History
The History major introduces students to major civilizations of the past while it develops skills of research, analysis and expression that are essential to students in the Liberal Arts environment. History majors learn not only what happened in the past, but also how to explain significant elements of continuity and how to analyze moments of profound rupture. Thus a History major develops a deep appreciation for the durable phenomena of world cultures (the persistence of poverty, the transcendence of genius, the corruption of political power), as well as a keen analytical framework for understanding transformative moments in time (the American, Mexican and French Revolutions, the Civil Rights Movement, etc.)
In view of the variety of departmental offerings, History majors are allowed to design their own mix of courses. The department offers guidelines, attentive advising, and carefully selected requirements to ensure coherence in the student's growing mastery of the discipline. Still, much of the choice on specific courses is left up to the individual student. The student's pathway through the major should reflect his or her particular interests, abilities and career plans.
See History Department Web site: https://apps.carleton.edu/curricular/history/
Requirements for a Major
The major requires a total of 72 credits from courses taken in the history department. History 100's and the comprehensive exercise count toward the total number of credits. Courses in ancient history are taught in the Classics department and count toward the history major. Certain courses offered outside the history department also count toward the major; these courses are specified in the course catalog.
Primary Field
Courses must be taken in at least three of the following eight fields: 1) United States, 2) Ancient and Medieval, 3) Early Modern and Modern Europe, 4) the Middle East and Asia, 5) Africa and Its Diaspora, 6) Latin America, 7) the Atlantic World and 8) Environment and Health. Students choosing fields 1-4 as their primary field will take four courses; those choosing 5-8 may take four courses in that field, or take three courses in the field and one additional course that is of relevance to the field. This additional course will be chosen in consultation with the adviser.
Self-designed Thematic Field Option
In consultation with the faculty, students may also propose a self-designed thematic field as their primary field (e.g., Gender and History, Colonialism, Environmental History, Communism, Economic History). Interested students should consult the department chair for further details and procedures.
History 200 Sophomore Workshops
Working with evidence is what allows historians to encounter past societies and people. What kind of evidence we have and our approaches to interpreting it shape the questions we can ask and the interpretations we can offer. This series of courses geared toward sophomores will provide interested students with hands-on experience in working with various kinds of evidence and learning about the process of writing histories.
Additional Requirements
In addition to four courses in a primary field, all majors must also take at least two courses in each of two secondary fields. The History major must complete a research seminar (History 395), the History Colloquium (History 298) and Advanced Historical Writing (History 398). Students prepare for the senior integrative exercise by submitting an acceptable proposal, normally in fall term of the senior year and writing a senior thesis (History 400), normally in the winter term of the senior year. See History Comps Web page.
It is recommended that students planning to major in history take a History 100 seminar and one or two other courses during their first year. History majors who are interested in study and research in a major library should consider the Newberry Library Seminar program. One off-campus program in History is offered in 2016-2017, spring term in Rome. Other additional off-campus programs and graduate studies programs and information can be found in the History department lounge and on the History Department Off-Campus Programs and the Off-Campus Studies office web pages.
Courses from other departments
(may be included in the seventy-two credits total and count towards fields).
- AMST 115 Introduction to American Studies: Immigration and American Culture
- AMST 115 Introduction to American Studies: Placing Identities
- CLAS 227 Greek History: The Greek Polis
- CLAS 231 The Roman Principate
- ECON 232 American Economic History: A Cliometric Approach
- EDUC 245 The History of American School Reform
- EUST 100 Allies or Enemies? America through European Eyes
- POSC 245 Politics of the Middle East I (1918-67)
- RELG 140 Religion and American Culture
Please ask the history department chair or your adviser about any courses in African/African American Studies, American Studies, Asian Studies, Classics, Cross Cultural Studies, Economics, Education, European Studies, Environmental and Technology Studies, Latin American Studies, Religion, Women's and Gender Studies, or other special courses offered by an historian in another department if you wish to apply them toward the history major.
History Courses
HIST 100 Gandhi, Nationalism and Colonialism in India This seminar will examine the wide array of nationalist movements which struggled for independence from colonial rule in South Asia. Most prominent among these was the anti-colonial struggle led by Mohandas K. Gandhi. In this course we will examine the historical forces and the people which comprised these socio-political movements, in an effort to understand the complex and intriguing ways in which Gandhi's movement intersected, combined, and conflicted with other nationalist trends. Topics including the role of political violence and non-violence, conceptions of masculinity and femininity, caste, class, and race will also form part of our material. 6 credits; AI, WR1, IS; Fall; Brendan P LaRocque
HIST 100 History and Memory in Africa, Nineteenth through Twenty-first Centuries This course explores how Africans have remembered and retold their own history in the colonial and post-colonial contexts (nineteenth-twenty-first centuries). Students will examine memories of origin, the slave trade, conversion, and colonialism as well as of personal and communal triumphs and tragedies. Both long-standing historical texts like praise-names and rituals and modern texts like journals, court records, and letters will be explored. What is the relationship between the historical medium and the memory? Drawing from select cases in West, East and South Africa, students will come to understand the rich and varied history of Africa's creative expression. 6 credits; AI, IS, WR1; Fall; Thabiti Willis
HIST 100 Migration and Mobility in the Medieval North Why did barbarians invade? Traders trade? Pilgrims travel? Vikings raid? Medieval Europe is sometimes caricatured as a world of small villages and strong traditions that saw little change between the cultural high-water marks of Rome and the Renaissance. In fact, this was a period of dynamic innovation, during which Europeans met many familiar challenges—environmental change, religious and cultural conflict, social and political competition—by traveling or migrating to seek new opportunities. This course will examine mobility and migration in northern Europe, and students will be introduced to diverse methodological approaches to their study by exploring historical and literary sources, archaeological evidence and scientific techniques involving DNA and isotopic analyses. 6 credits; AI, WR1, IS; Fall; Austin P Mason
HIST 100 Music and Politics in Europe since Wagner This course examines the often fraught, complicated relationship between music and politics from the mid-nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth. Our field of inquiry will include all of Europe, but will particularly focus on Germany, Poland, and the Soviet Union. We will look at several composers and their legacies in considerable detail, including Beethoven, Wagner, and Shostakovich. While much of our attention will be devoted to "high" or "serious" music, we will explore developments in popular music as well. 6 credits; AI, WR1, IS; Fall; David G Tompkins
HIST 100 Slavery and the Old South: History and Historians This seminar introduces students to historiography of slavery in antebellum America. Debates over slavery are important to Americans generally and to historians of the American South in particular. The topic illuminates our understanding of human bondage through emphasis on the development of skills in historical analysis, writing, and oral argumentation. Major readings from the early twentieth century to the present engage the problem of methodology, relations between masters and slaves, the slave community, gendered work, and expressive culture. A mixture of short assignments and response papers and a final essay is required. 6 credits; AI, WR1, IDS; Fall; Harry M Williams
HIST 100 The Black Death: Disease and Its Consequences in the Middle Ages In the 1340s, the Black Death swept through the Middle East and Europe, killing up to a third of the population in some areas. How can we understand what this catastrophe meant for the people who lived and died at the time? In this seminar, we will examine the Black Death (primarily in Europe) from a range of perspectives and disciplines and through a range of sources. We will seek to understand the biological and environmental causes of the disease, therapies, and the experience of illness, but also the effects of the mortality on economic, social, religious, and cultural life. 6 credits; AI, WR1, QRE, IS; Fall; Victoria Morse
HIST 120 Rethinking the American Experience: American History, 1607-1865 A survey of the American experience from before Christopher Columbus' arrival through the Civil War. Some of the topics we will cover include: contact between Native and European cultures; the development of the thirteen mainland British colonies; British, French, and Spanish imperial conflicts over the Americas; slavery; the American Revolution; religious awakenings; antebellum politics; and the Civil War. 6 credits; HI, IDS, QRE; Winter; Serena R Zabin
HIST 121 Rethinking the American Experience: American Social History, 1865-1945 This course offers a survey of the American experience from the end of the Civil War through World War II. Although we will cover a large number of major historical developments--including Reconstruction, the Progressive movement, World War I, the Great Depression, the New Deal and World War II--the course will seek to emphasize the various beliefs, values, and understandings that informed Americans' choices throughout these periods. A particular theme will be individual Americans' varied personal experiences of historical trends and events. We will seek to understand the connections (and sometimes the disconnections) between the past and present. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Spring; Ellen L Manovich
HIST 122 U.S. Women's History to 1877 Gender, race, and class shaped women's participation in the arenas of work, family life, culture, and politics in the United States from the colonial period to the late nineteenth century. We will examine diverse women's experiences of colonization, industrialization, slavery and Reconstruction, religion, sexuality and reproduction, and social reform. Readings will include both primary and secondary sources, as well as historiographic articles outlining major frameworks and debates in the field of women's history. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17; Annette Igra
HIST 123 U.S. Women's History Since 1877 In the twentieth century women participated in the redefinition of politics and the state, sexuality and family life, and work and leisure as the United States became a modern, largely urban society. We will explore how the dimensions of race, class, ethnicity, and sexuality shaped diverse women's experiences of these historical changes. Topics will include: immigration, the expansion of the welfare system and the consumer economy, labor force segmentation and the world wars, and women's activism in civil rights, labor, peace and feminist movements. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 124 History of the City in the United States This course introduces modern United States urban history in social, cultural, political, and economic perspective. Our particular focus will be the period from 1865-present, but we will also consider earlier trends of urbanization in the U.S. Major course themes will include: life in the city, the rise, fall, and renewal of the American city, urban history and public memory, the economic and political history of the city, the culture of cities, and immigration, race, and ethnicity. We will also examine approaches to studying U.S. urban history. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Fall; Ellen L Manovich
HIST 125 African American History I: From Africa to the Civil War This course is a survey of early African American history. It will introduce students to major themes and events while also covering historical interpretations and debates in the field. Core themes of the course include migration, conflict, and culture. Beginning with autonomous African politics, the course traces the development of the United States through the experiences of enslaved and free African American women and men to the Civil War. The main aim of the course is for students to become familiar with key issues and developments in African American history and their centrality to understanding U.S. history. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 126 African American History II The transition from slavery to freedom; the post-Reconstruction erosion of civil rights and the ascendancy of Booker T. Washington; protest organizations and mass migration before and during World War I; the postwar resurgence of black nationalism; African Americans in the Great Depression and World War II; roots of the modern Civil Rights movement, and black female activism. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Winter, Spring; Harry M Williams
HIST 130 The History of Political Thought, 300-1600: Power, Authority, and Imagination The period between 300-1600 witnessed extensive and dynamic experimentation in political thought. The nascent and fluid polities and institutions of the period created a laboratory in which thinkers grappled with fundamental political issues: the nature and function of sovereignty and consensual rule; proper social order; and the nature and rule of law. Thinkers also debated the relative importance of reason, religion, tradition, and experience as sources of legitimate power and authority. Through a series of rich case studies, this course will explore the principles and preoccupations that shaped the political and institutional orders on the eve of the modern State. HI, WR2, IS Not offered 2016-17
HIST 131 Saints, Sinners, and Philosophers in Late Antiquity In Late Antiquity, Christians and pagans asked with particular intensity: How should I live? What should be my relationship to wealth, family, power, and the world? How are mind and body related in the good life and how can this relationship be controlled and directed? What place had education in the pursuit of the good life? Was the best life to be achieved through material renunciation, psychological transformation, or both? We will ask these and many other questions of a wide array of primary sources written originally in Latin, Greek, Syriac, Coptic, and Armenian while employing the insights of modern scholarship. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Winter; William L North
HIST 133 Crisis, Creativity, and Transformation in Late Antiquity This course investigates the dramatic transformations that shaped the eastern Mediterranean world and surrounding regions between ca. 250-850 CE. We will focus in particular on how people in late antiquity used environmental, institutional, socio-economic, and cultural resources to address an ongoing series of changes and challenges in their worlds. It also examines these responses from multiple perspectives: winners and losers, elites and non-elites, people of different ethnicities and cultures, urban and rural populations, and diverse religious groups and sects within these groups. The emergence and implications of Christianity and Islam as major organizing identities will also be explored. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 137 Early Medieval Worlds in Transformation In this course we will explore a variety of distinct but interconnected worlds that existed between ca.300 and ca.1050. We will interrogate primary sources, especially written and visual materials, as they bear witness to people forming and transforming political, social, religious, and cultural values, ideas and structures. We will work to understand how communities adapt to new conditions and challenges while maintaining links with and repurposing the lifeways, ideas, and material cultures of the past. We will watch as new and different groups and institutions come to power, and how the existing peoples and structures respond and change. Projects in this course will build capacity to interpret difficult primary documents, formulate research questions, and build arguments that combine rigor and humane sympathy. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 138 Crusades, Mission, and the Expansion of Europe This course examines the complex and sometimes contradictory roles of crusade and mission in the gradual expansion of Europe (eleventh -fifteenth century) into the eastern Mediterranean, the Iberian peninsula, the Baltic, and even Central Asia. We will examine questions like: What did "crusade" or "mission" mean? How did people respond to, resist, or co-opt these enterprises? Did crusade and mission expand Europeans' knowledge of other cultures? In addition to critical analysis of primary sources and current scholarship, the course will offer opportunities to share knowledge with a broader public. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17; Victoria Morse
HIST 139 Foundations of Modern Europe Witch hunts, religious reforms, economic transformation, global expansion... all of these phenomena exemplify the dynamic centuries c. 1500-1750, known as the early modern period in Europe. This course surveys the history of Western Europe from the Renaissance and Reformation through the era of the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment. We compare the development of states and societies across Western Europe in the larger context of expanding global trade and exchange with the Americas, Africa, South Asia and Japan. 6 credits; HI, IS, QRE, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 140 The Age of Revolutions: Modern Europe, 1789-1914 This course traces the evolution of Europe from the French Revolution to the outbreak of World War I, and examines some of the political, social, economic, intellectual, and cultural forces that have shaped and reshaped European society. We will cover the growth of modern nation-states, the industrial revolution and its effects on society, changes in the family and gender roles, and the evolution of modern consciousness in the arts, literature, and philosophy. The course will strive to look at both Western and Eastern Europe, and will conclude with a close examination of the causes of the First World War. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 141 Europe in the Twentieth Century This course explores developments in European history in a global context from the final decade of the nineteenth century through to the present. We will focus on the impact of nationalism, war, and revolution on the everyday experiences of women and men, and also look more broadly on the chaotic economic, political, social, and cultural life of the period. Of particular interest will be the rise of fascism and communism, and the challenge to Western-style liberal democracy, followed by the Cold War and communism’s collapse near the end of the century. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; David G Tompkins
HIST 142 Women in Modern Europe An exploration of women’s lives in Europe from 1700 to the present. We will focus on changes in women’s work before and after the industrial revolution, women as revolutionaries in 1789, 1848, and 1871, and campaigns for women’s rights. Why did Virginia Woolf say it was worse “perhaps” to be locked in than to be locked out? Why did Bertolt Brecht’s character known simply as "the mother" take up the flag of revolution in Russia in 1905? We will investigate these questions from the Early Modern era to the European Union through a variety of sources: philosophical treatises, novels, plays, and political tracts, as well as historical monographs. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Janet L Polasky
HIST 151 History of Modern Japan This course explores the modern transformation of Japanese society, politics, economy and culture from the Meiji Restoration of 1868 to the present. It is designed to provide students with an opportunity to explore basic issues and problems relating to modern Japanese history and international relations. Topics include the intellectual crisis of the late Tokugawa period, the Meiji Constitution, the development of an interior democracy, class and gender, the rise of Japanese fascism, the Pacific War, and postwar developments. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Seungjoo Yoon
HIST 153 History of Modern China This course examines major features of the trajectory of China’s recent past spanning from the seventeenth century through the present. Students will analyze deep socio-cultural currents that cut across the changes in socioeconomic as well as political arenas. Themes for discussion will include state formations, social changes, economic developments, religious orientations, bureaucratic behaviors, and cultural refinements that the Chinese have made. Students are also expected to develop skills to frame key historical questions against broader historiographical contexts by engaging in analyses of many different types of primary sources. 6 credits; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 156 History of Modern Korea A comparative historical survey on the development of Korean society and culture from the nineteenth century to the present. Key themes include colonialism and war, economic growth, political transformation, socio-cultural changes, and historical memory. Issues involving divided Korea will be examined in the contexts of post-colonialism and Cold War. Students are also expected to develop skills to analyze key historical moments from relevant primary sources against broader historiographical contexts. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 158 Cold War in East Asia How is the Cold War in East Asia related to the global Cold War? Many argue that Cold War came prematurely in East Asia and outlasts the collapse of the Berlin Wall. Students will examine evolving patterns of the region's engagement with global dimensions of war, diplomacy, and trade and conduct a case study (e.g., Roosevelt on China, Stalin on North Korea, Kennedy on Japan, Khrushchev and Nixon on China, or Bush on North Korea). Themes may be drawn from sports and pop culture or urban renewal projects in terms of post-colonial nation building, market fundamentalism, and new empire formation. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 161 From the Mughals to Mahatma Gandhi: An Introduction to Modern Indian History This is an introductory survey course; no prior knowledge of South Asian History required. The goal is to familiarize students with some of the key themes and debates in the historiography of modern India. Beginning with an overview of Mughal rule in India, the main focus of the course is the colonial period. The course ends with a discussion of 1947: the hour of independence as well as the creation of two new nation-states, India and Pakistan. Topics include Oriental Despotism, colonial rule, nationalism, communalism, gender, caste and race. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Amna Khalid
HIST 162 Politics and Public Culture in Modern South Asia This course examines the intersection of politics and culture in the public sphere in South Asia. We will look at the impact of British colonial rule, social hierarchies and caste, gender and the public sphere, race, religion and secularism. We'll also examine movements for independence, including Gandhian nationalism, left- and right-wing movements, and religious nationalism. Lastly, we will look at contemporary issues of popular culture, identity, gender, social justice, and militarism in the age of globalization. In addition to scholarly books and articles, course material includes music, poetry, journalism, popular Bollywood cinema and "art films." 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 165 A Cultural History of the Modern Middle East This course provides a basic introduction to the modern history of the Middle East from the late eighteenth century to the present. We will focus on the enormous transformations the region has witnessed in this period, as a world of empires gave way one of nation-states and new political and cultural ideas reshaped the lives of its inhabitants. We will discuss the cultural and religious diversity of the region and its varied interactions with modernity. We will find that the history of Middle East is inextricably linked to that of its neighbors and broader currents of modern history. We will read both the works of historians and literary and political texts from the region itself. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 167 Nuclear Nations: India & Pakistan as Rival Siblings At the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947 India and Pakistan, two new nation states emerged from the shadow of British colonialism. This course focuses on the political trajectories of these two rival siblings and looks at the ways in which both states use the other to forge antagonistic and belligerent nations. While this is a survey course it is not a comprehensive overview of the history of the two countries. Instead it covers some of the more significant moments of rupture and violence in the political history of the two states. The first two-thirds of the course offers a top-down, macro overview of these events and processes whereas the last third examines the ways in which people experienced these developments. We use the lens of gender to see how the physical body, especially the body of the woman, is central to the process of nation building. We will consider how women’s bodies become sites of contestation and how they are disciplined and policed by the postcolonial state(s). 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 169 Colonial Latin America This course examines the formation of Iberian colonial societies in the Americas with a focus on the lives of “ordinary” people, and the ways scholars study their lived experience through the surviving historical record. How did indigenous people respond to the so-called Spanish conquest? How did their communities adapt to colonial pressures and demands? What roles did African slaves and their descendants play in the formation of colonial societies? How were racial identities understood, refashioned, or contested as these societies became ever more globalized and diverse? These and other questions will serve as the starting point for our study of the origins and formation of contemporary Latin America. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 170 Modern Latin America 1810-Present Modern Latin American history is marked by both violent divisions and creative cooperation, nationalist proclamations and imperialist incursions, and democratic pursuits and dictatorial repression. This course offers a survey of this complex regional history from independence movements at the beginning of the nineteenth century through globalization in the twenty-first century. It addresses methodological issues that include the significance of multiple historical perspectives and the interpretation of sources. It considers the relationship between individuals and larger social contexts with an emphasis on race, ethnicity, class, citizenship status, and gender. It places Latin American culture and politics in regional and global contexts. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 181 West Africa in the Era of the Slave Trade The medieval Islamic and the European (or Atlantic) slave trades have had a tremendous influence on the history of Africa and the African Diaspora. This course offers an introduction to the history of West African peoples via their involvement in both of these trades from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century. More specifically, students will explore the demography, the economics, the social structure, and the ideologies of slavery. They also will learn the repercussions of these trades for men's and women's lives, for the expansion of coastal and hinterland kingdoms, and for the development of religious practices and networks. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 182 Living in the Colonial Context: Africa, 1850-1950 This course considers major actors and developments in sub-Saharan Africa from the mid-nineteenth through the mid-twentieth centuries. With a critical awareness of the ways that Africa's past has been narrated, it balances coverage of the state and economy with attention to daily life, families, and popular culture. The majority of the reading assignments are drawn from contemporary documents, commentaries, interviews, and memoirs. These are supplemented by works produced by historians. Students will analyze change, question perspectives, and imagine life during the age of European imperialism. Written assignments include a book review, examinations, and identifying and editing a primary source text. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 183 History of Early West Africa This course surveys the history of West Africa during the pre-colonial period from 790 to 1590. It chronicles the rise and fall of the kingdoms of Ancient Ghana, Mali, and Songhai. We will examine the transition from decentralized to centralized societies, the relations between nomadic and settler groups, the institution of divine kingship, the emergence of new ruling dynasties, the consolidation of trade networks, and the development of the classical Islamic world. Students will learn how scholars have used archeological evidence, African oral traditions, and the writings of Muslim travelers to reconstruct this important era of West African history. 6 credits; HI, IS; Fall; Thabiti Willis
HIST 184 Colonial West Africa This course surveys the history of West Africa during the colonial period, 1860-1960. It offers an introduction to the roles that Islam and Christianity played in establishing and maintaining colonial rule. It looks at the role of colonialism in shaping African ethnic identities and introducing new gender roles. In addition, we will examine the transition from slave labor to wage labor, and its role in exacerbating gender, generation, and class divisions among West Africans. The course also highlights some of the ritual traditions and cultural movements that flourished in response to colonial rule. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 194 The Making of the "Pacific World" The Pacific is the largest ocean on our planet, covering thirty percent of the Earth’s surface and bordered by four continents. This course will explore how a “Pacific World” framework can help us understand the movement of peoples, goods, and ideas across an oceanic space. Can we describe the history of the Pacific as having a unified history? This course will explore various topics in Pacific history including the history of exploration and migration, cross-cultural encounters, science and empire, and environmental history from 1750 to the present. While this course will be transnational in scope, it will focus primarily on U.S. exploration, trade, and the making of an American Pacific frontier. 6 credits; HI, IS; Winter; Tony Adler
HIST 200 History Workshop: The Chinese Cultural Revolution, 1966-76 In the recent past the youthful radical movement in Communist China has made an indelible mark on the society comprising a quarter of the world's population. In 1966 the student radicals known as Red Guards launched a series of destructive campaigns against the Communist Party with the Maoist cue to "Bombard the Headquarters!" How could a Leninist party find itself the victim of its own supreme leader? Students will examine tabloids, wall posters, pamphlets, cartoons, memoirs, reportage literature, play scripts, films, as well as party documents to explore theories on personality formation, class consciousness, legitimation of violence, and operations of memory. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 200 History Workshop: The Russian Revolution How do historians use evidence and how do they use it to construct their histories? In this seminar, which targets sophomores with a strong interest in history, students will explore these questions through a hands-on study of the Russian Revolution of 1917, one of the seminal events of the twentieth century and one of the most contentious. By working on research projects making intensive use of primary sources, students will ask questions not just about revolutionary change, but also about the nature of power and legitimacy, about what holds societies together and what leads to their dissolution. Above all, however, they will get to experience first hand the challenges and delights of using evidence and constructing arguments about the past. Not offered 2016-17
HIST 201 Rome Program: Community and Communication in Medieval Italy, CE 300-1250 Through site visits, on-site projects, and readings, this course explores the ways in which people in Italy from late antiquity through the thirteenth century sought to communicate political, religious, and civic messages through combinations of words, images, objects, and structures. What are the "arts of power and piety" and when and why are they used? How do people use spaces and images to educate, to challenge, to honor, to remember, or to forget? How can materials create and transmit meaning and order? How do people combine creativity and tradition to maintain and enrich the worlds they inhabit? Prerequisite: Acceptance to Carleton Rome Program. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; William L North
HIST 204 Jews, Christians and Muslims in the Medieval Mediterranean The Mediterranean was a dynamic hub of cultural exchange in the Middle Ages. We will draw on Jewish, Muslim, and Latin Christian sources to explore this contact from 1050-1492 and the role of the sea itself in joining and separating the peoples who surrounded it. What did it mean to be a Muslim pilgrim in Christian-held Palestine? A Jewish vizier serving a Muslim ruler in Spain? A Christian courtier courting martyrdom in North Africa? We will explore lives led between coexistence and violence, intellectual and legal structures that helped to negotiate differences, and the textures of daily life. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 205 American Environmental History Environmental concerns, conflicts, and change mark the course of American history, from the distant colonial past to our own day. This course will consider the nature of these eco-cultural developments, focusing on the complicated ways that human thought and perception, culture and society, and natural processes and biota have all combined to forge Americans' changing relationship with the natural world. Topics will include Native American subsistence strategies, Euroamerican settlement, industrialization, urbanization, consumption, and the environmental movement. As we explore these issues, one of our overarching goals will be to develop an historical context for thinking deeply about contemporary environmental dilemmas. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Spring; George Vrtis
HIST 206 Eternal City in Time: Structure, Change, and Identity This course will explore the lived experience of the city of Rome in the twelfth-sixteenth centuries. We will study buildings, urban forms, surviving artifacts, and textual and other visual evidence to understand how politics, power, and religion (both Christianity and Judaism) mapped onto city spaces. How did urban challenges and opportunities shape daily life? How did the memory of the past influence the present? How did the rural world affect the city and vice versa? Students will work on projects closely tied to the urban fabric. Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Victoria Morse
HIST 207 Rome Program: Roman Journal: The Traveler as Witness This course examines travel as an occasion for investigation, encounter, and reflection and as an opportunity to document and communicate these observations of people and place. Through select readings drawn from a range of disciplines and genres, travel accounts, and ongoing discussion of their own travel experiences, students will seek better to understand the traveler as observer and recorder of other peoples and places. The course will also examine the nature of public memory and commemoration and the role of travelers as audiences for sites of memory. As part of the course, students will maintain their own travel journals, prepare several reflections, and contribute to the Program Blog. Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program. 3 credits; HI, IS; Spring; William L North, Victoria Morse
HIST 208 The Atlantic World: Columbus to the Age of Revolutions, 1492-1792 In the late fifteenth century, the Atlantic ocean became a vast highway linking Spain, France, Britain, and the Netherlands to the Americas and Africa. This course will examine the lives of the men and women who inhabited this new world from the time of Columbus to the eighteenth-century revolutions in Haiti and North America. We will focus on the links between continents rather than the geographic segments. Topics will include the destruction and reconfiguration of indigenous societies; slavery and other forms of servitude; religion; war; and the construction of ideas of empire. Students considering a concentration in Atlantic History are particularly encouraged to enroll. Emphasis on primary sources. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 209 The Revolutionary Atlantic Students in this course will investigate social conflicts, political struggles, and protest movements from the Age of Revolution, 1776-1848 ranging over four continents. We will read pamphlets from the Dutch Patriot Revolution, eye witness accounts of slave insurrections in the Caribbean, novels and plays describing/provoking changes in families on both sides of the Atlantic, and newspaper articles written by Karl Marx. We will compare histories of revolutions on both sides of the Atlantic, including the newest research on West Africa and Latin America. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Janet L Polasky
HIST 210 The Boston Massacre in 3D: Mapping, Modeling and Serious Gaming In this highly experimental, demanding, and project-orientated Digital Humanities Lab, we will research, design, and produce immersive 3D experiences based on the events of the Boston Massacre. We will leverage all the critical, creative, and technical skills we can assemble to bring this pivotal moment in early American history to life in 3D. Tools will include GIS and CityEngine procedural mapping software, 3D modeling programs, and the Unity game engine. No technical experience necessary, but a willingness to learn independently. Prerequisite: Requires concurrent registration in History 212, prior coursework in Computer Science or Cinema and Media Studies, or instructor permission. 3 credits; ARP; Winter; Austin P Mason
HIST 211 Revolts and Resistance in Early America Far from being a single entity, America in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was a world of vibrant, polyglot, globally linked, and violent societies. In this course we will learn how the enslavement of Africans and Native Americans created a state of war that bridged Europe, America, and Africa. We will examine how indigenous resistance to European settlement reshaped landscapes and cultures. We will focus throughout on the daily lives of the women and men who created and shaped the vast world of early America. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 212 The Era of the American Revolution How Revolutionary was the American Revolution? This class will examine the American Revolution as both a process and a phenomenon. It will consider the relationship of the American Revolution to social, cultural, economic, political, and ideological change in the lives of Americans from the founding fathers to the disenfranchised, focusing on the period 1750-1790. Students currently enrolled in History 212 are eligible to take the optional 2-credit digital lab, History 210, “Boston Massacre in 3D.” We will use 3D modeling and GIS to create a Boston Massacre digital game. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Winter; Serena R Zabin
HIST 213 Politics and Protest in the New Nation In the first years of the United States, men and women of all races had to learn what it meant to live in the nation created by the U.S. Constitution. This class will focus on the American attempts to form a more perfect union, paying close attention to the place of slavery, Native dispossession, sexuality, and politics during the years 1787-1840. Throughout the course we will examine the ways in which the politics and protests of the early Republic continue to shape the current United States. 6 credits; HI, IDS, QRE; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 214 Rethinking the American Civil War The Civil War, in which more than 620,000 died, was a cataclysmic event that reshaped American life. Using both original sources and the most recent scholarship, we will explore the causes, leadership, battles, and consequences of the war for ordinary Americans. Topics include the war's impact on men, women, slavery, legal rights, the economy, the confederacy, the presidency, and American memory. Special attention will be paid to Civil War photography, the problems of mapping the conflict, and the attempt to understand the war through modern movies and documentaries, including those of Ken Burns. 6 credits; HI, IDS, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 215 Carleton in the Archives: Studies in Institutional Memory and Culture Ours is a world of institutions--schools, corporations, non-profits, government agencies--that shape the way we act, think, and remember. The memory [and amnesia] of institutions themselves, the records they keep and throw away, and the way these repositories are organized and used are crucial elements in their function and survival. How do institutions remember? What is the relationship between "official" and "individual" memory in the making of an institutional world? How do past and present connect? We will explore this and related questions through readings, discussion, and a hands-on project based upon material in Carleton's own archives. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 216 History Beyond the Walls This course will examine the world of history outside the walls of academia. Looking at secondary-school education, museums, and public policy, we will explore the ways in which both general and specialized publics learn and think about history. A central component of the course will be a civic engagement project. Prerequisite: One History course. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Spring; Ellen L Manovich
HIST 217 Engaging Youth in the Past The course centers on a civic engagement project mentoring sixth grade students at the Northfield Middle School as they research and produce projects for a local version of National History Day. In addition to mentoring, we will also meet once a week to discuss readings on public history and issues such as the controversies over national history standards. Prerequisite: One college level history course. 3 credits; HI; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 219 Is Obama Black?: American Mixed Race History This course explores the historical political, social, philosophical, and cultural problems related to mixed-race identity since the late nineteenth century, with emphasis on the U.S. government's 2000 decision allowing Americans to define their racial makeup as one race or more. Life stories, literature, and film investigate identity formation, stratification based on race, and the particular ways mixed-raced people articulate their identities in various contexts. Final projects beyond black and white mixed-race people encouraged. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 224 Divercities: Exclusion and Inequality in Urban America This course examines the twentieth-century history of the United States city in global comparative perspective. It will focus on how exclusion, difference, inequality, and segregation have evolved along with diversity and heterogeneity in the modern city. We will explore this basic contradiction of the U.S. city in history as a contested site of opportunity and foreclosure, asking: how have American cities been both zones of exclusion and inequality while at the same time places in which diverse groups of people have interacted? 6 credits; HI, IDS; Winter; Ellen L Manovich
HIST 226 U.S. Consumer Culture In the period after 1880, the growth of a mass consumer society recast issues of identity, gender, race, class, family, and political life. We will explore the development of consumer culture through such topics as advertising and mass media, the body and sexuality, consumerist politics in the labor movement, and the response to the Americanization of consumption abroad. We will read contemporary critics such as Thorstein Veblen, as well as historians engaged in weighing the possibilities of abundance against the growth of corporate power. 6 credits; HI, IDS, WR2; Fall; Annette Igra
HIST 227 The American West Somewhere on the sunset-side of the Mississippi River, the American West begins. It is a region steeped in nostalgia and freighted with stories and longings that Americans have now cherished for many generations. It is also a place as complex and tangled in dynamic cultural, political, and environmental forces as any place on earth. Among the themes we will focus on are relationships among Native American and Euro-American peoples, the transition from imperial frontier to American territory, the shaping power of economic and cultural initiatives, and the centrality of nature and environmental change in forging our western past and present. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 228 Civil Rights and Black Power This course treats the struggle for racial justice from World War II through the 1960s. Histories, journalism, music, and visual media illustrate black and white elites and grassroots people allied in this momentous epoch that ranges from a southern integrationist vision to northern Black Power militancy. The segregationist response to black freedom completes the study. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Fall; Harry M Williams
HIST 229 Working with Gender in U.S. History Historically work has been a central location for the constitution of gender identities for both men and women; at the same time, cultural notions of gender have shaped the labor market. We will investigate the roles of race, class, and ethnicity in shaping multiple sexual divisions of labor and the ways in which terms such as skill, bread-winning and work itself were gendered. Topics will include domestic labor, slavery, industrialization, labor market segmentation, protective legislation, and the labor movement. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Winter; Annette Igra
HIST 231 Mapping the World Before Mercator This course will explore early maps primarily in medieval and early modern Europe. After an introduction to the rhetoric of maps and world cartography, we will examine the functions and forms of medieval European and Islamic maps and then look closely at the continuities and transformations in map-making during the period of European exploration. The focus of the course will be on understanding each map within its own cultural context and how maps can be used to answer historical questions. We will work closely with the maps in Gould Library Special Collections to expand campus awareness of the collection. 6 credits; HI, WR2, QRE, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 232 Renaissance Worlds in France and Italy Enthusiasm, artistry, invention, exploration.... How do these notions of Renaissance culture play out in sources from the period? Using a range of evidence (historical, literary, and visual) from Italy and France in the fourteenth-sixteenth centuries we will explore selected issues of the period, including debates about the meaning of being human and ideal forms of government and education; the nature of God and mankind's duties toward the divine; the family and gender roles; definitions of beauty and the goals of artistic achievement; accumulation of wealth; and exploration of new worlds and encounters with other peoples. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 233 The Byzantine World and Its Neighbors, 750-ca. 1453 The Byzantine world (eighth-fifteenth centuries) was a zone of fascinating tensions, exchanges, and encounters. Through a wide variety of written and visual evidence, we will examine key features of its history and culture: the nature of government; piety and religious controversy; art and music; the evolving relations with the Latin West, Armenia, the Slavic North and West, and the Dar al-Islam (the Abbasids and Seljuk and Ottoman Turks); gender; economic life; and social relations. Extra time will be required for special events and a group project (ecumenical council). 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2, QRE; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 234 Papacy, Church, and Empire in the Middle Ages This course explores the dynamic interactions between three distinct centers of authority and power: the Roman papacy, the Church, and the heir to the legacies of Rome, the Holy Roman Empire from the tenth through thirteenth centuries. Among other topics to be covered: the rise of canon and Roman law; new religious orders; changing models of sanctity; the Church and local and 'national' identity; and the development of the papacy as a powerful, but controversial, European institution. The course will also consider the Holy Roman Empire as a cultural zone in which Church and Empire play vital roles as patrons and subjects. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 235 Making and Breaking Institutions: Structure, Culture, Corruption, and Reform in the Middle Ages From churches and monasteries to universities, guilds, governmental administrations, the medieval world was full of institutions. They emerged, by accident or design, to do particular kinds of work and to benefit particular persons or groups. These institutions faced hard questions like those we ask of our institutions today: How best to structure, distribute, and control power and authority? What is the place of the institution in the wider world? How is a collective identity and ethos achieved, maintained, or transformed? Where does corruption come from and how can institutions be reformed? This course will explore these questions through discussion of case studies and primary sources from the medieval world as well as theoretical studies of these topics. 6 credits; HI, IS, QRE; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 236 Women and Gender in Europe before the French Revolution What were women’s lives and experiences like in Europe before the modern era? What work did they do, how did they manage their private lives, their family commitments, their faith, and their intellectual lives? We will examine these questions through women’s own writings, writings about women, and secondary literature on family, gender, medicine, law, and culture. In 2016-17, we will have a special opportunity to think about Jewish women’s lives. Projects will include helping to create an exhibition related to William Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice or working with Middle School students in the after school program. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2, QRE; Winter; Victoria Morse
HIST 237 The Enlightenment This course focuses on the texts of Enlightenment thinkers, including Locke, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, Kant and Mesmer. Emphasis will be on French thinkers and the effect of the Enlightenment on French society. The course covers the impact of the Enlightenment on science, religion, politics and the position of women. Students will have the opportunity to read the philosophies in French. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 238 The Viking World In the popular imagination, Vikings are horn-helmeted, blood-thirsty pirates who raped and pillaged their way across medieval Europe. But the Norse did much more than loot, rape, and pillage; they cowed kings and fought for emperors, explored uncharted waters and settled the North Atlantic, and established new trade routes that revived European urban life. In this course, we will separate fact from fiction by critically examining primary source documents alongside archaeological, linguistic and place-name evidence. Students will share their insights with each other and the world through two major collaborative digital humanities projects over the course of the term. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Austin P Mason
HIST 239 Health and Welfare in Industrializing Britain Historians disagree about the timing, causes and effects of the Industrial Revolution, but no one disputes that there were massive changes in England's population, economy and society from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. In this course, we examine those transformations with a focus on the ways that social and economic changes related to social welfare policies, the health of the people, and the environment. 6 credits; HI, IS, QRE, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 240 Tsars and Serfs, Cossacks and Revolutionaries: The Empire that was Russia Nicholas II, the last Tsar-Emperor of Russia, ruled over an empire that stretched from the Baltic to the Pacific. Territorial expansion over three-and-a-half centuries had brought under Russian rule a vast empire of immense diversity. The empire's subjects spoke a myriad languages, belonged to numerous religious communities, and related to the state in a wide variety of ways. Its artists produced some of the greatest literature and music of the nineteenth century and it offered fertile ground for ideologies of both conservative imperialism and radical revolution. This course surveys the panorama of this empire from its inception in the sixteenth century to its demise in the flames of World War I. Among the key analytical questions addressed are the following: How did the Russian Empire manage its diversity? How does Russia compare with other colonial empires? What understandings of political order legitimized it and how were they challenged? 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 241 Russia through Wars and Revolutions The lands of the Russian empire underwent massive transformations in the tumultuous decades that separated the accession of Nicholas II (1894) from the death of Stalin (1953). This course will explore many of these changes, with special attention paid to the social and political impact of wars (the Russo-Japanese War, World War I, the Civil War, and the Great Patriotic War) and revolutions (of 1905 and 1917), the ideological conflicts they engendered, and the comparative historical context in which they transpired. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 242 Communism, Cold War, Collapse: Russia Since Stalin In this course we will explore the history of Russia and other former Soviet states in the period after the death of Stalin, exploring the workings of the communist system and the challenges it faced internally and internationally. We will investigate the nature of the late Soviet state and look at the different trajectories Russia and other post-Soviet states have followed since the end of the Soviet Union. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 243 The Peasants are Revolting! Society and Politics in the Making of Modern France Political propaganda of the French Revolutionary period tells a simple story of downtrodden peasants exploited by callous nobles, but what exactly was the relationship between the political transformations of France from the Renaissance through the French Revolution and the social, religious, and cultural tensions that characterized the era? This course explores the connections and conflicts between popular and elite culture as we survey French history from the sixteenth through early nineteenth centuries, making comparisons to social and political developments in other European countries along the way. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2, QRE; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 245 Ireland: Land, Conflict and Memory This course explores the history of Ireland from Medieval times through the Great Famine, ending with a look at the Partition of Ireland in 1920. We examine themes of religious and cultural conflict and explore a series of English political and military interventions. Throughout the course, we will analyze views of the Irish landscape, landholding patterns, and health and welfare issues. Finally, we explore the contested nature of history and memory as the class discusses monuments and memory production in Irish public spaces. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS, QRE; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 246 Making Early Medieval England This course explores the world of Early Medieval England from Rome's decline through the Norman Conquest (c.400-1066) through its material culture. These six centuries witnessed dramatic transformations, including waning Roman influence, changing environmental conditions, ethnic migrations, the coming of Christianity, the rise of kingdoms, and the emergence of new agricultural and economic regimes. We will look beyond the kings and priests at the top of society by analyzing objects people made and used, buildings they built, and human remains they buried alongside primary and secondary written sources. Students will practice writing history from, and experiment with (re)making early English "things." 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 247 The First World War as Global Phenomenon On this centenary of the First World War, the course will explore the global context for this cataclysmic event, which provides the hinge from the nineteenth century into the twentieth. We will spend considerable time on the build-up to and causes of the conflict, with particular emphasis on the new imperialism, race-based ideologies, and the complex international struggles for global power. In addition to the fighting, we will devote a significant portion of the course to the home front and changes in society and culture during and after the war. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 248 Berlin Program: A German Crucible of European and Global Culture Berlin is the center of a transnational space that is German, European and global. This course will examine Berlin's complicated history and culture through its monuments, museums, and other sites of commemoration. Using Berlin as our text, we will gain insights into the significant historical events that shaped the society and culture of Germany's capital city. On visits to nearby cities, such as Vienna and Warsaw, we will also discuss developments in Germany and Europe more generally. Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 249 Two Centuries of Tumult: Modern Central Europe An examination of the political, social, and cultural history of Central Europe from 1848 to the present day. We will explore the evolution of state and civil society in the multicultural/multinational regions of the present-day Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary, as well as eastern Germany and Austria. Much of the course will focus on the common experiences of authoritarianism, anti-Semitism, fascism/Nazism, and especially the Communist era and its dissolution. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; David G Tompkins
HIST 250 Modern Germany This course offers a comprehensive examination of German history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will look at the German-speaking peoples of Central Europe through the prism of politics, society, culture, and the economy. Through a range of readings, we will grapple with the many complex and contentious issues that have made German history such an interesting area of intellectual inquiry. 6 credits; HI, IS; Fall; David G Tompkins
HIST 250F Modern Germany-FLAC German Trailer This course is a supplement in German for History 250, Modern Germany, and will meet once weekly. Open to students who have completed German 103 or who have intermediate or advanced skills in German. Speaking in German, we will discuss German language primary sources, including documents, music and film clips. Prerequisite: German 103 or equivalent. 2 credits; S/CR/NC; HI, IS; Fall; David G Tompkins
HIST 254 Migration in Asia-Pacific History Why do people migrate? Is there an East Asian pattern of migration that distinguishes itself from Euro-American ones? This course examines many faces of migration (voluntary to forced; downward to upward) across maritime frontiers evolving from the fifteenth century to the present. It explores various dynamics of on-the-spot human encounters in both sending and receiving societies. Topics include migratory networks, niche economies, colonial mapping and settlements, gendered frontiers, redefinition of health and hygiene, opium regimes, and conflicts and collaboration. Students will have hands-on experience in working with many different kinds of evidence and learning about the process of writing histories. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 255 Rumors, Gossip, and News in East Asia What is news? How do rumors and gossips shape news in modern China, Japan, and Korea? Is the press one of the sociocultural bases within civil society that shapes opinion in the public sphere in East Asia? Students will examine how press-like activities reshape oral communication networks and printing culture and isolate how the public is redefined in times of war and revolutions. Drawing sources from a combination of poems, private letters, maps, pamphlets, handbills, local gazetteers, rumor mills, pictorials, and cartoons, students will map communication circuits that linked authors, journalists, shippers, booksellers, itinerant storytellers, gossipers, listeners, and active readers. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Spring; Seungjoo Yoon
HIST 256 History of Urban China Who initiated the circulation of new ideas and novel communicative behaviors in urban China? Is there anything Chinese about the "public" forged in Chinese cities? This course adopts a comparative and integrative approach to examine the studies of major ritual centers (e.g., Beijing), market towns, and foreign concessions (e.g., Shanghai). Thematically, students will analyze the ongoing tension between time and place as expressed in the conflict between China's colonial past and its search for national identity. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 257 Urban History in Beijing and Beyond Program: History of Urban China and Korea In this course students will develop a mode of historical thinking with which to historicize the urban planning traditions as competing powers sought to transform both physical and human landscapes over time. Students will analyze the material topologies and epistemological underpinnings of particular aspects of the cities in question as they appear in sample primary sources. For example, in Mongolian Beijing, students will scrutinize excerpts from a historical fiction based on imaginary dialogues between Kublai Khan and Marco Polo and before visiting colonial Seoul, students will compare different plans prepared by the Germans, Japanese, and Korean designers. Not offered 2016-17
HIST 259 Women in South Asia: Histories, Narratives, and Representations The objective of this course is to analyse the historical institutions, practices and traditions that define the position of women in India. We consider the various ways in which the trope of the Goddess has been used for and by Indian women in colonial and post-colonial India; the colonial state's supposed rescue of Indian women; the position and role of European women in colonial India; how women's bodies come to embody and signify community honor and become sites of communal contest. We explore the making of Mother India; the connection between nation, territory and the female form; and the ways in which women have been represented in history as well as Indian cinema. 6 credits; HI, IS; Fall; Amna Khalid
HIST 260 The Making of the Modern Middle East A survey of major political and social developments from the fifteenth century to the beginning of World War I. Topics include: state and society, the military and bureaucracy, religious minorities (Jews and Christians), and women in premodern Muslim societies; the encounter with modernity. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 261 Turkey Prog: Nations, Islams, and Modernities: Trnsfrmtn of the Ottoman Empire-Making of Middle East An overview of the period since 1774 to the present through an analysis of the interplay of various currents of Islam, nationhood, and modernity. We will have the advantage of studying this material in Istanbul, where many of these changes transpired, and we will make full use of the opportunities afforded by our location and incorporate visits to historical sites and museums into the structure of the class. We will focus on the multiple and contested meanings of "nation," "Islam," and "modernity," and trace how political space itself was redefined in the transition from empire to national statehood. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 262 Public Health: History, Policy, and Practice This course will examine the rise of the institution of public health in the modern period. Locating public health within the social history of medicine we will consider how concepts of health and disease have changed over time and how the modern state's concern with the health of its population cannot be separated from its need to survey, police, and discipline the public. Topics covered will include miasma, contagion, quarantine, vaccination and the connection between European imperialism and the institutionalization of public health in colonial contexts. We will also consider how certain epidemics became the major drivers for public health. 6 credits; HI, IS; Winter; Amna Khalid
HIST 263 Plagues of Empire The globalization of disease is often seen as a recent phenomenon aided by high-speed communication and travel. This course examines the history of the spread of infectious diseases by exploring the connection between disease, medicine and European imperial expansion. We consider the ways in which European expansion from 1500 onwards changed the disease landscape of the world and how pre-existing diseases in the tropics shaped and thwarted imperial ambitions. We will also question how far Western medicine can be seen as a benefit by examining its role in facilitating colonial expansion and constructing racial and gender difference. 6 credits; HI, IS; Spring; Amna Khalid
HIST 264 Turkey Program: The Politics of Gender in the Modern Middle East This course will analyze the multiple intersections of gender with nation, Islam, and modernity in the Muslim world, with Turkey as the key example. The focus will be on the multiplicity of the intersections, so that different political situations produce markedly different configurations. The structure of the course will be historical but with a strong theoretical component. Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 265 Central Asia in the Modern Age Central Asia--the region encompassing the post-Soviet states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, and the Xinjiang region of the People's Republic of China--is often considered one of the most exotic in the world, but it has experienced all the excesses of the modern age. After a basic introduction to the long-term history of the steppe, this course will concentrate on exploring the history of the region since its conquest by the Russian and Chinese empires. We will discuss the interaction of external and local forces as we explore transformations in the realms of politics, society, culture, and religion. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 266 History of Islam in South Asia While Islam in popular thought is often associated solely with the Arab world, in reality eighty percent of the world’s Muslim population is not of Arab ethnicity. The countries of South Asia--particularly India, Pakistan and Bangladesh--are collectively home to the largest number of Muslims. After examining the early background of the appearance and growth of Islamic societies and governments, we will explore the rich history of the expansion of Islam into the Indian subcontinent. We will take account of the role of trade and conquest in the early centuries of Islamic expansion and study the development of specifically Indian forms of Islam. The nature and impact of the Indo-Islamic empires will receive our attention, as will the interaction of Muslims with non-Muslim communities in medieval and early modern India. This will be followed by a look at the period of colonial rule, and an analysis of the specific historical contexts that gave rise to specific religious nationalist movements. We will then trace out how, once established, these movements developed according to their changing relationships to national liberation movements, secularism, state administrative systems, global economic shifts, and changing social demands. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 267 Muslims and Modernity Through readings in primary sources in translation, we will discuss the major intellectual and cultural movements that have influenced Muslim thinkers from the nineteenth century on. Topics include modernism, nationalism, socialism, and fundamentalism. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 268 India Program: History, Globalization, and Politics in Modern India Indian democracy presents a complicated social and political terrain that is being reshaped and remapped by a wide variety of efforts to bring about economic development, social change, political representation, justice, and equality. In this course we will examine, among other topics, the history of modern India with a focus on political movements centered on issues of colonialism, nationalism, class, gender, and caste. We will also examine changes in contemporary India brought about by globalization, and study how particular groups and communities have reacted and adapted to these developments. Prerequisite: Acceptance into the India OCS Program required. 6 credits; HI, IS; Winter; Brendan P LaRocque
HIST 269 Turkey Program: Istanbul: Imperial Past, Global Present Byzantium, Constantinople, Istanbul--The City was the cosmopolitan capital of major world empires for sixteen centuries until 1923, when it became a provincial city in a national republic. Since 1980, however, Istanbul has risen as a global megalopolis. Today's Istanbul is the crossroads of Europe and the Middle East, of the Mediterranean and Central Asia, the hub of one of the world's great airlines. Its expansion has led to great innovations in urban planning and design as well as to intense debate over their course. This course will try to convey a sense of the place--of the past of the city and its vibrant present. Students will visit the great historical sites of the city, go on walking tours of its different neighborhoods, and meet with community groups representing different constituencies to get a sense of current debates about the future of the city. Prerequisite: Enrollment in OCS program. 3 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 270 Nuclear Nations: India and Pakistan as Rival Siblings At the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947 India and Pakistan, two new nation states emerged from the shadow of British colonialism. This course focuses on the political trajectories of these two rival siblings and looks at the ways in which both states use the other to forge antagonistic and belligerent nations. While this is a survey course it is not a comprehensive overview of the history of the two countries. Instead it covers some of the more significant moments of rupture and violence in the political history of the two states. The first two-thirds of the course offers a top-down, macro overview of these events and processes whereas the last third examines the ways in which people experienced these developments. We use the lens of gender to see how the physical body, especially the body of the woman, is central to the process of nation building. We will consider how women’s bodies become sites of contestation and how they are disciplined and policed by the postcolonial state(s). 6 credits; HI, IS; Fall; Amna Khalid
HIST 271 Political Violence and Human Rights in Latin America Rooted in earlier social struggles and influenced by the advent of the Cold War, political violence and war pervaded the Latin American landscape throughout the latter half of the twentieth century. This violence impacted political horizons, social relations, cultural representations, and the very memory of those who lived through this era. This course explores three different genres of violence through in-depth case studies: Southern Cone dirty wars (Argentina); Central American civil wars (Guatemala) and Andean civil wars (Peru). Writing assignments will involve multiple forms of analysis, while challenging students to think comparatively about the different case studies. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 272 The Mexican Revolution: History, Myth and Art As the twentieth century's first major social revolution, the Mexican Revolution represents a watershed moment in Latin American history. This course examines the origins of the conflict and its key domestic and international dimensions. It also explores how a collective memory of the Revolution was crafted and contested by the post-revolutionary state, artists, intellectuals, and peasants through the means of photography, murals, education, popular protest, commemorations, and shrines. Emphasis will be placed on agrarian leader and rebel chieftain Emiliano Zapata as both historical figure and myth. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Spring; Andrew B Fisher
HIST 273 Go-Betweens and Rebels in the Andean World This course examines the dynamics of imperial rule in the vertical world of the Andes from the time of the Inca, through Spanish rule, and beyond. Of particular interest will be the myriad roles played by indigenous intermediaries who bridged the social, political and cultural gap between their communities and the state. While critical for maintaining the imperial order, these individuals also served as a galvanizing source of popular resistance against the state. Emphasis will be placed on the reading of translated primary sources written by a diverse group of Andean cultural intermediaries and rebels. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 274 Drugs, Violence & Rebellion in Mexico: From the Dirty War to the Drug War Since 2006, some 100,000 lives have been lost as a result of the Mexican government's decision to unleash its army against the powerful cartels supplying the United States with marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and crystal methamphetamine. This course situates the bloodshed within a broader historical and transnational context. It traces the conflict's roots to a longer struggle against Mexico's authoritarian political culture and the state's repression of dissent, including a little known "dirty war" that raged during the 1960s-1970s. It also examines evolving attitudes toward drugs, the emergence of a narco culture in Mexico, and grassroots movements against the violence. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 280 African in the Arab World This course examines African people's existence as religious, political, and military leaders, and as slaves and poets in Arab societies from ancient to modern times. It also interrogates the experiences of men as eunuchs, and of women as concubines and wives. Beginning with the pre-Islamic era, it highlights the movement of Africans from the Sahara Desert to the Nile valley, from the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean. It traces the experiences of peoples whose dark skin became equated with slave status (and the legacy of slavery) even as they became loyal followers of Islam in the Arab world. 6 credits; HI, IS, WR2; Winter; Thabiti Willis
HIST 281 War in Modern Africa This course examines the causes, features, and consequences of wars across two critical phases of African history, colonial and post-colonial. It covers four cases studies from modern Central, East, and West Africa: the Congo (first under the rule of King Leopold and later the Belgian colonial government), Tanganyika (under German colonial rule), Nigeria (during the first republic through the civil war), and Uganda (under the rule of Idi Amin). Students will learn how certain memories or interpretations of events are narrated, fashioned, truncated, contested, forgotten, or silenced. Students also will learn how different historical actors participated in and experienced war. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 283 Christian Encounter, Conversion, and Conflict in Modern Africa This course explores the nature of Christian mission in West, Central, and East Africa and its complex encounters with practitioners of Islam, other Christian sects, and indigenous religious traditions in modern Africa. Using scholarship and primary sources such as oral traditions, missionary writings, vernacular publications, newspapers, and ethnographic fieldnotes, we will focus on understanding religious encounter in a variety of case studies: the Akan in the Gold Coast (Ghana), the Hausa in Nigeria, the Bantu in Zambia, and the Maasai in Tanzania as well as Atlantic-Creoles in Angola and the Kongo. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Spring; Thabiti Willis
HIST 284 Crafting a History of Africa Since Independence The course begins as Europe's African empire unraveled, and ends with a look toward the future. Students engage in this history while joining the professor in the project of compiling a textbook collection of primary sources. The course is organized thematically into units. Each begins with research on and critical discussion of a broad topic considered within specific historical contexts. Students will identify, edit, and comment on primary sources that represent these major developments and themes. The class will assemble their collection into a narrative collage consisting of official documents, political commentaries, interviews, memoirs, transcripts, and visual records. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 285 Museums, Monuments, and Memory "History" is not just the name of a department at Carleton College; "History-making" is an activity engaged in by everybody, everyday. We watch historical movies, listen to political leaders invoking history in making policy, tour historic sites and museums, etc. We listen to our elders tell us stories about their lives, and we tell ourselves stories that place our experiences into the historical continuum. This course ranges widely over the varied and sometimes risky terrain of contemporary history-making in Minnesota and beyond to examine preservation organizations, museums, archives, oral history projects, documentary films, historic sites, schools, theater, TV, and cyberspace. 3 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 286 Africans in the Arab World: On Site and Revisited This course is the second part of a two-term sequence. It begins with a two-week December-break trip to Dubai, UAE, to visit museums, mosques, other heritage sites, universities, media outlets, and markets. It promotes dialogue with Afro-Arab women around the historical constructions of gender, race, and ethnicity in heritage sites, Islam, Arab media, academic institutions, and popular culture. Ultimately, students will ponder Afro-Arab women's voice and visibility beyond the home in this Arab society. Then upon return to Carleton, students will reflect upon their experiences in the UAE, analyze their data, and present it in oral, written, and visual formats. Prerequisite: History 280. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 287 From Alchemy to the Atom Bomb: The Scientific Revolution and the Making of the Modern World This course examines the growth of modern science since the Renaissance with an emphasis on the Scientific Revolution, the development of scientific methodology, and the emergence of new scientific disciplines. How might a history of science focused on scientific networks operating within society, rather than on individual scientists, change our understanding of “genius,” “progress,” and “scientific impartiality?” We will consider a range of scientific developments, treating science both as a body of knowledge and as a set of practices, and will gauge the extent to which our knowledge of the natural world is tied to who, when, and where such knowledge has been produced and circulated. 6 credits; HI, WR2; Spring; Tony Adler
HIST 298 Junior-year History Colloquium In the junior year, majors must take six-credit reading and discussion course taught each year by different members of the department faculty. The general purpose of History 298 is to help students reach a more sophisticated understanding of the nature of history as a discipline and of the approaches and methods of historians. A major who is considering off-campus study in the junior year should consult with their adviser on when to take History 298. Prerequisite: At least two six credit courses in History (excluding HIST 100 and Independents) at Carleton. 6 credits; HI; Fall, Winter; William L North, Andrew B Fisher
HIST 306 American Wilderness To many Americans, wild lands are among the nation’s most treasured places. Yellowstone, Yosemite, Mount Rainier, Joshua Tree, Grand Canyon – the names alone stir the heart, the mind, and the imagination. But where do those thoughts and feelings come from, and how have they both reflected and shaped American culture, society, and nature over the last three centuries? These are the central issues and questions that we will pursue in this seminar and in its companion course, ENTS 307 Wilderness Field Studies: Grand Canyon (which includes an Off-Campus Studies program at Grand Canyon National Park). Prerequisite: Acceptance in Wilderness Studies at the Grand Canyon OCS program. History 205 is recommended but not required. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 307 Advanced Wilderness Studies This course is the second half of a two-course sequence focused on the study of wilderness in American society and culture. The course will begin with a two-week off-campus study program during spring break at the Grand Canyon, where we will learn about the natural and human history of the Grand Canyon, examine contemporary issues facing the park, meet with officials from the National Park Service and other local experts, conduct research, and experience the park through hiking and camping. The course will culminate in the spring term with the completion and presentation of a major research project. Prerequisite: History 306. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 308 American Cities and Nature Since the nation's founding, the percentage of Americans living in cities has risen nearly sixteenfold, from about five percent to the current eighty-one percent. This massive change has spawned legions of others, and all of them have bearing on the complex ways that American cities and city-dwellers have shaped and reshaped the natural world. This course will consider the nature of cities in American history, giving particular attention to the dynamic linkages binding these cultural epicenters to ecological communities, environmental forces and resource flows, to eco-politics and social values, and to those seemingly far-away places we call farms and wilderness. Prerequisite: History 205 is recommended but not required. 6 credits; WR2, IDS, HI; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 316 History, Nature & Smartphones For the past two decades, historians have increasingly used digital tools to construct and deliver their research. This is particularly the case in public history, which aims to collaborate with public audiences in the co-construction of the past. This seminar will build on this trend, exploring the ways that Minnesota's environmental history can be imagined, understood, and expressed in the digital age. During the course, we will meet with specialists in public and digital history; we will conduct research at the Minnesota Historical Society; and we will develop several web- and smartphone-based stories for the Minnesota Environmental History Project. Prerequisite: Previous History course or instructor permission. 6 credits; HI, IDS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 324 The Concord Intellectuals The social and intellectual history of the American Renaissance with focus on selected works of Emerson, Thoreau, Amos Bronson Alcott, and Margaret Fuller. Special emphasis will be placed on the one common denominator uniting these intellectuals: their devotion to the possibilities of democracy. Prerequisite: History 120 or instructor permission. Not offered 2016-17
HIST 346 The Holocaust This course will grapple with the difficult and complicated phenomenon of the genocide of the Jews of Europe. We will explore anti-Semitism in its historical context, both in the German-speaking lands as well as in Europe as a whole. The experience of Jews in Nazi Germany will be an area of focus, but this class will look at European Jews more broadly, both before and during the Second World War. The question of responsibility and guilt will be applied to Germans as well as to other European societies, and an exploration of victims will extend to other affected groups. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 360 Muslims and Modernity Through readings in primary sources in translation, we will discuss the major intellectual and cultural movements that have influenced Muslim thinkers from the nineteenth century on. Topics include modernism, nationalism, socialism, and fundamentalism. Prerequisite: At least one prior course in the history of the Middle East or Central Asia or Islam. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 381 U.S. Relations with Ghana This seminar prepares students for, participation in, and reflection upon the winter-break field trip to Ghana. Assignments involve readings in history, the social sciences, and intercultural communication. Preliminary research on history or social science projects required. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 382 U.S. Relations with Ghana: The Field Trip and Beyond The first part of the seminar is the winter break field trip to three regional capitals in Ghana. Fieldwork and experiential living starts in Accra, continues in Kumasi, and ends in Cape Coast. The seminar resumes on campus with weekly reflection meetings. Public poster sessions on fieldwork will be held in Spring term. Prerequisite: History 381. 6 credits; HI, IS; Not offered 2016-17
HIST 395 Controversial Histories This seminar explores the histories of how people in diverse times and places discussed, debated and decided the issues and ideals that shaped their lives, communities, and world. Particular attention will be paid to the role of institutions and individuals, networks, the forms and functions of polemical discourse, and the dynamics of group formation and stigmatization in the historical unfolding of conflict and consensus. Theoretical readings and select case studies from different historical contexts will provide the common readings for the seminar. Possible extra time required for end of term "mini-conference." 6 credits; HI, WR2; Fall; William L North
HIST 395 The Global Cold War In the aftermath of the Second World War and through the 1980s, the United States and the Soviet Union competed for world dominance. This Cold War spawned hot wars, as well as a cultural and economic struggle for influence all over the globe. This course will look at the experience of the Cold War from the perspective of its two main adversaries, the U.S. and USSR, but will also devote considerable attention to South America, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. Students will write a 25 page paper based on original research. 6 credits; HI, WR2, IS; Winter; David G Tompkins
HIST 395 The Progressive Era? Was the Progressive Era progressive? It was a period of social reform, labor activism, and woman suffrage, but also of Jim Crow, corporate capitalism, and U.S. imperialism. These are among the topics that can be explored in research papers on this contradictory era. We will begin by reading a brief text that surveys the major subject areas and relevant historiography of the period. The course will center on the writing of a 25-30 page based on primary research, which will be read and critiqued by members of the seminar. 6 credits; HI; Spring; Annette Igra
HIST 398 Advanced Historical Writing This course is designed to support majors in developing advanced skills in historical research and writing. Through a combination of class discussion, small group work, and one-on-one interactions with the professor, majors learn the process of constructing sophisticated, well-documented, and well-written historical arguments within the context of an extended project of their own design. They also learn and practice strategies for engaging critically with contemporary scholarship and effective techniques of peer review and the oral presentation of research. Concurrent enrollment in History 400 required. By permission of the instructor only. 6 credits; S/CR/NC; HI, WR2; Winter; Victoria Morse, Thabiti Willis
HIST 400 Integrative Exercise Required of all seniors majoring in history. Registration in this course is contingent upon prior approval of a research proposal. 6 credits; S/NC; Winter