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INTRODUCTORY COURSES
History of Western Civilization: Europe in the Making
V57.0001 Offered every year. 4 points.
The making of Europe, from the classical period to the beginning of the modern era, was a uniquely creative process. Three main elements formed the civilization of Europe: traditions of the Greco-Roman world, the Germanic peoples entering Europe in the fourth and fifth centuries, and the Judeo-Christian tradition. The course examines the fusing of these elements, the flourishing of European culture in the Middle Ages, and the transition from the Middle Ages to early modern times.
History of Western Civilization: The Rise of Modern Europe
V57.0002 Offered every year. 4 points.
Introduces the main social, economic, political, and cultural forces that shaped European society and Europe’s relationship to the world from the 17th century to the present. Topics: the rise of capitalism and the industrial revolution; political movements (absolutism, liberalism, socialism, and fascism); intellectual developments (the scientific revolution, the Enlightenment, Darwinism, and Freudian psychoanalysis). Concludes with post-World War II Europe, the Cold War era, and the onset of the nuclear age.
The United States to 1865
V57.0009 Eustace, Hodes, W. Johnson. Offered every year. 4 points.
Main currents of American historical development from the precolonial epoch to the Civil War. Analysis of the country’s economic and political growth, intellectual traditions, and patterns of social development. Historical development, not as a series of discrete events, but as an unfolding process. Topics: Puritanism, mercantilism, the colonial family, the War for Independence, political party systems, the Jeffersonian and Jacksonian eras, free labor and slavery, Native American cultures, attitudes of race and gender, westward expansion, the industrial revolution, sectionalism, and the Civil War.
Modern America
V57.0010 Katz, Mattingly. Offered every year. 4 points.
Main developments in American civilization since the end of the Civil War. Topics: urbanization; industrialization; American reform movements (populism, progressivism, the New Deal, and the War on Poverty); immigration; and the role of women and blacks in American history. Beginning with 19th-century American expansion through the Spanish-American War, traces the rise of America to world power, including World Wars I and II and the Cold War. Emphasizes broad themes and main changes in American society.
The Civilization and Culture of the Middle Ages
V57.0011 Identical to V65.0011. Bedos-Rezak, Griffiths. Offered every year. 4 points.
Concentrates on the culture of medieval Europe, a world that produced castles and crusades, cathedrals and tapestries, mystery plays and epics, and plainsong and philosophy. Examines the richness and diversity of medieval creativity through literature, slides, and museum visits.
Modern Europe
V57.0012 Offered every year. 4 points.
A survey of Europe from 1789 to the present. Investigates the political, social, economic, and cultural developments that shaped and continue to shape the modern age. Emphasis is on the evolution of the nation-state, on industrialization and its impact on society and politics, and on the intellectual responses to the rapid changes these developments inspired. Topics include Europe and the French Revolution; the rise of the nation-state, 1848-1914; and the impact of totalitarian ideologies on 20th-century Europe.
Major Themes in World History: Colonialism and Imperialism
V57.0031 Karl, M. Young. Offered every year. 4 points.
Introduces students to key texts in and critical methodologies for the study of modern world history from the perspective of two of its dominant themes: imperialism and colonialism. Helps students theorize and historicize these seemingly well-known and self-explanatory concepts by introducing them as historically specific theories for understanding the very notion of “modern world history.” The broad theoretical consideration is accompanied by a consideration of specific texts from Asia and the United States, although not confined to such a bilateral view of the “world.”
World War II
V57.0045 E. Rose. Offered every year. 4 points.
Describes and analyzes the history of World War II chronologically from 1939 to 1945. Like the course on World War I, this is not simply a study of battles. All aspects of the war, from the great civilian and military leaders to the common soldiers, are discussed, as are social, cultural, and economic changes on the various home fronts. Illustrates personalities and events through slides, contemporary literature, photos and posters, and the music of the time.
History of Modern Asia or Modern Japan Since 1850
V57.0053 Identical to V33.0053. Karl, M. Young. Offered every year. 4 points.
Survey of developments in 19th- and early 20th-century East Asia, modernization, Westernization, and war, with emphasis on the different responses of China and/or Japan to Western economic encroachment and ideological change.
Introduction to Pan-Africanism
V57.0054 Identical to V11.0010. 4 points.
See description under Africana Studies (11).
What Is Islam?
V57.0085 Identical to V77.0691 and V90.0085. Peters. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
INTRODUCTORY SEMINARS FOR FRESHMEN AND SOPHOMORES
The following introductory seminars are open to freshmen and sophomores. They do not require permission from the director of undergraduate studies. The topics vary yearly depending on the instructor. See the director of undergraduate studies or the class schedule for available seminars. These do not satisfy the major requirement for advanced research seminar. Offered every year.
Seminar: Topics in European History
V57.0091 4 points.
Seminar: Topics in American History
V57.0092 4 points.
Seminar: Topics in Asian History
V57.0095 Identical to V33.0095. 4 points.
Seminar: Topics in Latin American History
V57.0096 4 points.
Seminar: Topics in Comparative History
V57.0097 4 points.
ADVANCED COURSES
EUROPEAN HISTORY
The Early Middle Ages
V57.0111 Identical to V65.0111. Bedos-Rezak, Griffiths. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Europe in the early Middle Ages was created out of a mixture of ingredients—the legacy of the Roman Empire; the growth and development of Christianity; invading peoples who settled within the boundaries of the former Roman Empire; the clash of competing languages, religions, and legal systems. This tumultuous time forged a new entity, medieval Europe, whose development, growing pains, and creative successes this course examines. Uses the records and artifacts of the period itself as central elements for investigating the period.
The Crusades
V57.0113 Identical to V65.0113. Offered every year. 4 points.
The history of the Crusades (1095-1291), an important first chapter in European imperialism and a manifestation of deep religious conviction. Examines the background in Europe leading to the Crusades; the social, political, and economic situation in the eastern Mediterranean before the Crusades; the fortunes of the Crusader (Latin) Kingdom of Jerusalem; and the reactions of Europeans and Easterners to one another. Examines and reevaluates the legacy of the Crusades on both the Eastern and Western worlds.
The High Middle Ages
V57.0114 Identical to V65.0114. Bedos-Rezak, Griffiths. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Covers the period from the late 11th century to the close of the 14th century. Major topics and themes: the explosion of energy in the 12th century and the expansion of Europe on all levels, geographic (including the Crusades) as well as intellectual; development of agriculture and cities; the diversity that gave rise to our university system; movements of reform and dissent; and the waning of the Middle Ages.
The Renaissance
V57.0121 Appuhn. 4 points.
The history of the Renaissance from its origins in the 14th century to its waning at the end of the 16th century. Focuses on developments in Italy, especially the development of republican city-states, the social basis for the explosion in artistic and intellectual production, and the emergence of new forms of political and scientific analysis.
Pre-Modern Science
V57.0135 Appuhn. 4 points.
The history of Western scientific thought from its origins in the ancient Near East until the death of Isaac Newton. Covers the development of science as a distinctive way of understanding the natural world, as well as the relationship between science and western society.
French Revolution and Napoleon
V57.0143 Shovlin. Offered every year. 4 points.
Following an analysis of cultural, social, political, and economic conditions in France before 1789, the course follows the Revolution through its successive phases. Narrates and analyzes the rise of Napoleon and his consolidation of France, his conquests and the spread of his system, and his eventual overthrow.
Atlantic Migrations, 1500-1945
V57.0149 Identical to V58.0149. Scally. Offered every other year. 4 points.
This course explores the movement of peoples across and within the four continents bordering the Atlantic Ocean, from the voyages of discovery to the era of trans-Atlantic flight. Topics treated include early imaginings of the Western Hemisphere, interactions among the peoples of the four continents and the Atlantic islands, forced and free migrations from Europe and Africa, patterns of settlement, technologies and economies of travel, the role of port cities, maritime labor, emigrant voyages by sail and steam, and the evolution of an Atlantic economy.
European Thought and Culture, 1750-1870
V57.0153 Offered every year. 4 points.
Study of major themes in European intellectual history from the end of the Enlightenment to the last decades of the 19th century, considered in the light of the social and political contexts in which they arose and the cultural backgrounds that helped shape them. Topics include romanticism, liberal and radical social theory, aestheticism, the late 19th-century crisis of values, and the rise of modern social science.
European Thought and Culture, 1880-1990
V57.0154 Offered every year. 4 points.
Study of major themes in European intellectual history from the fin de siècle down to the 1980s, considered in the light of the social and political contexts in which they arose and the cultural backgrounds that helped shape them. Topics include new Marxisms, avant-gardes, Weimar and Bauhaus, André Malraux, Sartre, Lévi-Strauss, Habermas, and Foucault.
Europe Since 1945
V57.0156 Prerequisite: at least one course in European history. Judt. Offered every year. 4 points.
Covers the impact of World War II, the postwar division of Europe, the onset of the Cold War, the economic recovery and transformation of Western Europe, Stalinism in Eastern Europe, the 1960s and events of 1968, the origins and development of the European community, and the cultural and intellectual life of European nations in this period. Ends with a discussion of the Eastern European revolutions of 1989 and their significance, together with the reunification of Germany, for the future of the continent.
Modern Greek History
V57.0159 Fleming, Kotsonis. Offered every year. 4 points.
Examines Greece’s transformation from a traditional Ottoman society into a modern European state, the parallel evolution of Greek diaspora communities, and the changes in homeland-diaspora relations. Topics include state building, relations with Turkey and the Balkan states, emigration, liberalism and modernization, the old and new diaspora, interwar authoritarianism, occupation and resistance in the 1940s, the Greek civil war, Greece and NATO, the Cyprus crisis, the Greek American lobby, and Greece and European integration.
Modern Britain
V57.0162 Otter. Offered every year. 4 points.
This lecture course provides a survey of the social, cultural, economic, and political histories of Britain between roughly 1780 and 1914. It begins at a time of revolution overseas, in America and France, and ends at the dawn of the era of total war. In between, Britain became a modern, liberal state and the world’s preeminent industrial and imperial power. It also had to come to grips with the social maladies of urban, industrial life—crime, disease, unrest, alcoholism. In many ways, this course charts how Britain and its governments tried to find ways to simultaneously preserve economic strength and contain and ameliorate the “social problem.” The various solutions to this raised questions about the role of the state, which still loom large in Britain and elsewhere. The course also examines several major cultural issues of the period—gender, science, religion, and race. Consequently, lectures are as likely to discuss evolutionary theory, prostitution, germs, and water mains as Queen Victoria, the Boer War, elections, and Charles Dickens.
Modern France Since 1815
V57.0169 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Examines the ways in which France’s development from a traditional into a modern society was highlighted at each stage by political revolutions, class antagonisms, and cultural innovations. Discusses the role of the state in society and France’s activities as a world and colonial power.
The Irish in New York
V57.0180 Identical to V58.0180. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
Topics in Irish History
V57.0181 Identical to V58.0181. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
History of Modern Ireland, 1580-1800
V57.0182 Identical to V58.0182. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
History of Modern Ireland, 1800-1922
V57.0183 Identical to V58.0183. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
History of Modern Ireland, 1922-Present
V57.0184 Identical to V58.0184. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
European Migration to America: The Irish and Jewish Experiences
V57.0186 Identical to V78.0686. Diner, Scally. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Looks at the comparative experiences of two immigrant groups to the United States, the Irish and the East European Jews. Explores the forces that propelled the migrants out of their homes and the ways in which they created communities and new identities in America. Because of its comparative nature, this course asks students to seek both similarities and differences in those migrations. Additionally, there have been numerous points of interaction between the Jews and the Irish. This course focuses on how these two groups understood and related to each other.
The Irish in America
V57.0187 Identical to V58.0187. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
European Diplomacy to 1900
V57.0193 Stehlin. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Deals with the major diplomatic events from 1789 to 1900. The diplomatic aspects of such topics as the French and Napoleonic Wars, European restoration, national unification, imperialism, and the Bismarck settlement are discussed as well as their relation to political, economic, and social events.
European and World Diplomacy, 1900-1945
V57.0194 Stehlin. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Deals with the major diplomatic events from 1900 to 1945. The diplomatic aspects of such topics as the various crises in the century’s first decade, the origins and results of World War I, the search for security in the 1920s, and Nazi and Fascist policy and World War II are discussed as well as their relation to political, economic, and social events.
Women in European Society Since 1750
V57.0196 Identical to V97.0196. Nolan. Offered every year. 4 points.
Examines critically the public and private lives of European women from 1750 to the present. An introduction discusses the theory and methods of using gender as a category in history and proceeds to a chronological survey of women’s experience from both a social and a political viewpoint. Women are examined as participants in war and revolution as well as workers, consumers, and mothers in everyday life. The focus is primarily on France, Germany, and England, with some reference to women’s experience in America.
Gendering the Middle Ages
V57.0197 Bedos-Rezak. Given every spring. 4 points.
This course takes up questions about the identity and agency of women and about the performative nature of gender in Western culture and society during the Middle Ages. In exploring medieval texts and images, and the interpretive body of scholarship that made it its task to recover and to make visible ways that medieval women acted in history, we pay specific attention to interactions between women and men in order to understand how assumptions about male and female nature informed and gendered the very possibility of action, expression, empowerment, and subjectivity.
Modern Imperialism
V57.0198 Fulfills non-Western course requirement for the major. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Conquest, domination, and exploitation in the 19th and 20th centuries in Africa, Asia, and North America. Compares the imperialism of Western Europeans and Americans as well as non-Western peoples. Examines general, technological, environmental, cultural, political, and economic causes. Focuses on the effects of imperialism on conquered societies: the Chinese after the Opium Wars, the Plains Indians of North America, the Sotho of South Africa after the Mfecane and Great Trek, and the Indians after the Great Mutiny. Theory, practice, and results of modern imperialism.
UNITED STATES HISTORY
American Colonial History to 1763
V57.0601 Eustace, Kupperman. Offered every year. 4 points.
Examines European expansion in the early modern period and the creation of an interconnected Atlantic world with particular emphasis on North America and the Caribbean. Attention to the roles of Europeans, American natives, and Africans in forming systems of trade and patterns of settlement as well as the evolution of slavery and the development of new political structures, changing religious beliefs, and evolving family relationships in America. Assesses the imperial context of these developments.
American Natives in Early American History
V57.0602 Kupperman. Offered every year. 4 points.
Focuses on the relationship between Indians and Europeans roughly within the future United States from first contact through the period of Indian Removal. Examines colonialism’s impact on Indian societies and the broad variety of techniques native leaders used in attempting to control the relationship. Looks at changing Euramerican attitudes through the colonial period and the role of imperial conflict and American independence on policy development. Assesses the pressure created by Euramerican westward migration before and after the War of 1812, Indian resistance, and the campaign for removal of Indians beyond the Mississippi.
Religion, Family, and Gender in Early America, 1607-1840
V57.0604 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Conducted as a reading and discussion class. Measures the shaping influence of religion on family life and gender relationships from the founding of the American colonies in 1607 to the Second Great Awakening in the 19th century. Readings examine the effects of evangelical as well as more traditional religion on the men and women, husbands and wives, parents and children, and masters and slaves in the early years of the nation.
The Experience of the Civil and Reconstruction
V57.0607 Hodes. 4 points.
Social history of the Civil War and Reconstruction with crucial attention to politics and economics. Focuses on sectional conflict over systems of free labor and slave labor, with close attention to class conflicts within the North; conflicts between slaves and masters in the South; conflicts among white Southerners; and conflicts among African American freed people, white Northerners, and white Southerners after the war. Concludes with an assessment of the era’s legacies.
America in the Early 20th Century
V57.0609 Mattingly. Offered every other year. 4 points.
The political, economic, and foreign relation developments in the period from the Spanish-American War through the Hoover years. Topics such as imperialism, the Progressive Era, issues of war and peace, dissent, political suppression, and economic collapse. Emphasis on the conflicting perceptions and evaluations of these events among historians.
Postwar America: 1945 to the Present
V57.0612 Offered every year. 4 points.
General introduction to the history of the United States from 1945 to the present. Major themes include links between domestic concerns and foreign policy goals, especially concerning communism and the Cold War; growth of a postindustrial state with a significant impact on the economy and daily lives; demands for social equality and diversity in postwar life; and underlying social, economic, and demographic changes shaping American lives in the postwar era.
Sport in American Society
V57.0615 Prerequisite: V57.0009, V57.0010, V57.0648, or permission of the instructor. Sammons. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Demonstrates that sport is an important cultural, political, and socioeconomic asset revealing much about society. Shows how sport is an instrument of control and liberation. Attempts to elevate sport’s position as a legitimate scholarly subject by relating it to race, gender, class, and violence. Combines theory, fact, and interpretation and focuses on the 19th and 20th centuries with some background information on ancient sport and early American attitudes toward sport, leisure, and recreation.
Introduction to Asian/Pacific/American Experience
V57.0626 Identical to V15.0010. Tchen. 4 points.
See description under Asian/Pacific/American Studies (15).
History of African American Family Life in the 19th Century
V57.0627 Krauthamer. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Focuses on the ways in which enslaved and free African American men and women organized their families and communities in 19th-century America. Asks the following: How did slavery, religion, emancipation, education, labor patterns, and class divisions shape the lives of African American individuals and families? Also considers historical and contemporary representations of African American families.
American Indian Policy: Indian-White Relations, 1750 to the Present
V57.0628 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Historical development of Indian-white relations and the formation of major federal policies toward the Native American from the experiences in late colonial America to the present. Includes the nature of relations between the Indian and the white man in America, the formation and implementation of policies to deal with that relationship, the Indian dilemma in an expansive American society, the impact of historical change on major Indian tribes, and the significant influences of Indian and white leaders.
Women in American Society
V57.0635 Identical to V97.0635. Gordon. Offered every year. 4 points.
This course has two themes: how maleness and femaleness (gender) have changed in the last 150 years, and how women’s lives in particular have been transformed. It emphasizes not only the malleability of gender but also the way that gender systems have varied in different class, race, ethnic, and religious groups. The course looks at women and gender in politics, in work, in family and personal relationships, in sexuality, and in culture.
New York City: A Cultural History
V57.0638 Bender. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Explores the cultural history of New York City in the 19th and 20th centuries. Special attention to literary and pictorial symbolizations of the city, urban development and urban aesthetics, and the institutions and traditions of intellectual and cultural creativity. At least one walking tour.
New York City: A Social History
V57.0639 Identical to V99.0330. Walkowitz. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Examines key themes in the social history of New York City: the pattern of its physical and population growth, its social structure and class relations, ethnic and racial groups, municipal government and politics, family and work life, and institutions of social welfare and public order.
American Intellectual History, 1750-1930
V57.0643 Prerequisite: survey course on American history, American literature, or American political theory. Bender. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Explores selected practical and prescriptive visions of American culture and politics articulated by writers, intellectuals, and political leaders since 1750. The work of the course is the reading and interpreting of key texts in their intellectual, political, and social contexts. Concerns itself with the interplay between ideas and experience, and politics and culture.
U.S. Borderlands: Culture, Conflict, and Conquest
V57.0645 Krauthamer. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Examines the history of the U.S. Southwest—the borderlands—in the 18th and 19th centuries. Covers the history of the indigenous peoples in this region, Spanish and Mexican control of the area, and the struggles between Mexico and the United States to lay claim to the land. Readings and lectures focus closely on the ways in which communities and cultures developed and interacted in a region where territorial borders between nations were often unclear and shifting.
African American History to 1865
V57.0647 Identical to V11.0647. Krauthamer, Sammons. Offered every year. 4 points.
Survey of the experience of African Americans to 1865, emphasizing living conditions, treatment, images, attitudes, important figures and events, and culture using a chronological and topical approach. Topics include African way of life, initial contact between Africans and Europeans, slave trade, early slavery, freedom and control in slave society, abolitionism, slave resistance, free blacks, and gender.
African American History Since 1865
V57.0648 Identical to V11.0648. Sammons. Offered every year. 4 points.
Survey of the experience of African Americans from the Civil War to the present, including themes such as freedom and equality, migratory movements, cultural contributions, military participation, civil rights activism, black power, and contemporary conditions. Topics include the Reconstruction, white supremacy, black thought and protest, Washington and Du Bois debate, rise of the NAACP, World War I, the Harlem Renaissance, communism, World War II, civil rights, black power, black nationalism, and blacks and Reagan.
American Social Movements
V57.0652 Gordon. Offered every other year. 4 points.
An examination of large-scale social movements in the 20th century, as well as a brief introduction to social-movement theory. We examine civil rights, populism, feminism, labor union activism, the old and new left, the right-to-life movement, and the new Christian Right in general. Questions include the following: How do social movements construct identities and how do identities affect social movements? How do social movements use or repress multiple identities? When are social movements political? How and when do social movements yield or grow out of organizations and what is the impact of the relation between movements and organizations? Are there elite social movements? Do social movements have to be democratic? When do social movements become violent? Are social movements inevitably vulnerable to demagoguery and authoritarianism?
Race, Gender, and Sexuality in U.S. History
V57.0655 Identical to V97.0993. Duggan. Offered every year. 4 points.
Drawing primarily on the histories of hetero- and homosexual African Americans and women, this course explores the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality in 19th- and 20th-century American history. Throughout U.S. history, the social, economic, moral, and political arguments advanced to sustain the subordination of people of color, women, and gays and lesbians have frequently revolved around the sphere of sexuality. We explore important historical subjects such as abolition, lynching, welfare debates, teenage pregnancy policies, reproductive rights, and the Black Power movement with special attention paid to the intertwined histories of racial, gender, and sexual oppression.
Women and Slavery in the Americas
V57.0660 Krauthamer. Offered every other year. 4 points.
This course examines the history of African and African American women enslaved in the United States and Caribbean. The course begins with African slavery and the emergence of the Atlantic slave trade and then follows the forced migration of African women to the Americas. Readings address issues such as resistance, religion, labor, and reproduction and also cover theoretical questions about the dynamics of ideas of status, race, and gender. The course ends with a section on the legacy of slavery in contemporary representations of African and African American women.
American History in Transnational Perspective
V57.0667 Prerequisite: at least one college-level course in American history. Bender. Offered every year. 4 points.
This seminar is designed to explore the ways of narrating the history of the United States that are not wholly contained within the territory of the United States. It seeks to identify histories larger than the United States within which the history of America is embedded and entangled, with the aim of rethinking the basic narrative of American history. Themes range from immigration and economics to culture and politics in their global and transnational aspects. The course focuses on readings and discussion.
Seminar: Reading and Writing Experimental History
V57.0672 Hodes. 4 points.
Investigates and evaluates the ways in which scholars attempt to expand the boundaries of writing history. Focuses on relationship between historical evidence and the writing of history in new ways, relation between scholar and subject, connections between history and speculation, use of unconventional voices, recreation of past worlds and lives, and connections between history and storytelling.
African American Autobiography
V57.0688 Sammons. Offered every other year. 4 points.
By approaching autobiography as equally sociological, historical, and literary, this course facilitates a better understanding of the genre and opens new means of communication between disciplines in unraveling the meanings of human expression and experience. Sociological and historical issues raised by the materials are considered in tandem with the formal and stylistic means through which those issues are shaped in the works at hand.
American Jewish History
V57.0689 Identical to V78.0172. Diner. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Surveys the history of the Jewish people in America from the middle of the 17th century until the present. Focuses on the social, cultural, political, and religious development of the Jewish community against the backdrop of American history. Seeks to identify and explain both the preservation of tradition and patterns of innovation. Examines both the inner lives of American Jews and their communities and the kinds of relationships they had with the larger American world.
HISTORY OF ASIA, AFRICA, AND LATIN AMERICA
The Ottoman Empire in World History
V57.0515 Identical to V77.0650 and V65.0651. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
World of Goods in China
V57.0528 Identical to V33.0538. Waley-Cohen. 4 points.
Material culture and the nature of consumption in China 1550-1900. The course aims to introduce students to the theoretical framework of current scholarship on material culture and consumption and their relationship to modernity and its antecedents in different parts of the world; to give students a strong sense of Chinese elite social and cultural life during this period; and to provide students with a sufficient basis of knowledge on which to begin grounding comparative judgments. Themes include periodization (“early modern” versus “late imperial” and other labels); urbanization; commercialization and globalization; sex and gender, explored through such specific aspects of material culture as books and publishing; art, including collecting and connoisseurship; textiles; food; opium; and architecture and gardens.
The Emergence of the Modern Middle East
V57.0531 Identical to V77.0690. Offered every year. 4 points.
Surveys main political, social, economic, and intellectual currents of the 20th century. Emphasis on historical background and development of current problems in region. Topics include imperialism, nationalism, religion, Orientalism, women, class formation, oil, the Arab-Israeli crisis, and the Iranian revolution.
History of Modern Japan
V57.0537 Identical to V33.0537. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Emphasizes historical problems in Japan’s economic development, their challenge to political and social institutions, and their role in shaping foreign policy. Focuses on Japan’s transition from an agrarian economy to commercial capitalism, from hierarchical social organization to constitutional authority, and from isolation from the rest of the world to involvement with Western culture and diplomatic relations. Traces Japan’s development into an industrial giant fully engaged in world affairs.
Topics in Chinese History
V57.0551 Identical to V33.0551. Karl, Waley-Cohen, M. Young. Offered every year. 4 points.
Specific topics vary from time to time and may include Women and Gender in Chinese History; Rebellion and Revolution in China, 1683-1864; The Manchus in China; Urban China; American Wars in Asia; China in Revolution, 1949-Present; China After Mao; Maoism and China.
The History of Religions in Africa
V57.0566 Identical to V11.0566. Hull. Offered every year. 4 points.
Covers (1) traditional African religions, including the myths of origin; concepts of the individual and the Supreme Being; the individual’s relation to the universe; links between the world of the living and the spiritual; ancestral worship, divinities, witches, and sorcerers; and sacrifice, prayer, birth, and death; (2) the impact of Islam on traditional African religions and the spread of Islam; (3) the impact of Christianity and missionary enterprise in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in sub-Saharan Africa; and (4) the impact of secular culture on religions in sub-Saharan Africa.
Africa Since 1940
V57.0567 Identical to V11.0567. Previous course work on Africa is desirable but not required. Cooper. Offered every year. 4 points.
This is a course about how Africa got to be where it is now. It covers the period from the beginning of the crisis that shook colonial empires in the 1940s through the coming to power of independent African governments on most of the continent in the 1960s to the fall of the last white regime in South Africa in 1994, by which time the already independent countries of Africa had found themselves in deep crisis. By bridging the conventional divide between “colonial” and “independent” Africa, the course opens up questions about the changes in African economies, religious beliefs, family relations, and conceptions of the world around them during the last half century. Students read political and literary writings by African intellectuals as well as the work of scholars based inside and outside Africa, and they view and discuss videos as well. The course emphasizes the multiple meanings of politics—from local to regional to Pan-African levels, and it aspires to give students a framework for understanding the process of social and economic change in contemporary Africa.
History of Southern Africa
V57.0568 Identical to V11.0568. Hull. Offered every year. 4 points.
Exploration and analysis of the political, social, and economic development of African nations south of the Zambezi River from 1700 to the present. Focuses on South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Mozambique.
Vietnam: Its History, Its Culture, and Its Wars
V57.0737 Identical to V33.0737. Roberts, M. Young. 4 points.
See description under East Asian Studies (33).
History of Colonial Latin America
V57.0743 Thomson. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Introduces students to the colonial origins of the Latin American region and the ways they have shaped the present. It follows the unfolding and demise of a new social order under European rule, over a period spanning from the 16th-century conquest through the early 19th-century wars of independence. Specific topics include Inca and Aztec worlds; Indian-European confrontations; the Catholic Church and popular religiosity; patriarchy and honor codes; racial dynamics and slavery; the development of capitalism; anticolonial struggles; imperial rivalry; reform; decline; and colonial legacies.
History of Modern Latin America
V57.0745 Ferrer, Grandin. Offered every year. 4 points.
A comparative survey of Latin American social, economic, cultural, and political history from 1800 to the present.
Topics in Latin American and Caribbean History
V57.0750 Ferrer, Grandin, Thomson. Offered every year. 4 points.
Focuses on varying groupings of historical experiences in selected countries of Latin America and the Caribbean or on thematic issues on the history of the region. Recent topics include Race and Ethnicity in Latin America, History and Revolution in Cuba, and Latin American Populism.
History of Mexico and Central America
V57.0752 Grandin. Offered every other year. 4 points.
A survey of Mexican social and cultural history, including a brief sketch of indigenous societies and civilizations on the eve of the Spanish Conquest, an examination of the conquest as a protracted process and of the establishment of regionally distinct colonial societies, and an exploration of the formation and subsequent development of specific patterns of social life—urban society and rural hinterlands, characteristic agrarian institutions, and interracial and interethnic relations. Special attention paid to moments of real or apparent rupture in the social and political system, when these characteristic patterns and institutions were challenged or threatened—the Wars of Independence, the revolution, and the recent conflict and crisis in Chiapas.
History of the Andes
V57.0753 Thomson. Offered every other year. 4 points.
This course offers an introduction to one of the core regions of Latin America from preconquest to modern times. Course themes include Andean regional and cultural identity; ecology and peasant agriculture; native society and the Inca; colonialism, nationalism, and race; global commodity production (from silver to coca) and economic dependency; Indian and working-class political struggles. The Peruvian novelist and ethnographer José María Arguedas is taken as an exemplary figure whose life, work, and death provide a focus connecting diverse elements in the course.
Cuba: History and Revolution
V57.0755 Ferrer. 4 points.
Cuba was one of the first territories colonized by Spain and among the last to secure its independence. It was among the last territories in the hemisphere to abolish slavery, yet home to the first black political party in the Americas. Its struggle for independence from Spain helped usher in an age of U.S. imperialism. It is the hemisphere’s first and last socialist state. This brief description hints not only at the complexities of Cuban history but also at its significance for international histories of nationalism and imperialism, race and slavery, the Cold War and socialist revolution. This course serves as an in-depth examination of that complex and fascinating history. The course focuses in depth on the major themes that have shaped modern Cuban history in the 19th and 20th centuries: race and slavery, nationalism and imperialism, reform and revolution. Particular attention is paid to the revolution of 1959.
History of the Caribbean
V57.0759 Ferrer. Offered every year. 4 points.
The Antilles and the Guianas, from the arrival of Columbus to the present. A survey course organized chronologically and thematically around such topics as colonialism, slavery and emancipation, U.S. intervention, social revolution, and economic development.
GLOBAL AND SPECIAL TOPICS COURSES
Cold War
V57.0622 Nolan. 4 points.
The Cold War as global conflict. The course focuses on Europe and the Third World as well as on the U.S. and the Soviet Union. It looks at international politics and diplomacy; nuclear rivalry and the culture of the bomb; Cold War economic competition and development policies; and the impact of the Cold War on culture and gender in various countries.
Contemporary World History
V57.0831 Ben-Dor Benite, Berenson. Offered every year. 4 points.
A thematic approach to contemporary world history since the late 19th century. The course considers the following topics, among several others: the reasons for Europe’s unprecedented world domination in the final third of the 19th century; responses to Western hegemony; the world wars in global perspective; the new nationalism of the 20th century; the rise of authoritarian and fascist regimes; independence movements and decolonization; cultural change and the assertion of women’s rights; the Islamic revival, and the collapse of world communism.
Topics in Women’s History
V57.0820 Identical to V97.0820. 4 points.
Topics vary from term to term.
Topics in World History
V57.0830 Hull. Offered every year. 4 points.
This advanced lecture course varies in format and content each semester. In general, it examines different cultures comparatively over time and space from the 15th century to the present.
RESEARCH SEMINARS
The research seminar is the culminating intellectual experience for the history major. Having taken the relevant lecture and readings courses to provide historical background and context, the seminar student undertakes the research and writing of an original research paper. Research seminars should be taken in the senior year, but they are open to qualified juniors. They are small classes in which the students present their own work and discuss the work of the others. Permission of the director of undergraduate studies is required for admission. An occasional nonmajor may be admitted with permission of the director of undergraduate studies.
EUROPEAN HISTORY
Seminar: Topics in Irish History
V57.0185 Identical to V58.0185. Scally. 4 points.
See description under Irish Studies (58).
Seminar: Culture and Communism in Eastern Europe
V57.0263 Given every other year. 4 points.
This course considers the ways in which communism conditioned intellectual. literary, and artistic culture in Eastern Europe during the second half of the twentieth century. The course will discuss how communism sought to prescribe particular cultural paths, how political censorship affected cultural development, and how cultural works articulated resistance to communist regimes. The course will pay particular attention to cultural life in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.
Seminar: Women in Medieval and Renaissance Europe
V57.0270 Identical to V65.0270 and V97.0270. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Examines the role and status of women in medieval and Renaissance Europe, exploring theological and medical attitudes toward women as well as economic and social determinants for women’s lives. Includes topics such as the development of the institution of marriage; the ideal of romantic love; women’s religious experience; and women’s economic, literary, and artistic contributions to society. Balances studying women as a group in history and examining individual women, when possible, through their own words.
Seminar: Topics in Early Modern Europe
V57.0279 Identical to V65.0279. Appuhn, Shovlin. Offered every year. 4 points.
The specific subjects treated in this seminar vary according to student need and instructor interest.
Seminar: World of Medieval Magic
V57.0282 Bedos-Rezak. 4 points.
Paper topics preferably deal with the manifold aspects of medieval magic. Spanning the Jewish and Christian Western world, this course considers tales and legends of the supernatural and how the medieval mind accepted the power of the supernatural in everyday life as expressed in fairies, miracles, and cults of saints; astrology and fortune-telling; alchemy; folk medicine, remedies, and healing spells; death, burial, and vampires; ordeals and the judicial process; shivarees of youth groups and urban carnivals; the devil’s fields of action, such as the imagination, sorcery, and witchcraft. Both learned and popular medieval cultures preserved a place for the practice of magical arts. There is, however, a differentiated sociology of magic, for countrysiders, urbanites, aristocrats, women, and clerics all present us with their own brands of practice and belief, which were, in turn, variously accepted or rejected by official authorities. The history of medieval magic intersects that of repression and persecution.
Seminar: The European Enlightenment
V57.0286 Shovlin. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Students examine classic texts in Enlightenment studies as well as interpretations of the Enlightenment that place these texts in cultural context and larger historical perspective. Topics include the philosophies and the gods, the social and political sciences, ethical thought, utopian literature, and popular culture.
Seminar: Cultural History of the French Revolution
V57.0287 Shovlin. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Explores thematically and in depth selected new sources, recent interpretations, and current debates in French Revolutionary cultural history. The course is broadly divided into Revolutionary and counterrevolutionary ideology and culture; biography; legacies of the French Revolution; and 20th-century representations of the French Revolution in the arts.
Seminar: Origins of World War I
V57.0288 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Explores the causes and responsibility for the war. Topics include the diplomatic crises before 1914, the internal situation of Austria, the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand, and the varying interpretations of the causes of the war.
Seminar: The Russian Revolution
V57.0291 Kotsonis. Offered every other year. 4 points.
This seminar has two objectives: (1) an in-depth survey of the events, personalities, and interpretations of the Russian Revolution through a close analysis of numerous and varied sources and (2) a workshop in the writing of history through the preparation and criticism of short papers and written exercises.
Seminar: Cultural History of Europe, 19th and 20th Centuries
V57.0293 Otter. Offered every year. 4 points.
Stresses the theme of cultural responses to a changing civilization in the generation before World War I. Students present reports based on original research in fields such as literature, the arts, philosophy, science, religion, education, and popular culture. Emphasizes research methods, and discussions center on student investigations.
Seminar: Western Europe and Greece, 1700-1900
V57.0297 Fleming. Offered every year. 4 points.
This seminar focuses on European philhellenism from 1700 to 1900. Examines the impact of philhellenism on the Greek and European cultural contexts, assesses the contributions of European philhellenism to the Greek War of Independence, and traces the ways in which philhellenism shaped the development of Greece as an independent nation-state in the 19th century. Particular attention given to the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars; the so-called “Age of Revolution”; the role of the Habsburgs and Ottomans; and the rise of the British colonial empire.
Seminar: 19th-Century France
V57.0302 Berenson. Offered every year. 4 points.
Social and political history of France from the French Revolution to the late 19th century. Topics include the French Revolution and its legacy; the Empire; movements of the right and the left; urbanization; the Revolution of 1848 and the Paris Commune; the Dreyfus Affair; colonization; and the question of nationhood, citizenship, and the emergence of a French identity.
Seminar: 20th-Century France
V57.0303 Chapman. Offered every year. 4 points.
The transformation of French society since the beginning of the 20th century. Topics include nationalism, socialism, labor conflict, economic crisis, war and collaboration, colonialism and decolonization, student uprising, immigration, the establishment of a presidential regime, and regional and ethnic militancy.
UNITED STATES HISTORY
Seminar: The Jacksonian Era
V57.0673 Offered every year. 4 points.
American society in the Jacksonian era—1820s to 1848—confronted many dynamic challenges to the perceived social and economic order, as well as the political culture of the early Republic. This seminar explores ways of approaching research analysis of the era, focusing on the social, cultural, or political movements, such as its new reform efforts, its utopian communities, its new religious impulses, its varied politics, its disorders and dislocations in response to urbanization, immigration, and industrialization. After preliminary readings and discussions, the seminar features the individual research investigations of students.
Seminar: Constructions of Race in U.S. History
V57.0680 Hodes. 4 points.
Explores the ideas of race and how racial classifications have changed over time and across regions and cultures in the United States. Themes include language, color, law, science, slavery, mixed ancestries, and white identity.
Seminar: The Civil War
V57.0683 4 points.
Each student engages in a research project in the sources for the period of the Civil War, concentrating on a particular biographical, regional, or societal topic. The course begins with a few sessions of discussion about developments between 1860 and 1870 and follows with emphasis on individual oral presentations and class interchange on the selected topics.
Seminar: Ideology and Social Change in American History
V57.0684 Offered every other year. 4 points.
Explores classical arguments in American history concerning social behavior. Central themes: the power of cultural conditioning, the role of schooling and other acculturating institutions, the uses of “uplifting” reform and organizational benevolence, and the intervention of professional experts into social policymaking. Special attention to the role of ethnic and racial leaders, proponents of success and socialization, critical investigations of family and femininity, and analysis of distinctive generational responses to these and related issues.
Seminar: The New Deal
V57.0686 Katz. Offered every year. 4 points.
Explores the historical issues of the Great Depression and the New Deal years, 1933-1941, by discussing several relevant works on this period. Students choose a research project, which they report on orally and in a seminar paper.
Seminar: Urban America
V57.0695 Bender. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Concentrates on a topic in urban history. Students discuss readings on the topic and then write substantial papers on a specific aspect of the topic that interests them. Completed student papers are discussed in class. Special attention to methods of historical research and interpretation.
Seminar: Sport and Film in American History
V57.0698 Sammons. 4 points.
This course investigates how a visual medium (film), subject to the conventions of drama and fiction and a popular activity/institution (sport), often associated with frivolity, violence, and puerility, might be used as serious vehicles for conceptualizing and analyzing the past.
HISTORY OF ASIA, AFRICA, AND LATIN AMERICA
Seminar: Topics in Eurasian History
V57.0533 Given every year. 4 points.
This research seminar focuses on major historical issues and problems in the history of Eurasia, which is the largest landmass of the world but rarely taught as a region or unit of historical analysis. The course responds to recent shifts in the historical discipline, which emphasize frameworks larger than the “nation-state” for historical research and analysis. Topics might include The Mongol Empire and Its Legacy; Early Modern Empires: China, Russia, and the Ottomans; Scientific and Technological Exchanges, 1225-2000; Eurasian Militaries; and Nomads and Nomadism in Eurasia.
Gender and Radicalism in Modern China
V57.0536 Identical to V33.0536 and V97.0536. Karl. Offered every year. 4 points.
Examines the interrelated rise of political, ideological, and cultural radicalisms and of gender issues as a major subject and object of transformative social activity in 19th- and 20th-century China. Introduces approaches to gender theory and historical analysis through the use of primary and secondary sources on China, as well as through films and other visuals. Emphasis is on synthesizing contradictory material and on historical analytical issues. Includes heavy writing and class discussion component.
Seminar: Colonialism, Imperialism, and Nationalism in the Middle East
V57.0541 Identical to V77.0677. Lockman. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Seminar in Chinese History
V57.0552 Identical to V33.0552. Karl, Waley-Cohen, M. Young. Offered every year. 4 points.
Specific topics include China and the Global Economy, 1492-1842; China and Christianity; Culture and Politics in Qing History; Republican Shanghai; Modern Chinese Intellectual History; Frontiers of China; Politics and Culture of the 1950s; Nationalism in Asia; The Cultural Revolution.
Seminar: Modern Africa
V57.0584 Hull. Offered every year. 4 points.
This advanced seminar covers the period since 1960 with an emphasis on the last two decades. It analyzes a number of topics including religious fundamentalism and terrorism, governance, economic development, urbanization, environmental protection, gender and ethnic relations, and disease, especially AIDS and malaria. Each topic is discussed rather broadly while individual students in their own research have an opportunity to focus more narrowly on an aspect of a topic as it applies to a specific country or region.
Seminar: Ancient Africa
V57.0597 Hull. Offered every year. 4 points.
This research seminar attempts to examine critically a number of important cities, towns, and states that flourished before the period of external, mainly European, control. The course explores the key reasons for their emergence, their dynamism, and their demise. In the process, it considers such factors as governance, commerce, the arts and architecture, social organization, and religion. The period covered extends from the New Kingdom in Egypt (1550 BCE) to the forest kingdoms of West Africa on the eve of the Atlantic slave trade in the mid-15th century.
Seminar: Modern Central Asia
V57.0700 Identical to V77.0700. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Seminar: Japan and World War II in Asia
V57.0710 Identical to V33.0710. Offered every other year. 4 points.
Takes up a watershed event in Japanese history, the greatest single preoccupation of Japanese historians. The war is dealt with in two senses: its meaning for Japan’s international history and its impact on the domestic landscape. Readings are drawn from both primary and secondary sources so that interpretative controversies as well as texts may be discussed. Thematically, the course divides into sections: (1) the great debates over Japanese fascism and ultranationalism; (2) the China War; (3) the Pacific War; (4) the Co-Prosperity Sphere; (5) the atom bomb, surrender, and occupation; and (6) issues of public memory and war responsibility.
Seminar: Conquest and the Origins of Colonialism in Latin America and the Caribbean
V57.0757 Thomson. Offered every other year. 4 points.
How did colonizing European and colonized American peoples perceive each other, respond to unprecedented historical conditions, and reshape their worlds in the early modern era? What confluence of economic, political, and spiritual forces led to European domination in the New World? What were the common and distinctive features of the conquest in the Caribbean, Mexico, the Andes, Brazil, and New World frontier settings? These questions are addressed through a range of historical sources and contemporary works that cast light on the past and reflect postconquest thought about race, colonialism, and modernity.
Seminar: Latin America and the Caribbean
V57.0799 Ferrer, Grandin, Thomson. Offered every year. 4 points.
Seminars are organized around broad themes in Latin American and Caribbean history. Recent topics have included African Slavery in Latin America and the Caribbean; Haiti and Cuba: Connections and Comparisons; the Cold War in Latin America; and Memory and Violence in Latin America. Students choose a research topic related to the semester’s theme, conduct primary source research in area libraries, and produce a final, original research paper.
GLOBAL AND SPECIAL TOPICS SEMINARS
Colonialism and Decolonization
V57.0569 Identical to V11.0569. Goswami. Offered every year. 4 points.
Drawing on canonical works produced in the interdisciplinary context of “colonial studies,” this course addresses the history of colonialism since the late 18th century. Class discussions focus on the shifting forms and strategies of colonial domination for the remaking of 19th- and 20th-century worlds, the relationship between colonial and metropolitan politics, the meaning of “colonial modernity,” and anticolonial nationalism. Historical readings draw on examples of British, French, Dutch, and Japanese colonialism in South Asia, Africa, South East Asia, and East Asia.
Topics in Environmental History
V57.0829 Given annually or bi-annually. 4 points.
This topics seminar allows students to explore specific topics in the field of environmental history that might get partial coverage in a lecture course. Topics will vary according to instructor interest, but possible topics include urban environments, the history of human-animal relations, the history of forests, and the history of water management.
REQUIRED COURSE FOR HISTORY MAJORS
Workshop in History
V57.0900 Offered every term. 4 points.
At least one workshop is required for the major, usually taken in the sophomore or junior year and before an advanced seminar. Broadly speaking, this is a course in the historian’s craft, and it gives students an opportunity to learn about the discipline of history. The goal is not to impart a specific body of historical knowledge but to give students an understanding of the skills and methodologies of the professional historian. Students learn how to pose researchable questions, how to do the detective work necessary to gather evidence, how to analyze varieties of evidence, and how to present their findings before an audience of their peers. Students learn how to critique historical arguments and interpretations, as well as to create their own. Recent topics have included Families and the Civil War; New York City, 1870-1930; Decoding the Middle Ages; Travel and Travelers in American History; and Material Culture.
INDEPENDENT STUDY
Independent Study
V57.0997, 0998 Prerequisites: junior or senior standing and permission of the instructor and the director of undergraduate studies. Students may not take more than one independent study course per term. No more than two may count toward the major. Instructors are limited to two independent study students per term. Offered every term. 2 or 4 points per term.
INTERNSHIP PROGRAM
Internship
V57.0980, 0981 Prerequisite: permission of the director of undergraduate studies. Open only to junior and senior history majors. Offered every term. 4 points per term.
Enables advanced and qualified students to work on historical projects for credit for up to 12 hours per week in approved agencies or archival centers.
CROSS-LISTED COURSES
The following are designated related courses offered in other departments and generally cross-listed with the Department of History.
Modern Jewish History
V57.0099 Identical to V78.0103. Engel. 4 points.
See description under Hebrew and Judaic Studies (78).
History of Ancient Greece
V57.0200 Identical to V27.0242. Peachin. 4 points.
See description under Classics (27).
History of the Roman Republic
V57.0205 Identical to V27.0267. Peachin. 4 points.
See description under Classics (27).
History of the Roman Empire
V57.0206 Identical to V27.0278. Peachin. 4 points.
See description under Classics (27).
History of the South Asian Diaspora
V57.0326 Identical to V15.0326. Muhkerjea. 4 points.
See description under Asian/Pacific/American Studies (15).
The History of Ancient Egypt, 3200-50 BC
V57.0506 Identical to V77.0611. Goelet. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Islam and the West
V57.0520 Identical to V77.0694. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
The Emergence of the Modern Middle East
V57.0531 Identical to V77.0690. Haj, Lockman. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Palestine, Zionism, Israel
V57.0532 Identical to V77.0697. Lockman. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
The Land of Israel Through the Ages
V57.0540 Identical to V78.0141 and V90.0609. Schiffman. 4 points.
See description under Hebrew and Judaic Studies (78).
Seminar: Colonialism, Imperialism, and Nationalism in the Middle East
V57.0541 Identical to V77.0677. Haj. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Seminar: Topics in Middle Eastern History
V57.0550 Identical to V77.0688. Husain. 4 points.
See description under Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (77).
Introduction to the Asian/Pacific American Experience
V57.0626 Identical to V15.0010. Siu. 4 points.
See description under Asian/Pacific/American Studies (15).
Race, Class, and Metropolitan Transformation
V57.0656 Identical to V15.0601 and V99.0345. 4 points.
See description under Asian/Pacific/American Studies (15).
The Holocaust: The Third Reich and the Jews
V57.0808 Identical to V78.0685. 4 points.
See description under Hebrew and Judaic Studies (78).
GRADUATE COURSES OPEN TO UNDERGRADUATES
Certain 1000-level courses in the Graduate School of Arts and Science are open to qualified undergraduates each semester, and qualified undergraduates are encouraged to enroll in those that fit the needs of their program. Permission of the director of undergraduate studies is required.
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