Here is my article about the last MOOCs I followed:
- China: The Manchus and the Qing Dynasty
- China: Invasions, Rebellions and the Fall of Imperial China
- Creating a Modern China: The Birth of a Nation
These MOOCs start at the beginning of the Qing dynasty and how it came to be, it then goes on on how it conquered the Ming (while explaining the political situation of the Ming and how it came to be conquerable).
Later on we learn how the Qing ruled over China, in particular a funny anecdote about hairstyle (why Chinese were required to wear the "queue" and thus why it was thus their representation in the West).
The second lesson explains the downfall of the Qing, through the Opium war, many civil wars (incuding the biggest in human history, the Taiping rebellion) and internal corruption.
So that when the boxer war happened, the Qing was not able to sustain the fight and had to run away from China.
The last class, I have not finished yet, but will mostly talk about how the kuomingtang came to power before Mao (it talks about 1906 - 1940 China mostly).
I have already followed all the others lessons in this series, and that's why I wanted to do these MOOCs as my internet project. Indeed the teachers are the respectively the dean of the asian studies at harvard, and the former dean of it, one of them is also a teacher at the Harvard Business School.
The two have a lot of connections and bring many impressive lecturers and people in there lessons, for example in lesson 10 they do an interview of Mo Yan a Nobel Prize of literature winner.
It also gives a great understanding of one of the oldest and most definitely the biggest civilization on earth, as China is getting more and more open to the world, I believe that some knowledge of its history, psychology and culture is something can be hugely useful.
Cheers,
Felix
