Ghosts, Zombies, and Cyborgs: More-Than-Humans in East Asian Literature
Course Description
What makes humans human? What are the boundaries of humans? Who are included or not included within those boundaries? While the human species as they are today have physically existed on the earth for millennia, the concept of the human has changed throughout history. It has been questioned, challenged, and revised by humans who have been constantly curious about what made them human. In the present day, in which the extinction of the human species as a result of human-made climate disasters is already being discussed, critical thinking about the modern concept of the human that has brought about the unprecedented scale of changes on the earth is emerging as a pressing task for us. By conducting thought experiments in this class along with reading stories about ancient and futuristic others of humans, we aim at historicizing and thus challenging the modern concept of the human and ultimately thinking about an alternative future.
In the first half of this class, we are going to read supernatural tales of premodern East Asia (Korea, China, and Japan), featuring diverse imaginary creatures that look like humans but are not really, such as ghosts, monsters, shapeshifters, and animal-humans. In the second half, we will read science fiction stories of postmodern East Asia crowded with another group of humanlike creatures such as zombies, cyborgs, and robot-humans. The readings will be punctuated with recent theoretical interventions into modern anthropocentric (human-centered) worldviews from gender studies, critical race theory, posthumanist philosophy, and environmental humanities. We will also make use of a wide variety of visual materials from movies, TV shows, and animation from East Asia. This class requires no background knowledge or language abilities related to East Asia. Any students with curiosity and an open mind will be cordially welcomed.
Meet the Instructor: Hyun Suk Park
“I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. My specialty is Korean literature of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. For the past few years, I have been working on my first research project of writing a cultural history of female performers (kisaeng) in Korea at the intersections of the studies of gender, slavery, and performance. My interest in the boundaries of humans was sparked while thinking about slavery as a historical institution and was combined with my recent interest in environmental studies. I just launched a new research project on the cultural productions shaped by climate disasters and great famines in seventeenth-century East Asia, and I hope that I will be able to set out on a journey for this research project with students who have critical minds."
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