121/Asian Studies 121. Great Traditions of
East Asia. (4). (HU).
This is an introduction to the civilizations of China, Japan, Korea,
and Inner Asia. It aims to provide an overview of changing traditions from
ancient to early modern times (ca. 1660 AD) by outlining broad trends which
not only transformed each society, economy, and culture but also led to
the development of this region into distinctly different modern nations.
The development of state Confucianism, the spread of Buddhism, the functions
of the scholar and the warrior, the impact of the military empires of Inner
Asia, and the superiority of pre-modern Asian science and technology are
some of the topics we will cover. In addition to the required textbooks,
we will read contemporary accounts and view slides and films to acquire
intimate appreciation of these cultures. Course requirements include successful
completion of: quizzes given in sections; four major tests given in class
on October 3 and 25, November 15, and December 8; one report/project (5
pp. plus bibliography and notes). Cost:2 WL:3 (Forage)
151/UC 172/Asian Studies 111. South Asian
Civilization. (4). (HU).
This course is an introduction to the civilization of India, that is,
the region of South Asia consisting of the modern countries of India, Pakistan,
Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. We will begin with the first Indian civilization,
that of the Indus Valley, and go on to the Vedic age, the formation of empires
and the classical civilization of India, its social organization, arts,
and sciences. We will then examine the encounter of India with Islamic and
European civilization, and the formation of the independent nation-states
of today. Course requirements include short papers, midterm, and final exam.
(Trautmann)
160. United States to 1865. (4). (SS).
This lecture/discussion course will examine central issues and events
in the history of the territories that became the United States, and the
peoples who lived there, from the late 16th to the middle of the 19th centuries.
Among the topics that will be considered are the territorial expansions
of Europeans into the Americas; the creation of Anglo-American colonies;
the social, political, and cultural orders of British North America; the
creation of an independent American republic in the Revolution, and the
destruction of that first republic in the War Between the States. The required
readings will include both primary and secondary sources, and will be examined
in weekly discussion sections. There will be both a midterm and a final
examination, and active class participation will be expected in the sections.
(Thornton)
161. United States, 1865 to the Present. (4). (SS).
History 161 surveys the evolution of the United States from an agrarian
nation with little concern for foreign affairs to the world's preeminent
economic power with self-defined global interests. Within this context lectures,
reading assignments, and discussion sections will stress the changing nature
of the concept of freedom within the United States since 1865. This examination
necessarily will focus on the lives of individual citizens, the transformation
of the labor force and the workplace, and the role played by race, ethnicity,
class, and gender in determining a person's place with the greater society.
In so doing the course will address the era's major reform movements (Reconstruction,
Populism, Progressivism, the New Deal, and the Great Society) as well as
the nation's reaction to demands placed upon it in international affairs.
Course requirements will include at least one essay, a one-hour midterm
examination, and a two-hour final examination. (Fitzpatrick)
170/Amer. Cult. 170/UC 170/WS 210. New Worlds: Colonialism and Cultural
Encounters. First-year students only. (4). (Introductory Composition).
See American Culture 170.
(Karlsen)
195. The Writing of History. (4). (Introductory
Composition). This course may not be included in a history concentration.
"The Writing of History" courses offer students the opportunity
to learn writing through the study of historical texts, debates, and events.
Each "Writing of History" section will study a different era,
region, and topic in the past, for the common purpose of learning how history
is written and how to write about it. Students will read the work of modern
historians as well as documents and other source materials from the past,
such as historical novels, letters, diaries, or memoirs. In each case the
goal will be to learn how to construct effective arguments, and how to write
college-level analytic papers. History 195 satisfies the first-year writing
requirements. Each section will enroll a maximum of twenty students.
Section 001 - North Africa and Europe in the Mirror of Colonialism. North Africa has played a special role in the European imagination; it has stood for the exotic, the picturesque, the sensual, and the barbaric. At the same time, North Africans have been forced to think about Europe. They have done so in deeply ambivalent ways, portraying Europe as home to both violence and enlightenment, both greed and high culture. In this course we will consider the cultural encounter of Europe and North Africa - above all France and the Maghreb (Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia) - from the early nineteenth century until the present. We will survey European conquest and colonialism, together with North African nationalism and the drive for independence. But our central aim will be a history of cultural perception, a study of the ways in which North Africa and Europe perceived each other. Sources will include novels, press illustrations, travel accounts, political speeches, painting and poetry. Requirements: weekly writing assignments; active participation in discussion. (Shaya)
Section 002 - Race, Science and Social Policy in Western Europe and the United States. This course examines racial science and its influence upon government policy in twentieth century western Europe and the united states. Our goal is to understand how and why racial thinking was "respectable" prior to World War II and to consider the different ways in which the issue of "racial purity" shaped politics and social reform within different periods and national contexts. We will begin by exploring the idea of race in late nineteenth century natural science and considering the efforts of scientists, politicians and writers at the turn of the century to apply racial science to social policy. The topics in this part of the course will include popular and elite conceptions of poverty, illness and crime and the movements to reform health, welfare and criminal justice on both sides of the Atlantic, prior to World War I. The second part of the course will concentrate on the transformation of racial practice and the politics of social reform during World War I and its aftermath. We will examine the broad-based interest and support for "racial hygiene" between the wars in various European countries and in the U.S. In the last section of the course, the focus will shift to the role of "applied racial science" in right-wing political ideologies and movements in Italy, France and especially Germany. We will examine the appropriation of progressive ideals of social reform by the fascists in Italy and the nazis in Germany, and we will consider their differing attempts to transform and to politically utilize the idea of the biological "other". (Rosenblum)
Section 003 - The Holocaust in Text, Image and Memory. Since World War II - and particularly since the 1960s - historians, filmmakes, novelists, political analysts and museum directors have all sought to record the plight of European Jewry under nazi domination. Each new representation - whether its goal is to commemorate the past, to warn future generations of "history's lessons", or to apply the tools of historical, sociological and political analysis to the events of World War II - has shaped the public memory of those events. In this course, students will explore the evolution of this public memory. By examining primary documents, historical accounts, memoirs, fiction, film, and visual images, we will examine how the history of the holocaust has been written, and how themes of bearing witness have shaped that story. (Mandel)
Section 004 - Perceptions of Childhood in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. (Buettner)
Section 005 - Knights and Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, Tournaments, and Courtly Love. This course will explore chivalry as the defining ideology of medieval Europe in the period from 1000-1500. Although it originated primarily as a code of military conduct, chivalry became such an integral part of noble identity and expression that eventually it defined nobility itself. Chivalry was also an international value, and the ways in which chivalry was expressed will be considered in various regions, particularly its role in bringing areas considered marginal or backward into the mainstream of European culture. Topics that will be explored in this course include: the origins of chivalry as a martial code and its later development into courtesy and 'manners'; tournaments, jousts, pageants and other forms of chivalric display; chivalry's mediation of relations between men and women, and its creation of a public role for women; religious elements of knighthood and chivalry, and the turbulent interaction between secular and ecclesiastical authorities; chivalric literature such as Arthurian romances and guides to correct behaviour; and political applications of chivalry as embodied in chivalric orders of knighthood. Chivalry occupies an important place in recent scholarly debates, and there has been much discussion about its 'decadence' in the later middle ages. We will consider these ideas of the decline of chivalry, especially the parts played by values and culture in particular societies, and what they reveal about these societies. We will use a broad range of primary and secondary sources including: rule books for tournaments and jousts, codes of conduct for warfare, guides to good behaviour, chivalric romances, and charters for chivalric orders. The course is primarily a writing course, and thus weekly writing assignments will be assigned. These will include essays, book reviews, group reports, and a research paper. (Anderson)
Section 006 - Western Places, Past and Present. How do people interpret the landforms they see? What effect does altering the physical landscape have on their interpretations? What role does this process play in people making history? This course examines a series of American Western places with these questions in mind. From the 19th century midwestern frontier, to the dust bowl, to modern Los Angeles, a variety of times and places will be studied. Readings include essays by popular writers, historical monographs, Navajo myths, and recent works by historical geographers. The course requires four papers each of which emphasizes a different skill: critical analysis, interpretation of primary sources, comparative historiography, and historical synthesis. (Salmanson)
197. Freshman Seminar. (3). (HU).
Section 001 - European Intellectual History, 1789-1914. This course
will consider major ideas and intellectual movements, principally in Western
Europe, from the French Revolution to the outbreak of the First World War.
The topics will include: Nationalism; Liberalism; Romanticism; Darwinism;
the Rise of Industrialization and Technology; Militarism; Utopian Socialism;
Marxism; and Democratic Political Movements. There will also be a consideration
of the rise of modern psychological and sociological thought. The method
to be employed will include both lecture and class discussion. The student
will be required to do a series of written reports on the various topics
to be covered in this class. Readings will include both original texts and
documents, as well as a general narrative history textbook treating leading
historical events. WL:3 (Becker)
Section 002 - Women and Gender: Victorian Women. This course is a first-year seminar intended to allow students to explore the history and representation of women in Victorian Britain (1836-1901). The course will use historical scholarship, life-stories, visual images, and literary works - novels, short poems, plays, and non-fiction prose - to examine changes and continuities in the real and imagined lives of real and imagined women, and to look at the intersections and mutual effects of material conditions and cultural discourses. Special attention will be paid to the ways in which "Victorian women" are divided and differentiated, especially by class, but also by "race," religion, ethnicity and region, generation, and politics; we will explore the ways in which working-class women (including servants) and women colonial subjects are represented in literary writings by other women, as well as the ways in which they represent themselves, and the ways in which the diversity of women's affiliations and interests are addressed or ignored by the Victorian organized women's movement. (Israel)
Section 003 - Critical Thinking in the Renaissance and Reformation. The period from about 1450 to 1600 was obsessed with the need for reform, in religious, political, social, and intellectual life. Reading in this course will be taken from those authors whose moral and intellectual critiques of contemporary life, letters, and society made them the most important promoters of reform in their eras. The reading list is certain to include Desiderius Erasmus, Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Michel de Montaigne. Other readings will be selected from the works of some of the following: Petrarch, Lorenzo Valla, Thomas More, Machiavelli, Rabelais, Jean Bodin, and Galileo. Our primary focus will therefore be on "great books" and their authors. In the course of the term students will also become familiar with a wide range of reference works, which they will use to gain the necessary background information to place the reading in historical context. Two hours a week will be devoted to class discussion of the assigned readings. The third hour will serve a variety of purposes (preparation for the next assignment, discussion of effective writing, slide presentations, and the like). There will be three short essays (3-4 pages) and a final synthetic exercise of 10-12 pages. A principal goal of the course will be the development of clear, effective writing; comments will, therefore, address problems of expression as well as substantive historical and textual issues. There will not be a midterm or a final examination, but there may be occasional quizzes and student reports. Cost:3 (Tentler)
Section 004 - Inventing Women and Men (Inventing Sex and Gender). This first-year seminar will examine the different ways that westerners have imagined sex (the biology of difference) and gender (the culture of difference) and the links between the two. Shifting between primate studies and rock-and-roll bobby-sox culture, we will investigate not only the incredible range of expressing and acting upon sexual difference over the ages, we will also look at how people assumed that such a very different set of meanings and practices were "natural" or "normal." At the center of our discussion will be how historically westerners have shifted between biologically- and culturally-based explanations of difference. From there we will branch out to discussions of the role of science, popular culture, and law in efforts to fix or codify the meanings of femininity and masculinity. We will not neglect to discuss how westerners simultaneously defined Asians and Africans in ways to define European and American virtue. (Frost)
200-Level Courses are for Sophomores and Upper Class Students
200. Greece to 201 B.C. (4). (HU).
This course presents a survey of history from human beginnings through
Alexander the Great. Primary emphasis is on the development of civilization
in its Near Eastern and Greek phases. Students need no special background
except an ability to think in broad terms and concepts. In view of the extent
of historical time covered in the course, a general textbook is used to
provide factual material. There are two hour examinations plus a final examination.
Discussion sections are integrated with lectures and reading. Cost:2 WL:1
(Humphreys)
210/MARC 210. Early Middle Ages, 300-1100.
(4). (SS).
An introduction of the transformation of the Roman Empire into Byzantine,
Islamic, and west European successor states between AD 300 and 1000. The
course focuses on the social, cultural, and economic developments in the
barbarian kingdoms of Europe. Lectures are integrated with weekly discussion
of early medieval texts; two short papers and two tests are the basis of
evaluation of performance. WL:3 (Squatriti)
220. Survey of British History to 1688. (4). (SS).
This course introduces students to the sweep of English history from
Roman times until the Glorious Revolution. The first half of it is devoted
to the Middle Ages and focuses on the formation of the English monarchy,
the role of the church in politics and culture and basic social and economic
structures. The second half treats the early modern period (c. 1450-1700)
and concentrates on the growth of the state, the Protestant Reformation,
the English Revolution, and the social and economic changes that followed
the Black Death and played themselves out during the reigns of the Tudor
and Stuart monarchs. No prior knowledge of English history is assumed in
this class, and it is intended to serve as the basis for more advanced work
in British history and to provide background and comparisons for courses
in English literature and European and American history. (MacDonald)
250. China from the Oracle Bones to the Opium War. (3). (HU).
This course consists of a survey of early Chinese history, with special
emphasis on the origins and development of the political, social, and economic
institutions and their intellectual foundations. Special features include
class participation in performing a series of short dramas recreating critical
issues and moments in Chinese history, slides especially prepared for the
lectures, new views on race and gender in the making of China, intellectual
and scientific revolutions in the seventeenth century, and literature and
society in premodern China. WL:1 (Chang)
274/CAAS 230. Survey of Afro-American History I. (3). (SS).
See CAAS 230.
284. Sickness and Health in Society: 1492 to the Present. (3).
(SS).
From devastating infectious epidemics to the quiet suffering of malnutrition,
health problems have both affected and reflected the evolution of modern
society. The course will study four different historical periods, exploring
such issues as: the effects of individual habits, environmental conditions,
and medical innovation on public health; the role of ethics, economics,
and politics in medical decision making; the changing health problems of
the disadvantaged, including Native Americans, women, Blacks, immigrants,
and workers; the changing meaning of concepts like "health," "disease,"
"cause," and "cure"; the dissemination and impact of
medical discoveries; and the changing organization and power of the healing
professions. We will focus on American history, although comparisons will
be drawn to other societies. The course is a basic introduction, however,
first-year students must obtain permission of the professor to enroll.
Classes are taught in lecture format, and will include a variety of audio-visual
sources. Reading assignments will range from modern histories to poetry
and old medical journals. There will be two essay-style examinations, and
frequent short quizzes. This is a challenging and demanding course. Those
who miss the first meeting without advance permission will be dropped from
the course. Required purchases cost $15, but additional required reading
assignments, available on reserve or for optional purchase, cost up to $110
additional if bought. WL:4 (Pernick)