ENROLL

Thabiti Willis

This course looks at the ways that Africanist historians, art historians, anthropologists, and sociologists have examined gender and sexualities in selected cases on the African continent. Students will study the complexities of gender and sexual experiences, practices, identities, and communities within various historical and cultural contexts.

Held for new first year students

Stacy Beckwith

How have Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel shaped their senses of personal and collective identity since the early twentieth century? We will explore mental pictures of the land, one's self, and others in a selection of Israeli Jewish and Palestinian short stories, novels, and films. We will also explore some of the humanistic roots of U.S. involvement in Israeli-Palestinian relations today, particularly in the realm of American initiated bi-cultural youth camps such as Seeds of Peace. Students will enrich our class focus by introducing us to perspectives on Israel/Palestine in their home countries or elsewhere. In translation.

Held for new first year students

Seungjoo Yoon

An introduction to the study of historical biography. Instead of what we heard or think about Confucius, we will examine what his contemporaries, both his supporters and critics, thought he was. Students will scrutinize various sources gleaned from archaeology, heroic narratives, and court debates, as well as the Analects to write their own biography of Confucius based on a particular historical context that created a persistent constitutional agenda in early China. Students will justify why they would call such a finding, in hindsight, "Confucian" in its formative days. Themes can be drawn from aspects of ritual, bureaucracy, speech and writing

Held for new first year students

Amna Khalid

In the junior year, majors must take this six-credit reading and discussion course taught each year by different members of the department faculty. The course is also required for the History minor. 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.

Required for History majors and minors

Serena Zabin

This course is part of an off-campus winter break program that includes two linked courses in the fall and winter. The creation and establishment of the United States was a contested and uncertain event stretched over more than half a century. For whom, for what, and how was the United States created? In what ways do the conflicts and contradictions of the nation’s eighteenth-century founding shape today’s America? We will examine how the nation originated in violent civil war and in political documents that simultaneously offered glorious promises and a “covenant with death.” Our nuanced understanding of the American Revolution and Early Republic will underpin our ability to tell these stories to the wider public.

Prerequisite: One previous history course

Participation in OCS History Winter Break Program

Caleb S Hendrickson

For much of recorded history, what we now call “art” and what we now call “religion” were inseparable. In the modern period, art and religion have gone their separate ways. What, if anything, continues to connect them? Is art inherently religious? Can religion be considered a form of art? In this class, we look at modern works of art (from Renaissance painting to contemporary performance art) alongside the sights and sounds of religion (including the symbols, rituals, and architecture of multiple religious traditions), seeking points of confluence and displacement between these apparently disparate areas of culture. 

Held for new first year students