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Source: www.futurelearn.com
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Starts on September 28, 2015
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Ends on October 6, 2015
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8 sequences
assignment
Level : Introductory
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History
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Language : English
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384 points
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Key Information
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Free access
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Free certificate
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48 hours in total
About the content
Explore Chinese history through the eyes of Western travellers, discoverers and missionaries, with this free online course.
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Syllabus
This free online course focuses on when and how the West first approached China. We will explore the influence that the discovery of China exerted on late medieval and early modern European minds. Explore Chinese history through the eyes of Westerners The backdrop of the course is the history of China. We will begin by looking at China’s place in the world and connections to the West via the Silk Road, before examining the changes brought about by the Song dynasty, the rise of Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire, and finally the Ming dynasty. We’ll analyse this period of Chinese history through the eyes of travellers, discoverers and missionaries who wrote about China from the 13th to the 17th century. These will include Marco Polo - not the first European to discover China, but the first to chronicle his time there in detail - and later Portuguese settlers, such as Galeote Pereira. We’ll also take advantage of Chinese and European illustrated sources, like scrolls, paintings and maps, to give a more accurate picture of how China really was at each time. Understand how Europe constructed the image of China Through these sources, we’ll see how Europeans constructed a highly positive image of China that would persist until the 18th century. What these Western travellers saw, what they didn’t see, what they choose not to tell and what they invented - that’s the story that we will unravel in this course.
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Instructors
- Dolors Folch
- Anna Busquets Alemany
assistant
Platform

FutureLearn is a massive open online course (MOOC) learning platform founded in December 2012.
It is a company launched and wholly owned by The Open University in Milton Keynes, England. It is the first UK-led massive open online course learning platform, and as of March 2015 included 54 UK and international University partners and unlike similar platforms includes four non-university partners: the British Museum, the British Council, the British Library and the National Film and Television School.
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