Courses
GDSS1057 Critical Approaches to Hong Kong History since 1945 (3 units)
- Medium of Instruction:
- Cantonese
This course makes use of social sciences concepts to critically examine the major historical processes that shape the political, economic, intellectual, social and cultural changes in Hong Kong since 1945. The major historical processes that Hong Kong has gone through since 1945 included the questions about crises of political legitimacy, economic development, urban and social changes, and cultural interactions with China and the globe. Concerning the debates over changing political legitimacy in Hong Kong, this course covers the salient features of British colonialism, democratization debates since late 1940s, the transitional period that led to the handover, and the subtlety of “one country, two systems”. It thus aims to shed light on the historical factors that shape the current political scenarios. Besides, the course investigates into the material progress, such as industrialization, the emergence of Hong Kong as a major player in global trade and financial market, changes in urban and rural landscape, before discussing non-material changes (e.g. religions, cultural hybridity, educational changes) in detail. Special attention will be paid to scrutinize different assumptions behind the contributions of leading conceptual frameworks and/or school of thoughts in relevant topics and to facilitate students’ learning by the use of empirical data, such as different kinds of archival and historical sources.
http://ge.hkbu.edu.hk/course/GDSS-1057/