Distance and Connection: Teaching Premodern China in the Time of Pandemic
Ying Zhang, The Ohio State University
History is a foreign land, metaphorically. China is a foreign land, literally. Epidemics is a familiar phenomenon to premodern historians but an alienating experience for the students. If teaching premodern China was always a challenge in America, then that challenge has become further confounded. How to teach empathy and analytical distance simultaneously in the time of pandemic? How to help the students stay calm and remain engaged in the current affairs? Like a historical process, our pedagogical concerns are multifaceted. This requires us to design the lectures and assignments intelligently. In this presentation, I will discuss a few examples from my history classes with which I teach what the discipline of history offers to our students: exploring how be imaginative and analytical at the same time. This is an important skill in life, critical to the cultivation of good citizenship and professional fulfillment.