China and Communism
1-3 hours per week • Start today
Individual Course
Modern China’s Foundations: The Manchus and the Qing
Course Length
12 weeks
1-3 hours per week
Featuring faculty from:
Harvard Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Enroll as Individual
Certificate Price:
$ 149
Enroll as Individual
Certificate Price:
$ 149
Join Harvard University faculty in this online course to learn how the Manchus conquered the Qing and established the last of the imperial dynasties in China.
This course, part of a comprehensive series on China, looks at the Qing state in the early 1600s and the challenges that the Manchus faced as minority rulers. While living in Chinese cities and surrounded by Chinese culture — a culture that was far more sophisticated than their own — the Manchus struggled to hold onto their identity as a conquesting people.
We'll look at the last period of ascendancy for China before the modern era. We’ll cover China in the 18th century, under the Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong emperors — a period in which the size of the empire nearly doubles.
The Qing was the last dynasty before the foundation of the modern republics and sets the stage for everything that will come after. Join us to learn about this critical era in Chinese history, an era that sets the stage for a truly modern China.
The course will be delivered via edX and connect learners around the world.
Self-Guided
edX
- Learning Outcome
Understand how the Manchus conquered Ming China.
- Learning Outcome
Learn to develop your own approaches to history and gain a critical appreciation of China’s literary, philosophical, political and cultural resources.
- Learning Outcome
Understand how the Qing dynasty became the foundation on which modern China was built.
- Learn from Harvard faculty
- Do it on your own time
- Get a certificate, add it to your resume
- Be part of the Harvard Community
Faculty
Your Instructor
Mark C. Elliott
Vice Provost for International Affairs, Harvard University
Mark Elliott is Vice Provost for International Affairs at Harvard University and the Mark Schwartz Professor of Chinese and Inner Asian History in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations and in the Department of History in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Elliott is an authority on the last four centuries of Chinese history, in particular the Qing period (1636-1911).
Your Instructor
William C. Kirby
T. M. Chang Professor of China Studies at Harvard University
William C. Kirby is a Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor. He serves as Chairman of the Harvard China Fund, the University's academic venture fund for China, and Faculty Chair of the Harvard Center Shanghai, Harvard's first university-wide center located outside the United States. A historian of modern China, Kirby's work examines contemporary China’s business, economic, and political development in an international context. He writes and teaches on the growth of modern companies in China (Chinese and foreign; state-owned and private); Chinese corporate law and company structure; business relations across Greater China (PRC, Taiwan, Hong Kong); and China’s relations with the United States and Europe.
Your Instructor
Peter K. Bol
Charles H. Carswell Professor of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University
Peter K. Bol’s research is centered on the history of China’s cultural elites at the national and local levels from the 7th to the 17th century. He led Harvard’s university-wide effort to establish support for geospatial analysis in teaching and research; in 2005 he was named the first director of the Center for Geographic Analysis. As Vice Provost (2013/09–2018/10) he was responsible for HarvardX, the Harvard Initiative in Learning and Teaching, and research that connects online and residential learning. He also directs the China Historical Geographic Information Systems project, a collaboration between Harvard and Fudan University in Shanghai to create a GIS for 2000 years of Chinese history. In a collaboration between Harvard, Academia Sinica, and Peking University, he directs the China Biographical Database project, an online relational database currently of 420,000 historical figures that is being expanded to include all biographical data in China’s historical record over the last 2000 years.
Complete your journey with this XSeries
These courses can be bundled together to receive a professional certificate at a discounted price.
Learn More- 5 Courses
- 4 Months
- Earn Your Certificate
Contemporary China: The People’s Republic, Taiwan, and Hong Kong
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Creating Modern China: The Republican Period to the Present
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Invasions, Rebellions, and the Fall of Imperial China
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Ways to take this course
Audit or Pursue a Verified Certificate
A Verified Certificate costs $149 and provides unlimited access to full course materials, activities, tests, and forums. At the end of the course, learners who earn a passing grade can receive a certificate.
Alternatively, learners can Audit the course for free and have access to select course material, activities, tests, and forums. Please note that this track does not offer a certificate for learners who earn a passing grade.
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