Midterm Paper
Due: Friday, March 18, 5 pm, my office, Vollum 312
Length and Format: 5-7 pages, double-spaced, 1 inch margins
all around, 12 point fonts. Please spellcheck and number your pages! Essays
should be well-organized, with a clear thesis or argument that is 1) articulated
in the first or second paragraphs, 2) supported by evidence from readings,
and 3) reconsidered and fleshed out in a conclusion.
Evaluation: I will evaluate and respond to papers based
on (in order of priority):
- Degree to which you respond to the assignment and incorporate ideas and issues from class materials in your discussion;
- Extent to which you demonstrate clear understanding of basic terms presented in the course;
- the creativity and originality of your ideas
- The clarity of your organization and writing
Topic: In the first 7 weeks of the course we have considered a variety of theories concerning the complex relationships among new forms of mass media, powerful corporate or state interests, and emerging notions of "the masses" and "national communities". We have also considered various forms of emerging/transforming media in the context of the massive social, economic and political changes in China from late imperial times up to the early post-Mao reform era. Drawing on your choice of theorists (considered in the first three weeks of the course, with the addition of de Certeau), consider one genre of communication or cultural production in its historical context in China. For this, focus on one of the following pieces: Lee and Nathan, Arkush, Chu and Cheng, Poon, Chen, Padma 'bum, Erwin, Zhao, Pickowizc, Yang, or Latham. Several of them would also work as pairs (Arkush and Chu and Cheng; Pickowicz and Yang, Zhao and Latham).
For Theorists, consider specifically:
- How are they defining "media"? "the masses"? In relation to what forces or agencies?
- In what specific ways do mass media forms shape people's views of themselves and their communities? How are these processes different than "before"?
- What or whose interests do media forms represent?
- What are the possibilities for resistance/creativity/negotiation of "hegemonic" or culturally dominant messages and practices promulgated in mass media?
For Genres, consider specifically:
- What role did this form of communication play in the cultural politics of the time?
- How did the formal characteristics of this medium affect/shape forms of expression, identity or subjectivity (remember to consider not only content but its constitutive social practices)?
- How did practitioners draw on older forms of expression, images, ideas to articulate contemporary concerns?
- How did these practices articulate with other types of communication and the apparatuses of (competing) regimes?
- Did this medium contribute as some suggest to an increasing "integration" or "homogenization" of Chinese culture and society? Can we see here the workings of "hegemony" or "resistance" or both or neither?