Theories in East Asian Liberal Arts I (1) (a)

This course aims at providing a general, open-ended understanding of "liberal education" through a series of lectures and conversations between professors from different departments and fields. Taking part in these discussions, students are supposed to learn more about: (1) what can we expect from liberal education and why do we still need it against the historical background of accelerated advancement of computer science and technology; (2) how to approach a text, whether in humanities, social sciences, or natural sciences, through the method of what has been used and abused as "close reading"; (3) how to raise productive questions and have conversations with other colleagues.