Dénouement
Our semester is rapidly nearing its conclusion. The payoff has been clear in the excellent presentations offered by our workshop colleagues in research presentations these past two weeks. It’s been wonderful to see how presenters have offered analytical insights and new lines of inquiry that transcend a particular topic — indeed, the shared issues that different research projects have invoked are striking.
Our last (but not least!) four research presentations will happen this Monday evening. We’ll also take some time to sketch out where we’ve come in the course. Central questions for the conversation:
- What are the key insights we’ve obtained in our study of the People’s Republic these last 14 weeks? One way to begin to answer this question may be to explore those that have, indeed, arisen in multiple conversations and in the context of diverse research projects.
- Given the insights our research has offered, what are the next questions we should raise?
- As a global audience gears up to watch the Olympic Games hosted by Beijing this summer of 2008, what information about China do you think is most likely to be overlooked amidst the coverage — and is most important for an understanding of China today?
Finally, cheers out to our workshop group for the great job you’ve done this semester. You’ve offered a consistently engaged and creative discussion, one that began with the critical exploration of a textbook narrative and which has nicely developed with your own contributions to a nuanced understanding of history. Bravo!
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