text quiz, right? Where I quiz

36:42

you on with Confucious and the Dowist

36:44

and all that. One retake offered

36:47

midterm. We do one retake offer for the

36:49

midterm, too. Okay? And it's like a

36:51

totally it's a new exam. Some people

36:53

like literally take everything twice

36:55

because they just like the challenge.

36:57

I've had that. MIT students are

36:59

incredible. Okay. It's like you took

37:02

this midterm, you got a 95. I want to

37:04

take it again. All right. We're going

37:07

for that five points, right? I get I got

37:09

it. Okay. All right. Uh so there is a

37:12

timeline uh project. It's not It's not

37:14

bad. You just propose a topic. This is

37:17

where you can kind of follow your own

37:19

interests. If you want to do the history

37:21

of a certain type of fashion in China,

37:23

Chinese certain type of Chinese food,

37:25

you can follow that over time. You just

37:27

create a timeline. I give you all the

37:29

sort of way. How do you create the

37:30

timeline? That's it's not bad. And the

37:32

final exam and then that's the final

37:33

grade. One thing that we do, and I just

37:35

want to say we're really uh excited this

37:37

semester, we have a TA from the HAS

37:39

program, Linda Rinsswan, uh who's

37:41

wonderful to join us. Anthrop anth

37:44

historian his history a historian of

37:47

nuclear energy. So really really excited

37:49

to have Linda and Linda does had does

37:51

does know Chinese history fairly well.

37:54

So definitely co correspond with me,

37:56

correspond with Linda during the

37:57

semester as as I try to do in all my

38:00

classes. We'll do one sort of it's like

38:03

a required office hour mid semester. So

38:06

you come to my office, Linda and I will

38:08

greet you and we talk for 10 minutes

38:10

about whatever you want to talk about

38:12

typically about what what confuses you

38:15

in Chinese history or questions about

38:16

the midterm or questions about whatever.

38:18

Right? So everybody does that and that's

38:21

also part of the grade. Okay? So you you

38:23

you do have to do that once you're happy

38:25

to answer questions at any time. Okay?

38:27

But that's that's uh that's what we do

38:29

expect. Okay. All right. So let me just

38:32

say something final point about the

38:33

discussion posts. Okay. So, discussion

38:36

posts. Um, yes, I'll do I I've changed

38:40

this. I'll do Wednesday. I'll give it to

38:43

you Wednesday before 3:30. I'll give you

38:46

a little bit extra time than Tuesday.

38:48

So, get them in before that time, the

38:50

Wednesday class. Okay? Basically, what

38:53

you have to do is you have to look at

38:55

the readings uh and you have to answer a

38:58

question. I'll give you an example uh

39:00

for next week's discussion post just a

39:02

second. You write two paragraphs. Okay?

39:05

Uh and the the the two paragraphs,

39:09

right? I'll tell you exactly how we want

39:11

the structure of these paragraphs to

39:12

look like. You have some agency and

39:15

creativity in it. Don't worry. But I'll

39:17

tell you about what we're looking for.

39:18

Okay. Um so the thing I want to just

39:21

remind you all the facts, inferences,

39:24

uh judgments and opinions, right? How

39:27

you sort of separate out those things,

39:29

right? facts, things that we know to be

39:31

true based on evidence. Bees make honey.

39:34

Inferences, statements of the unknown,

39:35

based on the known, derived from reason,

39:37

right? Judgments, and then all the way

39:39

to opinions, like I like whatever ice

39:41

cream. Okay? When you write a post, I

39:44

don't want just opinion, right? I hate

39:47

Confucious, so congratulations. Okay?

39:50

But that's not a post. Okay? I I we want

39:52

a combo, right? You can give me the

39:54

opinion at the end in the second

39:57

paragraph. The first paragraph, we want

39:59

you to focus on facts and inferences

40:02

based on the primary sources of that

40:04

week's reading. So you look at the

40:06

question, you try to answer based on the

40:09

primary sources, and then in the second

40:11

paragraph, you can expand into judgments

40:13

and opinion. Okay? So that way you know

40:16

what we expect. You know how to do it.

40:18

All right? So laid it out, I think

40:21

really just clearly and nicely for you

40:23

there. Let's take a look at what we're

40:24

doing next week. I have to tell you this

40:27

is just give you an example for next

40:28

week. So next week on Monday you come in

40:31

I'm going to like rush you through the

40:33

rise of agriculture the origins of state

40:36

formation in China and we end up on next

40:39

Monday with I think one of my favorite

40:41

lectures of the whole semester the rise

40:43

of writing in China and writing is super

40:45

fascinating is it's a technology and

40:47

China was a very early place to have it

40:50

so what is writing what counts as

40:52

writing right one of the questions I

40:54

think we have are emojis writing right

40:57

what counts as it you can answer that

40:58

question if you'd like next week. Right?

41:00

So, this is what we're kind of doing,

41:02

right? So, you look at it, you'll notice

41:05

up here every week, you'll see, wow, it

41:07

looks like there's a lot of reading.

41:08

There's not that much reading. You just

41:11

have to break it down. The primary

41:13

sources are what you really need to

41:15

focus on. That is the original, right?

41:18

Translation of oracle bone inscriptions,

41:21

something like that. Translations of Joe

41:24

Bronzes, right? You'll see those are

41:25

primary sources. That's what you focus

41:27

on. But if you're like, I don't really

41:30

understand what this is, then you go to

41:34

secondary source, which for the

41:36

beginning part of this class will be

41:38

Leong's Early China. Very nice book.

41:40

I've given you sort of selections from

41:41

it. I've uploaded them. Right. This is

41:43

like a pretty like sophisticated book of

41:47

early Chinese history, right? It's it's

41:49

like really good. It's it's fairly

41:51

comprehensive. Yeah. And then if you're

41:53

like, I took a look at this and I still

41:56

don't know what's going on. We have the

41:59

textbook big picture. Okay, so this is

42:02

the optional textbook. Okay, I provide

42:05

you with three different ways to break

42:09

down sort of an era's writing or an

42:11

era's sources. The primary sources,

42:14

secondary sources, and a textbook. The

42:17

secondary sources in the textbook are

42:19

optional for you. Okay? If you want to

42:22

read it, you can read it. If you feel

42:24

you need it, some some errors you might

42:26

feel, I know three kingdoms, I don't

42:27

need it. Right? I know Tong Dynasty, I

42:29

don't need it this week. I'll just do

42:30

primary. But some errors you might be

42:32

like, oh, you know, North South

42:34

Division, I want to read the textbook.

42:36

Right? So, it's there if you need it.

42:38

Right? So, it's not as much as it looks.

42:40

Okay? And I got the uh dynasty China

42:43

geography quiz study guide. I put up all

42:45

the study guides. Don't worry. Okay.

42:47

Questions?

42:49

How's it sound?

42:52

Interesting. Yeah. How do you compare to

42:55

your other classes? Yeah. Pretty good,

42:57

right? Yeah. Like, let me know. Let me

42:59

know. You know what I mean? You know,

43:00

like, all right. So,

43:04

let's talk about how we talk about

43:06

Chinese history. Periodization.

43:09

All right. There are ways. This is just

43:12

getting you into like foot in the door.

43:15

Foot in the door. Remember that long

43:17

sort of like list, that chronology I

43:20

gave you of all those reigns, dynasties,

43:22

whatever. Here's how we break it down.

43:25

First, preodern China. Preodern China.

43:30

This is like it's a loaded word. When

43:32

does modernity begin? It's like it's

43:35

kind of a useless phrase, okay? Because

43:38

like 50 years from now, it's like

43:40

they'll be like, "Was the 20th century

43:41

modern? It looks pretty old to us,

43:44

right?" But for the sake of

43:46

conversation, for the sake of dialogue,

43:49

you should know that in China officially

43:52

in Chinese textbooks in China today,

43:55

modernity begins with a very actually

43:57

western centric notion of the opium

43:59

wars. Okay? Middle of the 19th century.

44:03

Okay. Basically, so you have like modern

44:05

history, preodern history

44:09

coming back.

44:11

Ah, good. Thank you. Okay. I said to the

44:16

computer, thank you. Okay. So, so, so

44:19

preodern. Sometimes we could also say

44:21

traditional. Okay. Uh, so this is just

44:25

like I'm not endorsing these terms. I'm

44:27

just letting you know these are the

44:29

terms you may encounter. Okay. Uh, so

44:32

when we say imperial China, imperial

44:35

China, that has a very very fixed

44:38

beginning and end date. That is not like

44:40

open to interpretation. Imperial China

44:42

begins in 221 B.CEE or or or BC,

44:46

whatever have you. Okay, it begins when

44:48

Chin Shaong proclaims himself to be the

44:51

first emperor. He was the first person

44:52

to do it. Realize writing was invented

44:56

in China approximately in 1200 BC.

45:00

China's got a thousand years of recorded

45:03

history before there were any emperors.

45:05

Before there were any. So this is the

45:08

amazing thing about thinking about scale

45:10

in terms of Chinese history. When when

45:12

Confucious was alive, he was already

45:15

thinking about the deep past in

45:17

antiquity. We think of Confucious and we

45:19

go, "Wow, that guy lived a long time

45:21

ago." He was thinking of other people

45:22

thinking living a long time ago, 600

45:25

years ago, right? So this is just

45:28

imperial China begins with the

45:29

proclamation of the first emperor, which

45:31

was a new form of sort of royal

45:34

kingship. you know that sort of like

45:37

superseded everything that came before

45:39

it. That imperial system remains

45:43

basically the primary form of governance

45:47

in China until 1912. Well, this is

45:51

another thing of like when does it end?

45:53

1911. The Shinhai Revolution, many of

45:56

you been familiar with it, might have

45:57

heard of it, broke out in 1911. The

46:00

emperor abdicated in early 1912. So, as

46:04

a historian of late imperial China, I

46:06

insist on 1912. Okay? But you will

46:08

sometimes see 1911. It's not okay. What

46:11

are we talking? We're talking about a

46:12

couple months here. Okay? It's I won't

46:14

mock you down if you say 1911. Okay? Uh

46:18

it's it's when China had an emperor.

46:20

Okay? That's what we're talking about.

46:21

All right? We also sort of have a few

46:24

periods periodizations that we can say.

46:27

Now, think about sort of like history

46:29

that you might have encountered in AP

46:31

world. I haven't taken AP World in like

46:34

a million years. So I don't know like

46:36

and I heard now it's starting like 1500.

46:38

Is that right?

46:39

>> 1300.

46:40

>> 1300. Still way way too late. What a

46:43

tragedy. Okay. But it's a it's it's it's

46:45

it whatever it is. So you basically

46:47

start in like the late medieval period

46:49

or medieval. Okay. We have early China.

46:53

Okay. This is again really good book on

46:56

early China. What is early China? Early

46:58

China basically means the origin of

47:00

whatever we can talk about when it

47:02

happened to basically

47:06

the end of the Han dynasty about 200

47:12

common era 200 AD okay approximately

47:15

like that okay appro roughly then we

47:18

enter we can talk about another era

47:21

called the middle period or medieval

47:23

China and that's from that end of the

47:25

Han that's a a great way I know

47:27

everybody will here. Well, this is a

47:28

better way to think about it. The three

47:30

kingdoms period, right? Okay. The three

47:32

kingdoms period is like the end of early

47:34

China. You can think about we're

47:36

entering a new era at that point. Okay.

47:39

So, you can say that's approximately

47:40

medieval China, which you go when does

47:43

quote unquote medieval or middle period

47:45

China end?

47:46

I mean, you some people say, do you put

47:48

it before the Mongols? Do you put it

47:50

after the Mongols? Is it about a

47:52

thousand? Okay. I'm just doing really

47:54

really traditional rain dates here. I

47:58

founding of the Ming dynasty. You don't

48:00

have to it's approximate. Okay. And then

48:02

the last two dynasties are something

48:05

like late imperial China. Sometimes

48:07

you'll also hear this like early modern

48:09

China. It all depends on what type of

48:11

historian you're talking to. If you're

48:13

talking to a European historian, you

48:16

might say early modern because that's

48:17

how they talk. Okay. Late imperial China

48:20

is how like if we if the Chinese

48:22

historians are together in in a in a in

48:25

a bus that's how we go oh late imperial

48:27

right because we all know what that

48:28

means okay so either one is fine okay

48:31

but just realize this is how you break

48:33

it down this very long periods yeah of

48:35

history all right usually

48:38

should we look at this I don't know

48:43

the computer answered the question well

48:45

uh I always I mean let's let's just well

48:48

take a peek Okay. This is like this

48:51

really like Let's see. Is it going to

48:54

go? Okay. H this like very forboding

48:58

music. Oh, no. It then it then it just

49:00

like it just All right. Let me try one

49:02

more time. Let me try one more time.

49:04

Okay. If it goes This is like a kind of

49:06

fun sort of like

49:08

It's going to go.

49:12

Okay. I'm losing patience with it. Okay.

49:14

Let's So basically that was a sort of

49:16

like it's like a looking at the borders

49:18

of Chinese uh reigns over time, right? I

49:22

can show it to you. I'll put a link

49:23

online. Okay. So we're going to get now

49:26

maybe for the last half hour of class.

49:29

I'm going to talk about sort of like a

49:31

few more like big questions, big ways to

49:33

think about Chinese history. And then

49:35

we'll do a tour of China, which is like

49:37

always again really fun. Uh so let's

49:40

talk about a Chinese history hack. North

49:42

and south, east and west, right? Okay,

49:45

these are just cardinal directions,

49:46

right? So, we have a western Joe and we

49:50

have an eastern Joe, right? We have a

49:53

western Han and we have an eastern Han.

49:57

That basically means in the early period

49:59

of China, in early China, basically we

50:02

have Western capitals and eastern

50:05

capitals. Okay. Yeah. As time goes on,

50:09

this changes. This shifts. Okay. the

50:12

Tong dynasty in middle in medieval China

50:15

7th century 8th century 9th century

50:17

approximately around here there's a

50:20

still a western capital and still an

50:22

eastern capital of Chongan Xian and

50:24

Lyang but once you get to about the year

50:27

1000 this shifts and now we don't have

50:29

western eastern capitals we have

50:30

northern and southern capitals and

50:32

that's that Beijing and Nanjing right

50:34

you know Beijing northern capital

50:36

Nanjing southern capital so what's going

50:38

on well what you have to realize is that

50:40

over a very very long period of time the

50:43

Chinese people migrated south okay there

50:46

was a major migration of people okay

50:48

from from the north China plane okay to

50:51

the south as the south is basically

50:53

filled in with rice agriculture okay the

50:56

south that area south of the Yangzi

50:58

river don't worry I'll show you where

50:59

the river is in just a second it was

51:00

really swamp and marshland okay it

51:04

population as early as the Han dynasty

51:07

as early as around the year zero there

51:09

were people moving down there. Okay,

51:12

that picked up over the first thousand

51:15

years of this era, right? So from the

51:17

year zero to about the year 1000, the

51:19

population moves south. And then by the

51:21

time you get to that medieval era,

51:24

sometime in the medieval era, most of

51:26

the people, most of the population of

51:28

China lives in the south. Okay? And the

51:30

south actually ends up becoming

51:33

rather wealthy, right? Because they they

51:35

grow rice, they have surpluses, they pay

51:38

taxes. Okay? Where do they pay taxes to

51:40

the north? Okay, so this is a very

51:43

interesting dynamic, right? So

51:45

basically, let me just phrase it to you

51:47

this way. You look at over here that's

51:48

that's Diana, big goose pagod. You'll

51:51

recognize that in a few weeks from now.

51:53

That's Shi, the capital of Shanchi

51:55

province. This a very very historic

51:57

city. It's basically like a a great

52:00

number of the early imperial capitals

52:02

are located there. Okay, this is uh this

52:05

is kind of what you might think of South

52:07

China looking like, right? mountainous,

52:09

green, uh, uh, water, humid, and rice.

52:14

Okay. So, that's that's what that's

52:16

South China in a nutshell. Okay. All

52:18

right. So, then we go back to that's our

52:21

map. Okay. Here's this is the Mongol

52:24

Empire. Okay. Mongol Empire. The Mongols

52:27

create once the sort of their capital

52:29

their their reign in China is

52:31

established they start they move their

52:34

capital to Dad the great capital which

52:37

is Beijing they they are kind of the

52:40

ones who actually move it to Beijing

52:42

right so the Beijing actually gets its

52:44

start not as a Han Chinese capital okay

52:47

it was actually the northern the

52:49

northern peoples right non-han peoples

52:50

who started it so after the Mongol

52:53

period you get that Nanjing in Beijing

52:56

mix. That's in the late the last two

52:58

dynasties, southern capital and northern

53:00

capital. And what you can kind of say

53:02

even to this day is that the economic

53:06

heart of the country, the most basically

53:09

profitable part of the country, highest

53:11

incomes are in that greater Shanghai

53:13

area also in Guangdong, Pearl River

53:16

Delta area. Okay, those southern hubs,

53:19

okay? Those are the economic engines of

53:21

the country. The political center of the

53:23

country is in the north. Okay. And

53:25

that's basically a bit been that way for

53:27

a few centuries actually go a number of

53:29

centuries, right? And that's what the

53:31

the southern southerners end up paying

53:33

for defense, right? The northerners

53:35

handle frontier defense, right? When you

53:38

see where Beijing is on a map and you

53:40

see where historical Mongolia was,

53:44

Beijing is almost not in China, right?

53:47

That's why it has all those sandstorms.

53:49

It's almost in what is it, the Gobi

53:50

Desert or whatever it is. It's re it's

53:52

really far up north actually. Um, so

53:55

that's a sort of Chinese history hack.

53:57

Think of north, south, east, west,

54:00

right? That tells you a lot about what

54:02

era you're in. Tells you a lot about the

54:04

sort of geography and the in the sort of

54:06

geography of power of the era. Okay,

54:08

talk about north and south. Okay, some

54:11

of you will, if you taken a class with

54:13

me before, you might have seen this

54:14

slide before. Let's talk about north and

54:17

south. Okay, what is north China? What

54:20

is South China? Okay, well, let me just

54:22

pause here for a minute. What what is

54:24

the northern United States like? Is is

54:28

Maryland north?

54:30

Is it south?

54:33

It's north. Why do you say it's north?

54:37

>> Okay. Right. So, you've answered this

54:39

question by referring to like a

54:42

historical political geography. That's

54:45

great because there is no real objective

54:48

answer to this question, right? Aside

54:50

from doing that, the same is true in

54:52

China. Basically, in the 20th century,

54:54

there was a line drawn and it was like,

54:56

"Okay, this is this is the Chinland

54:58

Mountains over here in the Hawaii, the

55:00

Hawaii River. Draw a line. If you're to

55:02

the north, that's the north. If you're

55:04

to the south, that's the south." And

55:05

that the joke I've always made, right,

55:07

is that in the I think 1950s, I think we

55:09

went over this 1950s, Joan lie, uh,

55:12

basically made it so that if you're

55:13

above that line, you got free subsidized

55:17

or free central heating from the state.

55:19

And if you're below that line, you

55:20

froze. uh because the south was

55:23

generally warmer. But you know, this is

55:26

the whole thing. It's one of those

55:27

things where it's like, how do I

55:28

describe it? I once did a new year f uh

55:33

Chinese New Year spring festival in

55:36

Guangyen, which is in the northern part

55:37

of Sichuan province. You could imagine

55:40

how frozen I was. That's pretty far

55:42

north, but staying south, right? That's

55:45

one of those border places, you know. I

55:47

went to bed at night with like eight

55:49

blankets over me. I shared a bed with

55:51

like a 60- year old man and and and for

55:55

days and I and there were so many

55:57

blankets over me I couldn't move. So

56:01

when I woke up I was just like I'm up

56:04

and then somebody came and took off the

56:06

blank. I mean, it was just incredible

56:08

that it was I don't want to say that's

56:10

there are many warm parts of the south.

56:12

Don't get me wrong. If you're in

56:13

Guangdong or Hong Kong, that's warm. You

56:15

know, that's a nice place to be in the

56:16

winter, but just to know this is this is

56:19

a very large area with a very diverse

56:21

climate. Okay. So, that can be really

56:23

cold. So, this is a Mason Dixon line.

56:26

Okay. This is kind of like this kind of

56:27

idea. Yeah. Uh but there are cultural,

56:31

you know, traits that we associate with

56:33

northerners. There are cultural traits

56:36

we associate with southerners. Again,

56:38

nothing is ever absolute, but we can

56:41

talk about that when we get into more

56:42

specific geographies. Okay, let's say

56:45

political jurisdictions of the PRC

56:47

today. I, you know, I realize this is a

56:49

dynastic Chinese history class. Um, so

56:52

you might be kind of like, why do we

56:54

need to know this? And I think the

56:56

reason you have to know this is because

56:58

well you you do need to know the

57:00

geography of China today to appreciate

57:02

where things are happening right to be

57:05

able to have a conversation about it

57:07

just realize there are 20 34 total units

57:09

23 provinces there also these autonomous

57:12

regions Tibet is today recognized

57:14

autonomous region Jang in Mongolia Ning

57:17

Sha the Hoy autonomous region and

57:18

Guangshi Dwang autonomous region so

57:20

there's all the also special zones right

57:23

Shanghai Chongqing and so forth Um, so

57:26

you know, just you know, we can talk

57:27

more about I have the whole geography

57:29

quiz for you. Uh, and I have the study

57:32

guide to tell you what exactly you need

57:34

to know. Okay. One other sort of like

57:38

way to think about Chinese geography is

57:41

this line. This is called the Hu Tong

57:44

Chong line. And it was so interesting

57:45

this summer. I finally got a chance to

57:47

visit Tong Chong. And you see, you might

57:50

not find that impressive, but like

57:51

actually Tong Chong is not a

57:52

particularly famous place. The only

57:54

reason why Chinese people across the

57:55

country know about it is because of this

57:57

line. But it's actually a great place.

57:59

Uh, and it's it's a really fun part.

58:01

It's in Yunan Province. I have some

58:02

photos when we go through the when we go

58:04

through the tour here. Right. But the

58:06

key is is that basically this is 64%

58:10

of the area of the country and in 1934

58:13

it had 4% of the population. Okay? And

58:17

this is in 2015 it had 6% of the

58:20

population. Okay? So this is actually

58:22

something that hasn't changed all that

58:24

much, right? Most Chinese people live in

58:27

the red zone, right? They live in this

58:29

this area, right? This very high dense

58:31

area like you know the big cities, you

58:33

know, city with two million people

58:34

doesn't count as anything in China,

58:36

right? This is all that over here,

58:37

Tibet, Sing Jang, lots of land, not so

58:40

many people. Okay, so that's like a sort

58:42

of big way to do it. All right, so I was

58:45

going to do let me just say

58:46

pronunciation. Should I say this? Let me

58:49

do it really really quickly so that you

58:51

know I know many of you probably know

58:52

Chinese. Uh many of you speak Chinese.

58:55

Uh you know Chinese is tonal. That means

58:58

that it's very hard to be a beginner in

59:00

this language right because you're

59:01

constantly asking for like you're

59:04

constantly saying you know horse I miss

59:06

you but it's really your mom right? You

59:08

know, there's a there's all the it's

59:09

it's tricky when you're when you're

59:11

getting into it, right? Because uh

59:12

because the tone makes the difference,

59:14

right? Just realize that uh ju maybe

59:16

just going through a few things here.

59:18

The Z in the Z, right? It's like Z is

59:21

like a a hard. Okay. But these are words

59:23

that like I sort of encounter in the in

59:25

in in research, right? So, you know, oh,

59:29

okay. X, right? You see X, okay? It's

59:32

like uh it's like an sh, right? So,

59:36

right something like this. Okay. So,

59:38

just know like this is how this is how

59:40

the pronunciation works. Okay. All

59:41

right. What do I got? All right. Let's

59:43

start uh let's start talking about

59:46

China's geography. We got like 20

59:47

minutes left. Cover the country. Okay.

59:50

I'm going to start purely for no

59:53

apparent reason in Sichuan province.

59:56

Okay. It's just because this is what my

59:59

PowerPoint told me to do. I I opened it

1:00:01

up. I was like, "All right, let's we got

1:00:02

to start somewhere. Let's start over

1:00:04

there." Okay. You have probably

1:00:06

encountered Sichuan province before

1:00:08

because it's actually a pretty famous

1:00:10

province. It's got like compared to

1:00:12

other Chinese provinces, it's got a lot

1:00:14

of international cache in part because

1:00:16

look at all the Sichuan restaurants all

1:00:18

over the Cambridge Boston area, right?

1:00:21

When Chinese food traveled, right?

1:00:23

Sichuan high was a sort of kind of

1:00:26

cuisine that just traveled. A lot of

1:00:29

times the restaurants are not owned or

1:00:31

operated by people from Sichuan, but

1:00:34

they just created Sichuan restaurant. I

1:00:36

don't know why, but it was like there it

1:00:38

is. You will also sometimes see Sichuan.

1:00:40

All right, that's again that older

1:00:42

transliteration system. Same thing. It

1:00:44

refers to that province. Okay, there it

1:00:46

is. In western China, Sichuan is famous

1:00:49

for spicy food. Okay, a lot of parts of

1:00:52

China today have spicy food to be frank.

1:00:55

It's also famous for hot pot, right?

1:00:57

Sichuan is like where hot or chongqing.

1:01:00

Now I again I'm sort of like biased here

1:01:04

because I'm a historian of the imperial

1:01:06

period. I sort of take Chongqing and

1:01:08

Sichuan together. Culturally they are

1:01:11

together. They all speak a very similar

1:01:14

kind of Mandarin dialect. Okay. But

1:01:16

Chongqing was se was siphoned off from

1:01:19

Sichuan in the late in the 1990s. Okay.

1:01:22

And it's now it's sort of its own sort

1:01:25

of it's a separate political entity

1:01:27

today. But you can see Chongqing and

1:01:28

Sichuan culturally they're kind of in

1:01:30

this. This is Chongqing right here.

1:01:32

Okay. Right there. Okay. Uh it's also

1:01:35

home to Oh, let me just say one thing

1:01:37

about hot pot. The the problem I feel

1:01:40

about talking about Chinese food today

1:01:42

is that now China has beencome so

1:01:46

flattened and in a sense it's a good

1:01:48

thing. It's it's part of the progress of

1:01:50

the country. It's part of the wealth of

1:01:51

the country. But now every place has hot

1:01:54

pot, right? It's not like, you know,

1:01:55

you're going to go and you, oh, I got to

1:01:57

go to Sichuan. I got to go try the hot

1:01:59

pot. It's like, you're going to get hot

1:02:00

pot in Kuning and Yunan. You're going to

1:02:02

get, you're going to get hot pot in

1:02:03

Beijing, whatever. They have I realize

1:02:05

they have a Beijing hot pot. It's

1:02:06

different. I get it. But the point is

1:02:08

nowadays, if you're in a provincial

1:02:10

capital, you can pretty much get the

1:02:12

food of all the other parts of China. It

1:02:14

might not be good, but they will have

1:02:17

it. Okay? So, it's like it's like it's

1:02:19

kind of like Mexican in the US, right?

1:02:22

Massachusetts has it, right? Like, if

1:02:24

you want to eat it, they they have it,

1:02:26

right? Is it as good as Arizona? I don't

1:02:28

know. But like, you get what I'm saying.

1:02:30

All right. So, uh it's also home. The

1:02:33

panda, right? Sichuan's most famous

1:02:35

export besides the peppercorns. Okay. Uh

1:02:39

right. And and and the panda, right? We

1:02:41

talk a lot about the panda. The Just

1:02:43

realize something about the panda. Just

1:02:45

realize it is not important in Chinese

1:02:48

history. Okay? I don't I'm not I'm not

1:02:51

breaking any hearts here. It's a very

1:02:53

very lovable vegetarian bear. It fits so

1:02:57

well with so many of the aesthetics of

1:03:00

modernity in so many ways, right? Like

1:03:02

it is sort of friendly vegetarian and a

1:03:06

bear. How how do you get that

1:03:08

combination, right? I mean, it's like

1:03:11

evolution, right? I mean, okay, it is

1:03:13

actually a bear. Okay, so it is like

1:03:16

related to like the Russian brown bear

1:03:18

and all of that stuff. How did this

1:03:20

happen? Well,

1:03:22

I don't know how many years ago a bear

1:03:25

moved to Sichuan and said, "I like it."

1:03:27

And then just said, "I'm just going to

1:03:29

eat bamboo all the time." Right? And so,

1:03:31

like, so basically, you ended up with

1:03:33

that. Okay. uh the the panda became a

1:03:37

symbol in actually really the communist

1:03:41

era because the panda was not associated

1:03:44

with imperial symbols, right? The dragon

1:03:48

is an imperial symbol. The tiger is a

1:03:50

very ancient symbol. The elephant even

1:03:53

is an ancient symbol. All of these

1:03:54

things like are fair game. You can see

1:03:56

them in imperial history. You can see

1:03:57

them in ancient history. The nobody

1:03:59

talked about the panda. Nobody was

1:04:01

impressed by the panda. Okay. But then

1:04:03

that's why perfect. We're having a

1:04:05

communist revolution. We're throwing out

1:04:06

all the old. We got a new animal right

1:04:08

here. It's the panda. And it worked. You

1:04:11

just got to say it worked. It was

1:04:12

incredible marketing. And now it it's

1:04:14

it's on the World Wildlife Foundations.

1:04:16

Like it's their emblem, you know? I

1:04:18

mean, this is like it's the most famous

1:04:19

bear in the world. Let's face it. Um,

1:04:21

and then the other thing is with

1:04:22

Sichuan, you get this great culture of

1:04:24

tea houses that go back to the 20th

1:04:26

century. Sichuan also had a great number

1:04:28

of mafias. It's like we could talk about

1:04:31

mafias in China. The south was loaded

1:04:34

with them and they would hang out in the

1:04:36

tea houses and there was so many

1:04:38

interesting things that happened there.

1:04:39

It's got a great lifestyle. The way that

1:04:41

people talk about life in Sichuan, they

1:04:42

say it's right. It's like easygoing,

1:04:45

easy life. There's even this expression

1:04:48

when you're young, don't go to Sichuan.

1:04:50

When you're old, don't leave it. Okay?

1:04:52

There's there's expressions in China for

1:04:54

like everything that kind of give you

1:04:56

advice. And this is one of those

1:04:58

advices, right? So I I didn't listen to

1:05:00

this expression. I went and you know you

1:05:03

can see what am I doing now right? So uh

1:05:05

so it continued. Um one interesting

1:05:08

thing about Sichuan is that it is a

1:05:10

basin. It is a geological basin. What

1:05:14

that means is that it is surrounded on

1:05:16

basically all mo all sides. To get into

1:05:21

Sichuan is difficult. To get out, there

1:05:24

is one really easy way to get out, which

1:05:26

is through the Yangzi River, but it only

1:05:28

flows in one direction. So is you can

1:05:31

send rice out of Sichuan. You can send

1:05:33

people out of Sichuan, but getting into

1:05:35

Sichuan is rather difficult. That is

1:05:38

actually why across Chinese history,

1:05:40

it's been a place to flee to. So during

1:05:43

the Tong Dynasty, we're going to have a

1:05:45

really, really big rebellion called the

1:05:47

Anlan Rebellion. It's one of the most

1:05:49

famous devastating civil wars,

1:05:52

rebellions of Chinese history. The

1:05:53

emperor will go from Xian, he will go

1:05:56

from Chan. Don't worry, you you will

1:05:58

memorize all these places. You will know

1:05:59

what I'm talking about. And he will flee

1:06:02

into Sichuan. And actually, this

1:06:04

actually happened in the 20th century as

1:06:07

well. Some of you will know this, right?

1:06:09

Jang Kaishek's government, Jangu's

1:06:11

government when Japan invaded from the

1:06:14

east, right? in Nanjing fell the

1:06:16

government basically had to move to the

1:06:18

west and it moved to Chongqing which is

1:06:20

again basically the Sichuan region okay

1:06:23

so that's where they held out for the

1:06:25

war more or less so just realize this is

1:06:28

a big part of the sort of geography uh

1:06:31

of Sichuan that gives it its interesting

1:06:33

flavor there's another expression that I

1:06:34

love here when China has yet to fall

1:06:36

into chaos Sichuan is the first to fall

1:06:39

when China has yet to been pacified

1:06:41

Sichuan has yet to been pacified again

1:06:42

because it's hard to get too, right? So,

1:06:45

that gives it a unique culture in a way,

1:06:47

you know, really interesting. Okay, now

1:06:49

we continue on with our tour and let's

1:06:51

go. We're going to go from Sichuan. You

1:06:53

can see where Sichuan is right here.

1:06:55

Okay, that's Chongqing. Now, we're going

1:06:57

to go to the northeast. We're going to

1:06:59

go to Shyenshi province. Okay, now Shy

1:07:01

Province is if you love history and you

1:07:03

take this class, this is the province

1:07:04

you really got to go to. It's loaded

1:07:07

with history. You basically cross the

1:07:09

Chin Mountains down here in the southern

1:07:11

part of the province and you get right

1:07:12

up here. the it's called the Guanjong

1:07:14

region. Don't worry about it. But Xian,

1:07:16

right, Western Peace, literally or Chong

1:07:20

An was its older medieval name. That's

1:07:22

the capital of the province. That tower

1:07:24

that you see right there, that was built

1:07:27

a very long time ago. That was built in

1:07:29

the medieval period. It is not very

1:07:31

common across China to see towers that

1:07:34

are that old. It's an incredibly

1:07:36

impressive piece of architecture. You

1:07:38

probably know this place because, of

1:07:39

course, the Terracotta Warriors are

1:07:41

here. All right. more or less there.

1:07:44

This is where you would go if you're

1:07:45

going to go see them and that's

1:07:46

certainly something to go see. We of

1:07:48

course will cover them in probably a few

1:07:51

weeks. Okay, so we will cover all of

1:07:52

this. Let's talk a little bit about

1:07:54

local food, right? Again, the caveat

1:07:58

being nowadays in Xian you can get

1:08:00

whatever fish you want. You can get hot

1:08:02

pot, whatever. So again, you know, it's

1:08:05

all flattened, but there are still local

1:08:07

tastes and there are still local

1:08:09

specialties. Northerners in general eat

1:08:11

wheat. They eat uh you know not not as

1:08:15

riceheavy. So that it's a noodle eating

1:08:17

culture. Okay. Most of North China eats

1:08:20

noodles. And she is famous for it all

1:08:24

different types of noodles and noodle

1:08:25

type dishes. This is a salamian a

1:08:28

chishan salamyan. Right. So salamian is

1:08:31

it's from a county. It's like a sort of

1:08:33

it's a very nice it's got like a vinegar

1:08:35

taste. It's a little spicy. It's a

1:08:36

noodle dish. This is Does anybody know

1:08:38

what this is?

1:08:40

Yeah. Palo Yro palmo, right? This is a

1:08:43

lamb sort of. You take a like it looks

1:08:45

like a naan bread and you you you you

1:08:48

you destroy your hands by cutting it up

1:08:52

into a million little pieces and then

1:08:54

they pour like a soup in it with lamb.

1:08:56

It's delicious. It's super heavy. So

1:08:59

like when you eat this like you don't

1:09:00

eat anything else for the rest of the

1:09:01

day. Okay. Uh so it's it's it's fun.

1:09:04

It's it's it's it's really good. Now,

1:09:06

let me just tell you, when you're

1:09:08

learning Chinese history for the first

1:09:09

time, you're learning Chinese geography

1:09:11

for this first time, you will say, "How

1:09:13

is this true? This is totally not fair."

1:09:16

The province right next to Shanshi

1:09:19

Province is called Shansi Province.

1:09:23

Are you kidding me? Right? Like you say,

1:09:25

couldn't they couldn't they put it in

1:09:26

another place? Yeah. Listen, you just

1:09:28

got to learn it. You just got to learn

1:09:30

it. In English, this will be

1:09:32

transliterated. Okay? the one that I was

1:09:35

talking about, the ancient capital with

1:09:36

the terracotta warriors and all that

1:09:38

stuff. Two A's. Okay, there will always

1:09:41

be two A's. Shi, it's in the third tone.

1:09:45

Okay, it's another tone. If you come

1:09:47

over to this one, you go east, it's the

1:09:50

first tone, one A, right? Shi. Okay, so

1:09:54

for a Chinese person, these don't sound

1:09:56

alike. But when you're when you're in

1:09:58

the US and you're like, okay, what's

1:09:59

going on? You're like, seriously, I have

1:10:01

to learn this. Yes, you have to learn

1:10:03

it. So not the same. Okay, it actually

1:10:06

will make it easy for the geography quiz

1:10:08

because you'll know that approximately

1:10:10

in this area there's a place and you

1:10:13

it's approximately spelled the same way.

1:10:15

Okay, Shaji province really great place.

1:10:17

Lots of interesting stuff, lots of great

1:10:19

dowist temples, old temples to visit.

1:10:22

Also noodles, right? Dawian I believe is

1:10:25

from here. This is like a knife cut

1:10:27

noodle is famous from this region, you

1:10:28

know, hanging the hanging temples over

1:10:31

there. This really fun. Okay, continue

1:10:33

on.

1:10:35

Let's go. I think our next one. Let's

1:10:37

go. It's coming. Okay, Beijing. Okay,

1:10:39

the imperial capital Beijing. So, if you

1:10:41

look over here, we went from Sichuan and

1:10:44

we're going to the northeast. Okay, we

1:10:47

went through Shanshi. We went through

1:10:49

Shanchi. I sort of cut through HB. Okay,

1:10:51

and then now we're here in Beijing. How

1:10:54

many of you have been to Beijing? You've

1:10:56

been there. You've been there. You've

1:10:57

been there. How was it? What do you

1:10:58

remember? It was kind of smoggy.

1:11:01

>> It was kind of smoggy.

1:11:03

>> Okay. What do you remember?

1:11:08

>> Yeah, the palace is incredible. Yeah.

1:11:11

What else do I remember? The weather is

1:11:13

terrible. Look, you just got to you just

1:11:15

got to say the [snorts] weather. It's

1:11:17

like hot and then all of a sudden it

1:11:19

rains and it's like it's not a nice

1:11:21

rain. It's like a killer rain and it's

1:11:24

like I don't have an umbrella big enough

1:11:25

to handle this. And then there's tons of

1:11:28

traffic. I realized just being there

1:11:30

this summer, even though like all the

1:11:31

cars, many cars are now electric and

1:11:33

there's great public transit everywhere,

1:11:35

the traffic in Beijing is still really

1:11:37

bad. So, it's like whenever we were

1:11:39

like, "Oh, I'll be there in a half

1:11:40

hour." It's like, "No, just say an

1:11:41

hour." Okay. It was It's It's really But

1:11:43

it's loaded with historical sites. It's

1:11:46

an incredible place. I've been there,

1:11:47

you know, probably a dozen times in my

1:11:49

life, you know, over the years. And I've

1:11:51

You don't see everything, right? You

1:11:53

could always go back and see something

1:11:55

new there. So, it's it's really really

1:11:57

fun. Of course, many people who go to

1:11:59

see the Great Wall will go to Beijing to

1:12:02

see it. You actually don't need to be in

1:12:04

Beijing to see it. There's Great Wall in

1:12:06

Gansu Province out west. There's Great

1:12:08

Wall in other provinces, but Beijing has

1:12:10

the most famous ones. Like the panda,

1:12:13

just realized that this quote unquote

1:12:15

Great Wall was oftentimes not very

1:12:17

important. It was a little bit more

1:12:19

important than the panda. Okay, it was

1:12:21

mainly it was important in certain

1:12:23

periods of time in history and other

1:12:26

periods of time just nobody cared. Okay,

1:12:28

it just depended who was like

1:12:29

controlling Beijing at the time. Okay,

1:12:30

we'll get into all of this. Okay, but

1:12:32

just realize I I'll say one thing here.

1:12:35

I was going to say I have a little video

1:12:37

here I'll show you about Dongbe. Has

1:12:39

anybody ever been to Dongbe? You've been

1:12:42

to Dongay? Why did you go to Dongbe?

1:12:44

This is northeast China, Manuria. Where

1:12:46

did you go? Because I I was born there.

1:12:50

>> Oh, no way. You were born in Gil

1:12:52

Province. Fantastic. Fantastic. Where

1:12:54

else you went there?

1:12:55

>> Uh skiing.

1:12:56

>> You went skiing? Oh, nice. Okay. Yeah,

1:12:58

you went to like Halongja.

1:13:00

>> Yeah. Yeah.

1:13:01

>> Nice. I I was in Leoning this summer. I

1:13:04

had a very nice time. Great historical

1:13:06

place. Uh I was going to say so Dong is

1:13:09

definitely unique. Uh it's unique in a

1:13:12

number of ways. So you will see if you

1:13:13

go up to uh Haleyongjang, one of the

1:13:16

provinces, you go to Harbin, it's like

1:13:18

almost in Russia and it does have some

1:13:20

old sort of Russian architecture that's

1:13:22

around. It's very interesting to kind of

1:13:24

see. Uh Manuria is very important in the

1:13:27

20th century. You realize that like

1:13:29

during World War II, it's a big sight of

1:13:31

contention. Japan sort of sets up a

1:13:33

puppet government in Manuria. I guess I

1:13:35

would say what would I say about it?

1:13:37

Just realize that first of all and I

1:13:41

this is again one of those things I

1:13:43

notice over the years that people in

1:13:45

China today associate people with from

1:13:48

Dongbe with being very funny with being

1:13:50

humorous. Okay. And there's all of these

1:13:53

folks I'll just see if see if my video

1:13:55

plays. You could you can watch these

1:13:57

shows on Chinese TV. It's like a

1:14:01

humorous talk show.

1:14:05

So, so she's like from Dongbe. She's got

1:14:08

a Dombbe accent

1:14:12

>> and and and there's this like there's

1:14:14

like this kind of humor and I don't know

1:14:16

exactly how to describe it, but it's

1:14:18

like people just think Dome people are

1:14:19

funny. I don't I I I I don't know what

1:14:22

is there a scientific basis of this. I

1:14:24

don't know, but just realize that like

1:14:26

that's what people will say. Okay. So,

1:14:28

do you think it's true?

1:14:30

>> Yeah.

1:14:30

>> You think it's true? You think it's

1:14:31

true? They're a little bit funnier.

1:14:32

Like, you know, I don't know. Like, are

1:14:34

there parts of America where you'd say

1:14:36

like, "Okay, people from that state are

1:14:37

just funny." Do we have that?

1:14:39

>> Where are people funny? I don't think

1:14:41

Massachusetts people are that funny. I'm

1:14:42

going to be honest with you. I'm from

1:14:43

here. Where where are people funny?

1:14:46

>> I feel like it's more that we know where

1:14:48

people are. Excuse like jerks.

1:14:51

>> Okay. See, I see. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

1:14:53

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. We know where people

1:14:56

have attitude. Yeah. Yeah. Attitude for

1:14:58

sure. Yeah. Uh Yeah. you know, you know,

1:15:01

humor. It's kind of an interesting

1:15:03

question, right? Like like who's funny,

1:15:05

who's not, right? But like this is one

1:15:07

thing just to kind of throw in there,

1:15:08

right? All right. So, continuing on, we

1:15:11

don't have a ton of time left. I want to

1:15:13

take if you go south from Dong Bay, from

1:15:16

northeastern China in that area all

1:15:19

around Beijing, basically the south of

1:15:20

Beijing ma mainly, you get to this north

1:15:23

China plane and it's flat. This is a

1:15:25

very very old area. Okay, what I mean by

1:15:28

that is people have been farming here

1:15:30

for thousands of years. Very very early

1:15:32

Chinese history starts, you know, is

1:15:35

around here in a big big way. And this

1:15:38

is a fascinating place because on the

1:15:41

one hand, it's so important. It's near

1:15:44

at least the capital in the later eras.

1:15:47

It's also where the Yellow River sort of

1:15:50

it gets to the North China plane. And

1:15:53

this is where the Yellow River gets

1:15:54

really violent because the North China

1:15:56

plane is flat. So the Yellow River every

1:16:00

few hundred years changes course across

1:16:02

the North China plane and you can it's

1:16:04

devastating floods, crop failures and

1:16:07

there's chaos. That's in a way one of

1:16:09

the things you could say this is again a

1:16:11

generalization. Northerners have a sort

1:16:14

of like let's say the state has been

1:16:16

more interventionist in the north,

1:16:18

right? The state kind of originates in

1:16:20

the north, right? around in some ways

1:16:22

the control of the yellow river because

1:16:24

you have to control it is the south very

1:16:27

far far away right it's less control

1:16:30

more lass fair more like oh you know

1:16:32

tanga right heaven's high the emperor is

1:16:35

far away right it's a different

1:16:36

relationship you know that's what's this

1:16:38

it's sort of this is one of the ways

1:16:39

that you could think a little bit about

1:16:41

south north yeah uh confucious is from

1:16:44

the north China plane right he's from

1:16:46

Shandong province we'll encounter him in

1:16:48

a bit a number of the big early

1:16:50

confusion philosophers ers are from this

1:16:52

area. Okay. So, it's got like an

1:16:55

association, you could say, with um with

1:16:59

with Confucianism and with ancient

1:17:01

learning and with, you know, again, the

1:17:03

area around the late imperial capitals

1:17:05

as I mentioned, but it's also a place

1:17:07

you could say of in sometimes like

1:17:09

lawlessness, okay, in rebellions, right,

1:17:12

that threaten the state. One of those

1:17:15

big Chinese novels, right? Water margin.

1:17:18

This is the we've already went over. My

1:17:20

god, just one class. We went over three

1:17:21

of the big novels today. Yeah. Uh, this

1:17:24

takes place, you could say, in this

1:17:25

area. It's like outlaws, right? So,

1:17:27

there's it's a very interesting

1:17:29

location. It's a very interesting place.

1:17:30

All right, two minutes left. I use it.

1:17:32

By the way, I always use like all of

1:17:34

class time. Okay. I just like I just

1:17:36

keep talking. You know what I mean?

1:17:37

Like, I just can't shut up about this

1:17:39

stuff. I apologize, but like I just love

1:17:41

it. Okay. One really, really, really,

1:17:44

really, really fascinating thing that's

1:17:46

important in dynastic Chinese history is

1:17:48

this thing. North to south the Grand

1:17:50

Canal. This was like the superighway of

1:17:53

dynastic China. It is constructed,

1:17:55

believe it or not, you won't believe

1:17:56

this, but it's like when I tell you

1:17:58

this, it's like, well, where is it? Go

1:18:00

back. Go back, please. Here we go.

1:18:03

Where's my date? No, it doesn't. There.

1:18:04

Okay, whatever. I'll just tell you. The

1:18:06

origins of the Grand Canal go back to

1:18:08

the seventh century. Okay, so you got

1:18:11

me. This is one of those things in China

1:18:13

where you're like, "What? Really? What

1:18:14

do you mean? You mean like a canal was

1:18:17

constructed in the seventh century and

1:18:19

then remained being used until like a

1:18:22

100 years ago? Yes. Basically, yes. Uh

1:18:25

it doesn't it didn't flow in exactly the

1:18:27

same area. The origins of the Grand

1:18:29

Canal were actually this southern this

1:18:31

this one that you see here. It connected

1:18:33

the Tong Dynasty capital of Lyang with

1:18:36

the south. Okay. Then in later years it

1:18:39

got expanded and eventually in the late

1:18:41

in the later period it basically

1:18:42

connects Beijing and the South. that

1:18:45

goes all the way down. You could say

1:18:46

like to Nanjing, Hjo, that area all the

1:18:48

way from north. It's like you get on

1:18:51

there and you and you can go north

1:18:53

south. It's like you can transport

1:18:54

grain. The emperor can travel it if he's

1:18:57

going to the south, right? It's a super

1:18:59

important way that the empire was

1:19:02

connected. Today there's highspeed rail.

1:19:04

At that time there was the Grand Canal.

1:19:06

Okay, I realize we're out of time. So go

1:19:11

home, tell your friends. Tell your

1:19:14

friends, enjoy the weekend. I'll see you

1:19:15

on Monday. We'll finish up our tour of

1:19:17

China and continue onward.

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