(BA) (4-year-programme) - The University of Hong Kong

92and more important than ever. Whether you see it as the most salient feature of our age or as so muchhype if not an alibi for transnational capitalism, it is an important term and phenomenon in the studyof literature, film, and culture more broadly. This course introduces students to some of the keydebates about globalization, especially but not only in terms of culture. We will examine questionslike: How do we understand globalization in Hong Kong, China, South East Asia and elsewhere?What is “new” about it? Are we becoming more alike everywhere or more aware of our culturaldifferences because of globalization? Are our identities and cultures more or less “hybrid” and“cosmopolitan” than before recent globalization? And how do national and local cultures everywhererespond to globalization? Are the nation-state and nationalism fading away or is it the reverse? Howcan we analyze the problems of globalization from the spread of European cultures in the age ofcolonialism to the present new world orders of global capitalism? We will think through these typesof questions with reference to local and global phenomena and texts.Note: This is a survey course which students can take in the second, third, or fourth year.Assessment: 100% coursework.CLIT2052.Chinese urban culture (6 credits)With specific references to contemporary Chinese cities ranging from Hong Kong and Taipei toShanghai and Beijing, the course examines how forces of modernization, colonialism, andglobalization have drastically transformed these cities and constantly changed, mutated, and revampedtheir cultural scenes. It ponders over key issues in urban studies like the politics of urbanity (the ruralvs. the urban), the aesthetics of the city, sexual desire and sexual citizenship, as well as discourses onpopular culture and global studies. The crucial issues will have to do with the questions of identity(urban, cultural, regional, global) and politics, as well as history and agency. We will focus on thechanges which have emerged since the 1980s. Despite their different paths, these cities witnessed thegrowth of a capitalist culture and the relentless processes of globalization. We wish to explore thetransformations of traditions and analyze the patterns of urban lives associated with consumptions,different modes of capitalisms, and cosmopolitanism. Dealing with debates on cosmopolitan cities, weshall see how these tensions are embedded and manifested in a wide range of filmic and literary texts.Note: This is a survey course which students can take in the second, third, or fourth year.Assessment: 100% coursework.CLIT2058.Histories of sexuality (6 credits)Analyzed, categorized, disciplined, pathologized, feared, fantasized, enjoyed and embedded in allsorts of cultural productions and human records: sexuality is a core part of human lives andcivilizations. This course explores the development of sexuality as a concept and what we mean by it,how we practice it, how we talk about it in different cultures. This cross-cultural approach recognizesthat the complex histories of sexuality in Eastern and Western cultures are also the result of intricatedynamics of colonial, racial, gender, class and cultural relations. Through examining different culturaland theoretical texts, this course considers questions like: What were the official or governingdiscourses of sexuality? What were the popular beliefs and practices about sexuality? What were therelationships of these ideas to the cultural contexts from which they emerged? What were the causesof transformations in sexual attitudes and behavior? What is the relationship between sexuality andother forms of social difference, such as gender, class, race and ethnicity? What are the changingresponses to these questions since the 19th century in which sexuality as a concept and as a globalmovement has developed exponentially?Note: This is a survey course which students can take in the second, third, or fourth year.Assessment: 100% coursework.