HIST4180RH 平凡的聲音·不尋常的故事：紀錄片與傳記中的歷史與記憶

Those who control the past control the future; those who control the present control the past.

 ― George Orwell, 1984

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Memories of shared historical experiences serve as lessons for societies to learn from the past and inform the present. However, individual memories of ordinary people often become obscured behind the grand narratives of the official accounts of history. This is especially true in societies where history is not just an academic discipline, or a search for historical truth, but a powerful political weapon manipulated by state power to promote historical amnesia, and to impede critical examination of historical tragedies and injustice.

Citizens understand their responsibilities for the future by debating the moral meaning of history. While those in power can erase history or distort memories of past glories, traumas, and humiliation, the hijacking of history is followed by distortions of all kinds in politics, society, and identity. Public opinion pertaining to democracy and nationalism is inseparable from a collective memory of the nation’s past, be it truthful, selective, or manipulated.

This course will be an intellectual exploration of individual stories and voices, through the lenses of independent documentaries, memoires, biographies, and oral histories, in major historical events throughout the PRC period of modern Chinese history.  In parallel to the discussions of the narratives, we would also have the opportunity to speak to writers and documentary film makers who decided to document those stories that would otherwise be invisible and unheard. Milan Kundera describes the struggle of man against power as the struggle of memory against forgetting. An important element of this course will be the critical examination of the contemporary relevance of China’s past, the challenges of the ongoing contest between state-imposed interpretations of history and the independent pursuit of historical knowledge, and its implications on China’s future and its relationship with rest of the world.

COURSE OUTCOME

This course aims to help students to develop skills to think, write, and speak critically and analytically about the past. In particular, we will examine the state-sponsored version of history presented by the Chinese Communist party with our own critical minds based on evidence. We will work together as historians to evaluate historical evidence in primary and secondary sources, to think within historical contexts, to recognize the historical forces at work, to identify continuities and changes, and to understand the ethical dimension of historical interpretations as world citizens. One of the highlights of this course would be the opportunity to have conversations about the readings and documentaries with their authors/directors.

EVALUATION

• Class Performance (30%)
• News Presentation (10%)
• Final Project (60%)

Time: 5:30pm – 6:15pm

Attention is drawn to University policy and regulations on honesty in academic work, and to the disciplinary guidelines and procedures applicable to breaches of such policy and regulations. Details may be found at http://www.cuhk.edu.hk/policy/academichonesty/.

With each assignment, students will be required to submit a signed declaration that they are aware of these policies, regulations, guidelines and procedures.

• In the case of group projects, all members of the group should be asked to sign the declaration, each of whom is responsible and liable to disciplinary actions, irrespective of whether he/she has signed the declaration and whether he/she has contributed, directly or indirectly, to the problematic contents.
• For assignments in the form of a computer-generated document that is principally text-based and submitted via VeriGuide, the statement, in the form of a receipt, will be issued by the system upon students’ uploading of the soft copy of the assignment.

Assignments without the properly signed declaration will not be graded by teachers.

Only the final version of the assignment should be submitted via VeriGuide.

The submission of a piece of work, or a part of a piece of work, for more than one purpose (e.g. to satisfy the requirements in two different courses) without declaration to this effect shall be regarded as having committed undeclared multiple submissions. It is common and acceptable to reuse a turn of phrase or a sentence or two from one’s own work; but wholesale reuse is problematic. In any case, agreement from the course teacher(s) concerned should be obtained prior to the submission of the piece of work.