ASIA 427/CMPL 527/PWAD 427: Cold War Culture in East Asia: Transnational and Intermedial Connections

Placing Korean, Chinese, and Japanese writers and artists in dialogue, this course introduces students to the specific contours that the global Cold War accrued in East Asian cultural production. Using literary texts, films, and selected secondary readings, it takes a transnational, regional, and intermedial approach to thinking about what the fall of the Japanese Empire and the emergence of the post-1945 world meant in East Asia and how these meanings shaped the emerging Cold War order on a global scale. Beginning with a brief exploration of the relationship between politics and literature as it was debated during the pre-1945 era, the course then moves on to a set of thematic investigations in order to show how writers and artists in East Asia engaged in dialogue regarding the Cold War conflict. Such themes include: city, space, and consumption; scientific and technological imaginaries; youth and student mobilizations; and the politics of the traditional/pastoral. Finally, this course ends with a consideration of the unique ways in which the Cold War standoff in East Asia has persisted into the contemporary era and continued to inform contemporary East Asian culture. In Spring 2021, this course will include special lectures from scholars in the field teaching and working in Asia. There are no prerequisites and all readings and films will be available in English or with English subtitles. LA, BN, CI.