In 1868, samurai revolutionaries and their allies seized the reins of power and established a new capital they called Tokyo. Against all odds, this fragile regime survived and made Tokyo a center of power that would transform both Japan and the world. This survey of Japanese history explores the rise and fall of Japan as a modern imperial power; its foreign relations; its economic and scientific development from feudalism to futuristic technologies; and Japan's many modern revolutions, from the rule of the samurai to Westernization and democracy, from democratic collapse to fascism and World War II, and from Japan's postwar rebirth to the present. We will examine not only big events but also everyday life, including gender and sexuality, family and schools, and art and popular culture. (SC)

Full details for CAPS 1622 - From Samurai to Superpower: Japan in World History II

This course explores the history of imperial China between the 3rd century b.c.e. and the 16th century c.e. with a focus on the following questions: How did imperial Chinese states go about politically unifying diverse peoples over vast spaces? How did imperial Chinese approaches to governance and to relations with the outer world compare with strategies employed by other historical empires? How did those approaches change over time? How did major socio-cultural formations - including literary canons; religious and familial lineages; marketing networks; and popular book and theatrical cultures - grow and take root, and what were the broader ramifications of those developments? How did such basic configurations of human difference as Chinese (civilized)-barbarian identity, high-low status, and male-female gender operate and change over time? (GE)

Full details for CAPS 1740 - Imperial China

This course surveys modern Chinese history from 1600 to present. Time will be devoted to each of the three major periods into which modern Chinese history is conventionally divided: the Imperial Era (1600-1911), the Republican Era (1911-1949), and the People's Republic of China (1949-present). It guides students through pivotal events in modern Chinese history, and uncovers the origins of China's painful transition from a powerful early modern empire to a country torn by civil unrest and imperialist invasion, and then from a vanguard of world revolution to a post-communist party-state whose global power is on the rise. (GE)

Full details for CAPS 1920 - Modern China

This is an introduction of Chinese civilization from ancient times up to the end of the Chinese empire in 1911. It is intended to familiarize students with the major concepts of Chinese history, society, and culture, focusing on agents that have been often neglected in canonical histories, such as socially marginalized people, the natural and ecological environment, and local and global networks. (GE)

Full details for CAPS 2230 - Introduction to China: Outsiders in History

This course offers a broad understanding of the crucial roles East Asian women played in culture, the economy, and society from antiquity to the early twentieth century. By rethinking the pervasive stereotype of the passive and victimized East Asian women under by staunch Confucian patriarchy, it aims to examine women’s struggles, negotiations, and challenges of the normative discourse of femininity, with a focus on patrilineal family, the female body and reproduction, domesticity and women’s economic labor, women’s work, literacy and knowledge, and the modernization of women. We will examine how Confucian notions of gender and family were, far from being fixed, constantly redefined by the historical and temporal needs of East Asian contexts. This examination is undertaken through a combination of reading original texts and secondary scholarship in various disciplines, including philosophy, anthropology, history, literature, and material culture. No knowledge of Chinese, Japanese, or Korean necessary. (SC)

Full details for CAPS 2281 - Gender, Family, and Confucianism in East Asia

This course focuses on the human condition of Chinese women after 1949. In the name of the Women's liberation movement since the early 1900s, do Chinese women eventually hold up the half sky? From the cradle to the grave, what was most challenging in women's life? How did political, economic, and cultural forces frame women's professional careers and private life? No judgments nor imaginations. Using multi-media, such as Chinese independent documentary films, music, and photographs, students will discover the hidden stories behind the mainstream narratives. Workshops with film directors, pop music singers, and photographers offer students an unusual way of accessing all backstage field experiences.

Full details for CAPS 2575 - Tyranny and Dignity: Chinese Women from the Cultural Revolution to the White Paper Revolution

This course examines the long, complicated history of Korea’s relationship with China, focusing on the period from the fourteenth century to the present. Rather than having a nation-bound interpretation of history, the course explores how Korea’s national identity–from the Choson dynasty, through the colonial period, to the contemporary era of the two Koreas–has been shaped and negotiated in close relation to its interactions with China. By addressing various issues in Korean history that reflect Korea’s strong ties and conflicts with China, the course not only offers a comprehensive understanding of Korean history from a broader comparative perspective but also contributes to the transnational history of East Asia. No prior knowledge of Korean or Chinese is required. (SC)

Full details for CAPS 3021 - History of Korea-China Relations

Ever since the creation of the concept of a culturally and geographically stable center in China, people have been intentionally excluded from that center. Disgraced officials are sent to far-flung provinces, loyalists to past regimes hide out across China’s borders, and dissidents have their entry visas revoked, making it impossible for them to return home. The experiences of these people, and the poems and stories they write, tell us a great deal about what it means and how it feels to be included and excluded. What is the difference between the way China looks from the inside and the way it looks from the outside? Who has the power to decide who gets to live in China, and how and why do they use it? What is the relationship between our identities and our homes? Texts studied will range from 300 BCE to the present; all will be read and discussed in English. (LL)

Full details for CAPS 3329 - Literature of Leaving China

This seminar, using faculty-directed research projects, is intended to survey China's transformation through revolution and reform since 1949, and to examine major issues under the themes of modernity and sustainability in the reform era.

Full details for CAPS 4001 - China in Transition

This course, offered by faculty members of Peking University's School of International Studies, provides Chinese perspectives on contemporary China's international relations.

Full details for CAPS 4002 - Chinese Perspectives on International and Global Affairs

Honors students conduct research to prepare a thesis on a topic of their own choosing under the direction of a faculty member. The application must be successfully submitted and an Honors Committee formed by the end of applicant's junior year in order for the student to be an honors candidate. Permission to enroll in CAPS 4020 is contingent upon the advisor's judgment of the viability of the student's honors thesis by the end of the semester.

Full details for CAPS 4010 - Honors Thesis Tutorial I

Honors students complete research and finish a thesis on a topic of their own choosing under the direction of a faculty member.

Full details for CAPS 4020 - Honors Thesis Tutorial II

This course serves as a survey of major issues within Chinese politics and foreign policy and constitutes the capstone seminar for CAPS students. It is intended to give students an opportunity to explore aspects related to Chinese politics, economics, and society that they may have touched upon in other China-focused courses at Cornell, but have not been able to examine as fully, and with the degree of care, that they would like. In this regard, the substance of the course will be developed through an iterative process between the instructor and the seminar participants. We will spend the first part of the course doing a series of recent influential readings on contemporary China and developing initial research projects. The second half of the class will be organized around student led presentations of research projects (accompanied by relevant academic, media, and policy readings). (SC)

Full details for CAPS 4030 - Making Sense of China: The Capstone Seminar

How did the U.S. and China reach this precarious moment? Are they on the brink of a hot war, or can diplomacy still prevent the worst? Is a cold peace even possible? This course critically examines the history of U.S.-China relations from 1949 to 2025, exploring the key diplomatic, economic, military, social, and ideological developments that have shaped bilateral ties. Beginning with early Cold War hostility (1949–1972), the Korean War (1950–1953), and the prolonged diplomatic estrangement (1953–1972), the course traces pivotal moments such as Nixon’s historic rapprochement (1972-1979), the cautious engagement of normalization (1979–1989), China’s economic rise and global integration (1990s–2008), and the evolving tensions of interdependence often described as ‘One Bed, Two Dreams’ (2008–present), shifting security dilemmas, and ongoing trade and technological competition. Special attention will be given to the contemporary landscape of strategic containment, rivalry, and the price of competition and cooperation. Through a multidisciplinary approach, students will analyze primary sources, academic literature, government reports, and firsthand accounts to assess how U.S.-China relations have evolved within a broader global context. Discussions will engage with pressing issues, including military tensions in the Indo-Pacific, economic decoupling, and the future trajectory of the bilateral relationship in an era of geopolitical uncertainty.

Full details for CAPS 4076 - History of US-China Relations, 1949-2025

Visions of bodily corruption preoccupy ruler and ruled alike and prompt campaigns for moral, medical, and legal reform in periods of both stability and revolution. This seminar explores the links between political, sexual, and scientific revolutions in early modern and modern Asia. The focus is on China and Japan, with secondary attention to South Asia and Korea. Interaction with the West is a major theme. Topics include disease control, birth control and population control, body modification, the history of masculinity, honorific violence and sexual violence, the science of sex, normative and stigmatized sexualities, fashion, disability, and eugenics. The course begins with an exploration of regimes of the body in traditional Asian cultures. The course then turns to the medicalization and modernization of the body under the major rival political movements in Asia: feminism, imperialism, nationalism, and communism. (SC)

Full details for CAPS 4127 - The Body Politic in Asia

China's transition to capitalism has resulted in more than a generation of rapid and nearly uninterrupted growth. It increasingly dominates the production of all sorts of goods, from the very low end and labor intensive, to the high value added and capital intensive. China is aiming to dominate future product cycles, and is making major inroads in digital technology, AI, and robotics. This spectacular re-emergence as a world power has also increasingly lead to political conflict, both domestically and internationally. This course proceeds by assessing the interplay between marketization and economic transformation on the one hand, and social change and resistance as seen from the perspective of workers, on the other. While the course is specifically concerned with labor issues, we will see that the workplace is a prism that condenses and refracts much broader transformations occurring in Chinese society. (SC)

Full details for CAPS 4355 - Work and Labor in China

This directed study course allows CAPS students to enroll at Beida (Peking University) in courses offered to international students by the Peking University School of International Studies.

Full details for CAPS 4888 - Directed Study - Beijing

Independent study course in topics not covered in regularly scheduled courses. Students select a topic in consultation with the faculty member who has agreed to supervise the course work.

Full details for CAPS 4999 - CAPS Independent Study