Course Catalog

HIST 100

The Myth of the Nation

As Ernest Renan once suggested, forgetting is essential to the creation of a nation. The cycle of myths generated as nations take form usually omits or distorts inconvenient elements of the past. As national narratives coalesce, the history of a state and its peoples is remembered selectively and with an instrumentalist logic that gives prominence to fragments of history that promote the goals of the new national collectivity. The study of history poses a danger for nationalism since it reveals the violence, the accidental inventions, and the self-serving amnesia often at the core of the national enterprise. This course will examine nationalism in settings around the world from the time of the French Revolution to the present. The course will draw extensively on the expertise of colleagues within the Trinity College Department of History to examine the national myth in a variety of settings throughout the world

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 102

Europe Since 1715

European history from 1715 to the present.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 103

Europe and the Post-War World, from Genocide to the Struggle for Human Rights

We explore European political culture since 1945 in a global context. This is an introductory survey of the period, from the close of World War II until the present. Themes include: reconstruction and memory, Marxism, social-democracy and the New Right; human rights, sexuality and immigration. We look at the events of 1968 and 1989 in a global framework. The Cold War, the New Left, the collapse of the Berlin Wall and of the Soviet Union, national liberation and imperialism, the welfare state, and globalization all offer instances of cultural expression and political conflict. The course emphasizes the role of the arts in politics, and includes lectures, discussion, and a film program.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 104

Europe in the 20th Century

This course will examine the upheavals of Europe's tumultuous 20th century. From the hopes of progress built on the advances of the 19th century came the destruction and despair of a century of revolution, war, genocide, oppression, and subsequent rebirth. This course will study the contours of Europe in 1914, the causes and consequences of the World War I, the weaknesses of liberal democracy in the interwar years, the allure of alternative political systems like Communism and Facism, the outbreak of World War II and the Holocaust, attempts to rebuild Europe after the war and the creation of the social welfare state in Western Europe since 1945, and the course of events in Communist Eastern Europe culminating in the collapse of the Soviet Union.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 107

War

Warfare is a fundamental part of the human condition. This course examines the phenomenon of warfare from a wide variety of angles. Through a comparison of warfare in different societies and cultures, the course studies the ways that governments, commanders, combatants, and civilians have experienced and reacted to war. Topics to be explored include: evolution in military technology, experience of combat, role of women and civilians, peacemaking, and comparative military cultures.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 111

Foundations of Greek and Roman History

This course provides a survey of Greek and Roman history. After an overview of political developments and chronology, the course focuses on topics in social, economic, and cultural change in the ancient world, with particular emphasis on differences and similarities across the societies studied. No previous knowledge of Greek and Roman history is required. The course serves as a foundation course of advanced work (200-400 level) in Greek, Roman, or medieval history, or as an introduction to Greek and Roman history for students with a primary interest in literature, art history, philosophy, or other disciplines.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 112

Europe in the Middle Ages

This course will introduce students to the major themes of medieval history from the fall of the Carolingian Empire to the beginning of the Reformation with an emphasis on how a distinctively European society takes shape. We will study feudalism, the papacy, the Holy Roman Empire, the formation of medieval states and law, kingship, Crusades, plague, famine, elite and popular religious movements, and major political and national conflicts. The course will be taught largely from primary documents.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 113

Europe 1300-1750: Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment

Topics in the history of Western Europe in the late Middle Ages, Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 114

Classical Historians

In this course we will investigate the works of the major Greek and Roman historians in translation. Authors will include Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Sallust and Tacitus. We will consider various topics, including the origins of ancient historiography; the relationship of history to other genres such as tragedy and epic; the sources available to ancient historians; the role of myth in history; issues of gender and ethnic identity; and various stylistic issues such as narrative techniques, the use of speeches and quotations, anecdotes, and characterization. The course requires no prior knowledge of Greek and Roman history or classical languages. Readings will consist of the ancient historians themselves along with some modern studies on classical historiography.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 115

History of the Greek World: c. 1500-200 BCE

This course covers the history of the Greek world—Greece, the Aegean islands, western Asia Minor, the Black Sea, and southern Italy and Sicily—in the period between the end of the Bronze Age and the arrival of the Romans (c. 1500-200 BCE). The emergence of the polis, the Greek city-state, as the predominant way to organize political, social, economic, religious, and cultural life, and the spread of these institutions, form the central foci of the course. There will be emphasis on the reading and interpretation of primary source material through lectures, discussions, and analytical writing.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 116

The Rise and Fall of the Roman Republic

By about 300 BCE the Roman state had in place its republican institutions, and began the expansionist process by which the Romans came to control the Mediterranean basin. Four hundred years later, the Roman empire extended from Britain to Egypt, but the state running that empire had undergone fundamental social, political, and cultural changes. This course traces the processes that created the empire and transformed the Roman world, with special emphasis on the interplay of political and social phenomena. We will look closely at primary sources on which our knowledge of these changes is based.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 117

Tokyo Story: From Fishing Village to Cosmopolitan Metropolis

This course explores the historical development of Tokyo, from its obscure, medieval origins to its present status as one of the world's most populous and cosmopolitan cities. In spite of being destroyed on average once every 30 years by fires, natural disasters, and war—or perhaps because of this—Tokyo has sprung eternal, constantly transforming itself within shifting political, economic, and cultural contexts. This course examines the constantly transforming urban landscape and its impact on the structure of the city and the lives of its inhabitants. Topics of particular interest include: the rise of capitalism and its impact on early-modern urbanization, the impact of Western-style modernization on the organization of urban life in the 19th and 20th centuries, labor migration and its impact on urban slums, the impact of the economic "high growth" years on Japanese urban lifestyles, and the rise of Tokyo as a symbol of post-modern urban culture.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 119

Diaspora: Jewish History Before Modernity

An introductory survey of Jewish history from the Biblical period to the beginnings of the Enlightenment. The course will study the evolution of Israelite identity, Jewish life in the classical world, creation of rabbinic Judaism, the Jewish experience in medieval Europe and the Islamic world, and the effect on Jews and Jewish culture of the expulsions and resettlements in early modern Europe.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 124

Hartford on Film, 1969-present

In 1969, film makers came to Hartford from Canada and California to document the problems of wealth and poverty in our city. They shot 35 short films in collaboration with residents, just as riots broke out in Hartford during that summer. Trinity's Hartford Studies Project has worked with students, alumni, and residents to restore the original footage and interview surviving activists, community leaders, and residents of the city, then and now. This course explores the problems of Hartford from the 1960s to the present, using both old and new documentary footage as tools for learning, research and dialogue. Its central themes are: racial politics, immigration, community mobilization, policing, education, housing, corporate and civic power, "urban renewal," and Hartford's changing place in national and global political cultures. Students will interact with residents, community organizations, and interviewees. They will devise their own related projects in the city, working in the documentary tradition that inspired the original film makers. We will also work with the Old State House/Connecticut Historical Society exhibition on Hartford's history, which opened in 2006.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 125

The Postwar City: Political Culture, Film and the Arts

We explore the urban dilemmas manifest in postwar global culture, from the vantage point of the arts, especially film. We study Hartford, New York, London, Paris, Los Angeles, Cape Town, Moscow, and Johannesburg through visual, literary, documentary, archival, and artistic media, with special concentration on the 1960s and after.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 129

The Culture of Revolution: Politics, Class, and Gender, 1789-1917

In the 19th century, many Europeans sought to overthrow the existing political, social, gender, and artistic order. This course will look at the dreams, plans, successes, and (more often) failures of revolutionary movements. The course will focus on examining revolutionary moments—in France, in 1848 across Europe, in Russia—as well as revolutionary movements, including nationalism, socialism, feminism, and anarchism. We will pay particular attention to primary sources in our investigation of this tumultuous century.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 201

The United States from the Colonial Period through the Civil War

An examination of the developing American political tradition with emphasis on economic and ideological factors.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 202

The United States from Reconstruction to the Present

A continuation of History 201, examining the transformation of the divided and agrarian society of the 19th century into a highly organized, urban-industrial world power.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 203

Magic & Medicine in Ancient Greece

Magic seeks to influence the world through control of unseen forces. Medicine seeks health through manipulation of a materialistic understanding of the body. Or so we moderns draw the distinction, distinctly to the detriment of magic. Looking back on the ancient Greeks, still regarded in many quarters as the inventors of rationality, we prefer Hippokrates to Asklepios, Asklepios to Hermes Trismegistos, and Hermes to Hekate. But, as E. R. Dodds showed many years ago in his classic study The Greeks and the Irrational, matters weren't so doggedly differentiated in antiquity. Magic and medicine coexisted, even if some of the severer practitioners on both sides condemned the other. This course explores the interactions between both spheres, the common theories that underlay Hippokratic diagnosis and love potions, in order to reveal aspects of ancient Greek thought, science, religion, and culture not usually investigated in undergraduate survey courses

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 204

The Crusades

From the eleventh through the fifteenth centuries, Christians from Western Europe were pitted in a series of holy wars against their Islamic, Pagan, and even other Christian neighbors. This course offers a multi-faceted look at military, political, religious, and cultural themes from the era of the Crusades. The idea of "crusade" has survived to this day and has as much, if not more, cultural significance now than at its inception in 1095.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 207

Medieval Britain:Law & Government 1066-1688

This course will study the evolution of English law and government in the Middle Ages from the Norman Conquest to the Stuarts. It will emphasize key concepts of common law, the nature of English kingship, the development of Parliament, the status of particular groups in English society, the evolution of governmental power, as well as some comparative material from other medieval states. The course will be taught from primary source materials with supplementary readings from secondary scholarship.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 209

African-American History

The experiences of African-Americans from the 17th century to the present with particular emphasis on life in slavery and in the 20th-century urban North.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 211

US Since 1945

This course examines America since WWII. We will explore both political events and cultural and social trends, including the cold war, rock 'n' roll, civil rights, feminism, Vietnam, consumerism and advertising, the new right and the new left, the counterculture, religious and ethnic revivals, poverty, and the "me" generation. Enrollment limited.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 211

History of the Desert

Humans have a long history of interaction with arid environments. We have created great agricultural civilizations in arid environments, sought solitude for religious practice, drilled for oil, explored, conquered, and – most recently – preserved. This course explores the range of human activity in and attitudes toward arid environments in a diachronic and comparative manner. Note: This course applies only as an elective to credit toward a History major.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 212

The Crusades and Medieval Society

An introductory survey of the political, social, military and religious history of the Crusades. Using primary sources, the course will also examine how aspects of the Crusades reveal broader themes in medieval history, including: European identity, pilgrimage, religious violence, technological innovation, perceptions of non-Europeans, and the influence of the Crusades on early modern voyages of discovery. Lecture and discussion format.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 214

Modern Ireland 1535-1998

This survey course introduces students to the broad sweep of political, social, economic, and sectarian forces that have shaped the development of modern Ireland. Beginning with close of Hugh O’Neill’s rebellion against Queen Elizabeth I (1603) and concluding with the Treaty negotiations that ended the Anglo-Irish War (1921), students will examine the clash of cultural identity and faith that serves as backdrop to the unsettled conditions of the present day. To an extraordinary degree, the study of modern Ireland reveals the power of historical myth and stereotype to shape the destiny of a people. Note:This course does not satisfy the Europe before 1700 history major requirement.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 215

Drink & Disorder in Amer

Drinking as an institution has reflected the varieties of culture, interest groups, and ideologies that have swept America. We will examine the tumultuous history of this institution, from the origins of the Republic to the present, in order to understand what the 'wets' and the 'drys' can tell us about the nature of community in America. Special attention to the ways in which gender, race, class, and ethnicity shape perceptions of drinking, leisure, and social control.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 215

Drink & Disorder in Amer

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 217

Words of Fire: Bible in History

The Bible is arguably the most important book ever assembled. This course will explore the changing role of the Bible from Late Antiquity to the Enlightenment and its impact on society. Themes addressed in this course include: the holiness of the text, the role of the Bible in medieval culture, comparisons with the Hebrew Bible and the Koran, the impact of printing, and the critical re-conception of the Bible as a created rather than divine text.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 218

United States Since 1945

This course examines America since World War II. We will explore both political events and cultural and social trends, including the Cold War, rock 'n' roll, civil rights, feminism, Vietnam, consumerism and advertising, the New Right and the New Left, the counterculture, religious and ethnic revivals, poverty, and the "me" generation.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 219

US Since 1945

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 219

America in the World: Perspectives on 9/11

A study of the economic, ideological, and geo-political impetus for US foreign policy and military interventions abroad and their impact on the world. The emphasis of the course is on the trajectory of US foreign relations since 1945. Topics include, World War II and the changing conduct of war, the Cold War, the relationship between guerrilla war and terrorism, Vietnam, the oil crisis of the 1970s, Latin America, and the Middle East. The course aims to make sense of the current state of global conflict, through a study of the historical antecedents of our contemporary crisis.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 220

Modern Japan

This course will cover the history of Japan from the late Tokugawa to the present, with emphasis on the transformation of the Japanese tradition in the modern period. Primary attention will be given to such topics as the Japanese response to the Western expansion, the rise of Japan during and after the Meiji Restoration and its consequences, and the post-war economic miracle.

1.00 units, Lecture

WMST 220

Modern Japan

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 221

Science, Religion, and Nature in the Age of Galileo

The astronomer Galileo Galilei’s trial before the Roman Inquisition nearly four centuries ago endures as a symbol of the clash between science and religion. Undoubtedly, the rise of early modern science in 17th-century Europe provoked its share of battles, but was this the whole story? This course will lead students to consider the origin and extent of the apparently irreconcilable differences between world views. How wide was the rift between science and religion, especially before the Enlightenment? Students will be encouraged to explore this complex relationship in historical context, by weighing the coexistence of scientific curiosity and intense faith, and also by considering the religious response to the expanding horizons of knowledge. The course will highlight investigations of the heavens and the earth, thus seeking instructive comparisons between disciplines such as astronomy, botany, and geology. A number of broad themes will be the focus. These include the understanding of God and nature, authority (classical and scriptural) versus observation, the wide range of knowledge-making practices, the place of magic, and finally the influence of power and patronage. The class seeks to present a rich and exciting picture, looking forward as well to the influence of rational thinking and scientific inquiry on the making of modernity.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 222

Japan from the Dawn of Human History to the 17th Century

This course provides a broad overview of the events and themes encountered in Japan’s early history, from the earliest archeological evidence of human habitation to the establishment of a stable political and social order under the Tokugawa bakufu (shogunate). The course will explore the role of diverse religious and cultural influences in shaping Japanese society and culture during the pre-modern era. Themes and topics of particular interest are the impact of Chinese civilization and the “indigenization” of imported traditions such as Buddhism and Confucianism, early political organization and the rise of the imperial clan, and civil war and the ascendance of the warrior class to political and cultural hegemony.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 223

Japan into the Modern World: from the 18th Century to the Present

This course begins by looking at the nature of Japanese society and culture during the height of samurai rule under the Tokugawa regime, which set the stage for Japan’s tumultuous entry into the modern world. It then examines the social, economic, and cultural transformations that occurred in Japan from its initial encounter with Western modernity, through its rise to military superpower status in the first half of the 20th century and its reemergence as an economic superpower in the second half. Students will be encouraged to gain a greater understanding of the problems that have shaped Japan, by exploring the challenges, conflicts, triumphs, and tragedies of modernization, industrialization, and nation-building as the Japanese experienced them in the 19th and 20th centuries.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 224

Introduction to the History of Modern Middle EastIntro to Hist of Mod Midd East

This course will examine the history of the Middle East from the emergence of the Ottoman Empire as a Middle Eastern dynasty in the 16th century until the formation of the modern Middle East in the 20th century. For the purposes of the course the Middle East will be defined on a north/south AXIS from modern Turkey to Upper Egypt and on an east/west AXIS from Iraq and the Eastern Arabian Peninsula to Libya. The overriding theme of the course is change and continuity in a variety of arenas in the Middle East over a period of 500 years. For example, we will explore changes in power structures in 17th- century Egypt as the state’s political power declined while the individual’s economic power increased; examine how people’s modes of social organization and self-identification changed over the course of the 19th century; analyze the impact of European colonialism on Middle Eastern communities; and look at the emergence of modern Arab (and Turkish, Kurdish, Berber, Druze, etc) nationalisms in the 20th century. The material presented in the course is oriented toward producing a more precise understanding of how broader social, political and economic changes throughout the Middle East affected the everyday lives of individuals in the region. To the extent possible, material will be drawn from primary source documents.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 227

European Muslims

Heirs to many traditions—Hellenist, Roman, Mesopotamia, African, Persian and Central Asian— the medieval and early modern Islamic states’ tolerance of other faiths and their patronage of science and arts made them fertile meetings points for cross-cultural exchange and trade. This multidimensional and complex Islamic world ultimately helped shape Europe’s Renaissance and informed much of how Europe would understand their relationship with the rest of the world in the Modern era. These issues of social and cultural identity will be studied through the perspective of Europeans (Christians, Jews and Muslims) facing religious diversity within their realm. This perspective will serve as a point of discussion to consider how issues of “Engagement and Exclusion” may ultimately help us rethink European and Middle Eastern history.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 228

Islamic Civilization to 1517

This course surveys the transformation of the Middle East into an Islamic civilization from the life of Muhammad in the early seventh century through the collapse of the Mamluk Empire in 1517. It focuses on social, cultural, and political history and addresses regional variations from Morocco to Iran. Topics include women, religious minorities, and slavery, as well as Islamic education, mysticism, and literature.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 229

History of the Modern Middle East 1600 to 2001

This course examines the social, economic and political history of the Modern Middle East from 1600 to the present. This will involve a study of the growth of Islamic political theory, the relationship between the religious and political establishments that mark much of the history of Islam (including the numerous non-Muslim religious communities living in the region), and how they impact, in particular, Arab, Turkish, Iranian and Kurdish peoples. The course will familiarize the student with processes of state and social formation and transformation from the end of the Ottoman Empire to the present day. The assigned readings intend to help connect these issues in the Middle East with broader analytical trends in the social sciences, providing a foundation for integrating the Middle East into larger comparative analyses.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 229

Middle East Since 1517

This course surveys Middle Eastern history from the foundations of the Ottoman and Safavid Empires through the 20th century. Major topics include modernity, imperialism, nationalism, and the role of Islam. Textbook readings are supplemented with primary sources and biographical sketches to situate the complexities of gender and culture in the context of political and economic change.

1.00 units, Lecture

AFHI 230

Africa-1914 to Present

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 234

Paris, Vienna & Berlin in the 19th Century

Paris, Vienna, and Berlin exert a powerful hold on our imaginations. Home to Renoir and Jules Verne, Beethoven and Freud, Hegel and Bismarck, these great metropolises underwent enormous transformations across the span of the 19th century. This course explores these European capitals from the heights of the Eiffel Tower to the depths of their sewers. Using art, literature, and film, this course investigates the fantasies that have been projected onto these capitals. We will then compare these images and myths with the realities of everyday life. How did ordinary residents - workers, immigrants, students, criminals - actually experience urban life? Key themes will include urban redevelopment, social control, consumer culture, revolutionary cultures, and the capital as a cultural center.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 235

Colonial Latin America

This course deals primarily with the social, cultural, economic, and political formation of Latin America during the period from 1492 to the movements for independence in the early 19th century. It will take into consideration the importance of indigenous societies a well as the African slave trade in the region's development.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 235

Colonialism in the Americas

Columbus’s voyage began a new period in the history of colonialism. This course examines the complex world that the Spanish Conquest destroyed, and it explores the “New World” created in its aftermath. It opens with a journey into the worlds of the Aztecs, the Mayas, and Incas, but it also considers indigenous peoples less well known to contemporary students, especially the Tainos, the Lencas, and the Guarani. The plight of millions of enslaved West Africans in the Americas is also a central topic. Finally, Spanish colonialism here extends between 1492 and 1898 in the Caribbean, and up to the 1820s in the U.S.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 236

Latin America since 1800

This course will examine the history of Latin America after Spanish rule, from 1821 to the present, focusing on the development of social inequality, civil conflict, and revolution. Cultural and political developments in countries like Brazil, Mexico, Cuba, and Venezuela will be discussed, and the U.S. role in the region, especially toward Central America, will also be considered. Finally, we will examine the historical construction of hierarchies based on race, gender, and economic position, and how those hierarchies have influenced the nature of social and political strife.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 238

Caribbean History

The location of the first encounter, conquest, and colonization of Native American peoples by Europeans, the Caribbean became a center of bitter rivalries between European imperial powers, and later in the 20th century a new, premiere location of the United States’ own imperial thrust. The Caribbean’s strategic location in relation to Atlantic Ocean trade routes and its tropical climate and fertile soils were key factors in shaping these imperial rivalries and the colonial and postcolonial societies that emerged in the region. The vast experience of African slavery, the later “indentured” migration of hundreds of thousands of Asians to some colonies, and the migration of similar numbers of Europeans (especially to the Hispanic Caribbean) have shaped deeply yet unevenly the nature of Caribbean societies since the 16th century, giving the Caribbean a complex multi-ethnic, yet also heavily “Western,” cultural landscape. This course will introduce students to these and other aspects of Caribbean history, from the pre-European era, through the epics of the Haitian Revolution (1791-1804) and the Cuban Revolution of 1959, to the present.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 239

Race and Ethnicity in Latin American and Caribbean History

This course will introduce students to the history of race and ethnic relations in Latin America and the Caribbean from the arrival of Columbus to the late 20th century. We will explore how the categories of race and ethnicity in Latin America and the Caribbean have undergone a very different evolution when compared to the U.S. Two distinguishing facts that make race and ethnic history in Latin America and the Caribbean different from the U.S.: the much larger “Indian” populations that the Spaniards confronted and, secondly, the larger number of peoples of African descent transferred as slaves to Latin America and the Caribbean. This course will examine this process in the context of colonization, post-Independence political systems, nation-state formation, and contemporary struggles over different identities. This course includes a community learning component.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 241

History of China, Shang to Ming

A survey focused on the development of Chinese politics, culture, and society from 1600 B.C. to the conclusion of the Ming dynasty in 1644 A.D. This course will provide a historical introduction to the growth of a unified Chinese empire with its own homogeneous intellectual tradition and will explore the empire’s coexistence with an enormously varied cluster of regional cultures.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 242

History of China, Qing to Present

A survey of modern Chinese history in the period covering the last traditional dynastic state (1644-1911) and 20th-century China. Emphasis on the collapse of the Confucian state, China’s “Enlightenment,” and the Chinese Revolution.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 244

Imm&Eth in Am:Urban Cruc

The urban experience has profoundly affected the lives of immigrants and the shaping of ethnic identity in this country. This course will examine the intertwined histories of various immigrant, ethnic and racial groups in several cities over time. Concentrating primarily on the late 19th and the 20th centuries, we will consider such issues as assimilation, pluralism, identity formation, notions of community, religion, and political struggle in the urban context. Enrollment limited.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 245

Eating in History: Europe from the Middle Ages to the Present

This course explores the evolution of the European diet from the Middle Ages through the Twentieth Century. Subjects to be covered include: the Agricultural Revolution, which achieved for Europe yields which broke traditional cycles of feast and famine; the Court Society of Early Modern Europe, which associated menus and manners with civility and asserted the cultural value of food; the depiction of food in European art during the Golden Age of capitalism; the foods of Early Modern empires - coffee, chocolate, and sugar - which fueled middle class socialbility; the invention of the restaurant in Revolutionary France; the development of haute cuisine in Nineteenth-Century Paris and London; and the significance of the continued European resistance to mass-market foods.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 246

Slav to Sub:Afr-Am Hist

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 247

Latinos/Latinas in the United States

Who are “Latinos/Latinas” and how have they come to constitute a central ethnic/racial category in the contemporary United States? This is the organizing question around which this course examines the experiences of major Latino/Latina groups—Chicanos/Mexicanos, Puerto Ricans, and Cubans—and new immigrants from Central America and the Caribbean. We study U.S. colonialism and imperialism in the Old Mexican North and the Caribbean; migration and immigration patterns and policies; racial, gender, and class distinctions; cultural and political expressions and conflicts; return migrations and transnationalism; and inter-ethnic relations and the construction of pan-Latino/Latina diasporic identities.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 248

The City in History

A selective introduction to the methods and practice of studying urban life from an historical perspective. The focus of the course is the crucial development in Euro-America which culminated in the modern 20th-century city. The purpose is to prepare students to participate in a discussion of the nature and fate of urban life in today's interdependent world by giving them the European context and theory which that discussion may challenge and amend.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 249

The Medieval Spains

Long neglected in the traditional American historical retrospective of pre-modern Western Europe, the peoples of this corner of Europe enjoyed an exceptionally diverse and cross-fertilized culture with a unique historical trajectory. We will survey the history of the Iberian Peninsula form the end of the Roman Empire in the West (5th century AD) to the golden age of Spanish unification and global expansion under Fernidad and Isabella one thousand years later.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 250

Industrl Revolutn in US

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 250

Animals and Ideology in Europe and America, 1600 to the present

This course offers a history of animal protection in Europe and America which will be of interest to students wondering how our current debates on the status of animals in law and society have come about. Because of the important role women played in the animal protection movements of the nineteenth century and the strong gender component to anti-vivisection arguments in the same era, the course may interest Women, Gender and Sexuality students as well as students in History, Public Policy and Law, and Philosophy Topics include: (1) Puritan arguments about the human/animal divide, which led to the English Ordinance of 1654, Europe’s first animal protection law. (2) The bestiality scandals of early America (3) The Game Laws of early modern Europe (4) Colonial and nineteenth-century American issues concerning hunting and the protection of game. (5) Nineteenth-century animal protection societies in Europe and the U.S. (6) The anti-vivisection movement (7) Nazi animal protection and the ‘new chain of being’ (8) Cold -war animal liberation movements (9) Further development of legal arguments about the rights of animals in the late twentieth century (10) The importance of new work in biological anthropology, ethnology and cognitive science in shaping future debate on the subject of animals in human societies.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 251

Les Miserables: History and Literature in 19th-Century France

Set in scenes ranging from the battlefields of Waterloo to the barricades of revolutions, the 19th-century French novel firmly situated itself in the history of the age. But how realistic are the descriptions presented in the great novels of events leading up to the century’s political cataclysms? This course will explore answers to this question (and the relationship between history and literature in general) by establishing the context within which the novels of Stendhal, Balzac, Hugo, Zola, and Proust were conceived. Attitudes towards women, religion, the poor, crime, ambition and politics, the Jewish minority, Paris life and the provinces will be analyzed to gain understanding of French culture during a period when rapid modernization appeared to threaten traditional norms. The course will end with a consideration of the current appeal of Les Miserables. Like the novel itself, the musical was greeted initially with disdain by critics but was an enormous popular success. What accounts for our interest in the French past?

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 252

African Histories and Cultures to 1880 - Early Period

This course is the first part of an introductory two-semester survey of African History. It covers the early period to the later nineteenth century. Topics discussed will include nations and identities, spirituality and conversion, slavery and slave trades, and women and gender, among others. Due to variations in the density of historical scholarship on various parts of Africa, some regions will be covered in greater depth than others. Combining lectures and discussions, the course will integrate audio recordings, films, autobiographies, and novels with conventional scholarly readings in African history. Students taking this course need no prior background in African History.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 252

African History to 1880

This course is the first part of a two-part introductory survey of African history. We will explore the rich and varied civilizations and cultures in Africa, as well as how elements of these cultures have been carried throughout the world. Because "African" as a uniform term is a creation of a later time, this course seeks to distinguish among various populations and regions on this immense continent. Beginning with human origins on the continent, we will address the major social, economic, religious, and political movements in Africa through the era of the Atlantic slave trade. Topics will include the peopling of Africa; ancient societies and African empires; African technology such as tools, weapons, art, and music; African religions and the spread of Islam and Christianity; famous early Africans such as Mansa Musa, warrior queen Nzinga, and Shaka Zulu; trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean trading routes; and the development and impact of the Atlantic slave trade.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 253

African History Survey: Modern and Contemporary Period

This course is the second part of a two–part introductory survey of African history. With a focus on "Black Africa" south of the Sahara, we will begin by exploring the impact of the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade on Africa and move to the establishment of—and resistance to—European colonial rule. We will then look at the impact of the two World Wars on Africa as well as the rise in nationalism and movements for independence. In the postcolonial period, we will explore Cold War politics in Africa, and address issues including the end of apartheid South Africa, the politics of foreign aid and military interventions, global health and resource wars.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 253

African History: 1850 to the Contemporary Era

This course is the second part of a two–part introductory survey of African history. With a focus on "Black Africa" south of the Sahara, we will begin by exploring the impact of the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade on Africa and move to the establishment of—and resistance to—European colonial rule. We will then look at the impact of the two world wars on Africa as well as the rise of nationalism and movements for independence. In the postcolonial period, we will explore Cold War politics in Africa, and address issues including the end of Apartheid in South Africa, the politics of foreign aid and military interventions, global health, and resource wars.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 254

Islamic Civilization to 1517

This course surveys the transformation of the Middle East into an Islamic civilization from the life of Muhammad in the early 7th century through the collapse of the Mamluk Empire in 1517. It focuses on social, cultural, and political history and addresses regional variations from Morocco to Iran. Topics include women, religious minorities, and slavery, as well as Islamic education, mysticism, and literature.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 255

Europe in the Age of the Cathedrals

Western Europe reached a cultural zenith in the period 1000 to 1300--the 'Romanesque' and 'Gothic' eras. This course explores the cultural flowering of this period, focusing on the great architectural and religious structures--cathedrals and monasteries--as microcosms of medieval society on many levels.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 256

Human Rights in Latin America & the Caribbean: A History

In the 1970s and 1980s, thousands of people were “disappeared,” tortured and murdered in Latin America and the Caribbean, mostly by military regimes and by para-military death-squads. The period is often characterized as perhaps the lowest point in the modern abuse of “Human Rights” in the region. This course explores how these central notions, the human and rights, have evolved in theory and in practice in the history of the Americas. The course begins with the 16th-century debates among the Spaniards over the “humanity” of Indians and enslaved Africans; it then covers distinguishing elements of the human and rights within the legal structures of the nations created after independence from Spain in the 1820s and before the more contemporary conceptions of human rights in the aftermath of the Holocaust and the crimes against humanity during WWII. Finally, the modern conception and practice of human rights defense and legal monitoring are explored in case studies in the region from the late 1940s to the 1980s.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 257

Nations and Nationalism in the Middle East

The idea of nations and the ideology of nationalism emerged as powerful political, social and cultural forces in the Middle East at the end of the 19th century. Nationalisms in the Middle East took on various guises, sometimes representing perceived ethnic communities, sometimes linguistic ones, and sometimes religious groups. In addition, nationalisms never existed insulated from other alternative ideologies for community organization, and thus nationalism incorporated, rejected or otherwise responded to other competing ideas and agendas. Benedict Anderson argues that "to understand [nations and nationalisms] properly we need to consider carefully how they have come into historical being, in what ways their meanings have changed over time, and why, today, they command such profound emotional legitimacy." This course aims to do just that with specific reference to the Middle East. We will look at both theories of nations and nationalisms and explore specific historical instances, including Ottomanism, Zionism, Arab nationalism, Turkish nationalism and Arab socialism. We will also look at some competing ideas, such as Berber trans-nationalism and the ascendance of political Islam.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 258

The "Islamic" City: Places, Pasts and Problems

This course studies, across time, the notion of the Islamic city from its invention in the French colonial period, through its debunking in the 1980s, to its revival and appropriation by urban planners, social scientists and architects in the Islamic world today, ranging from Rabat, Morocco to Ahmadabad, India. Issues to be explored include public and private space, gendered space, notions of real estate and ownership, and various social and public institutions that were thought to characterize a city as Islamic. We will first examine how these topics were conceived by medieval and early modern Muslim scholars in different geographical places and different historical periods. Then we will study how French and British colonial scholars developed a set of criteria for evaluating the “Islamicness” of a city as they worked alongside and within colonizing projects. Finally, we will see how these issues and criteria have been re-interpreted and embraced as a vernacular urban planning style. The course will draw upon passages from translated Arabic texts that discuss and describe historical cities, writings by historians on cities in the Middle East and the Islamic world, and critiques of the concept of the Islamic city. Throughout the course references will be made to the other conceptions of the urban environment that existed alongside the so-called Islamic city in any specific region under consideration. (Also offered under History.)

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 259

War and Society

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 262

America's Half Century: The US Since World War II

This survey examines the new era of American global hegemony following World War II as it defined international affairs and domestic life. Major topics include the Cold War, McCarthyism, the rise of American mass culture in the 50's and 60's, the Kennedy and Johnson Administrators, the Vietnam War, and the social movements of the 1960s and 1970s (including the Civil Rights, New Left, Black and Brown Power, and Women's and Gay Liberation Movements). We will also consider the major foreign policy challenges of Carter, Reagan, and Bush administrations with special emphasis on development in the Middle East and Latin America. In the last quarter of the course we will attempt to make sense of the state of global conflict since 9/11 through a study of the immediate historical antecedents to our contemporary crisis.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 263

Political Repression in the Modern U.S.: 1873-Present

This course will explore the ways in which governing elites have used the powers of the state to suppress dissent and limit political thought and expression at some of the most important moments in U.S. history. Students will also explore the effects that these repressive measures have had on the lives of American dissidents and, more broadly, American political thought and debate. The goal of this course is to enhance student’s understanding of U.S. history and democracy through a detailed examination of the repressive activities of certain governing institutions.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 264

Film and History

Up to the advent of the modern era, most people preserved their historical memory and produced historical narratives and interpretations of the past through oral traditions, since written texts were generally accessed only by educated elites. With the advent of the printing press and later the emergence of professional history as an academic discipline, the modern era witnessed the rise of printed historical scholarship as the principal medium for accessing historical memory and historical interpretation. However, the 20th century saw the emergence of new forms of communication through cinema and television that produced a multitude of texts that came to be the primary form through which large segments, if not the majority, of people the world over gained knowledge of the past. For example, from D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation, to Ken Burns' The Civil War and beyond, millions of Americans came to experience cinema and television as the principal form of historical knowledge-production and dissemination. This course will explore the relationship between history as written by historians and history as represented in cinema. We will study both fiction and documentary films framed by debates between historians, film scholars, and filmmakers. In the process, students will be introduced to film analysis as a form of literacy.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 265

Urban Life, Urban Culture: Coming of Age in the 20th-Century Metropolis

We explore life passages and political culture in New York, Berlin, London, Paris, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Cape Town, as portrayed in memoir, fictional, narrative, and visual sources.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 266

War and Peace in Early Modern Europe, 1500-1650

This course is a comprehensive examination of European life from the Reformation to the end of the Thirty Years War. It explores a vibrant 150 years fraught with conflict, but also characterized by an ever-present desire for peace. We will begin by considering the roots of European belligerence, which can be situated at the intersection of confessional conflict and nation building. Ranging from Spain to Sweden, our major topics will include cultural responses to war and peace, military history, the history of religion, gender, urban history, conflict with the Ottomans, and differences between Mediterranean and Continental Europe. Students will read mostly primary sources, including works of literature.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 267

Us and Them: Identity and Hegemony in the Americas

This interdisciplinary course examines United States-Latin American relations, from state-to-state interactions at the level of diplomacy and military intervention, to questions of culture and perception by everyday actors. As the eras characterized by the Monroe Doctrine, the Big Stick and Dollar Diplomacy, the Good Neighbor policy, the Alliance for Progress, human rights concerns, the Reagan Doctrine of counterinsurgency, and debates over neoliberal economic policy are examined, critical attention will be paid to consistencies and changes over time. The roles of ideology, national security, economic interests, and cultural factors will be weighed in the creation and outcomes of policy and interpersonal negotiations. This course will evaluate influences at work on officials in Washington, and will consider Latin American initiatives and responses. Issues ranging from attempts by nationalist regimes in Argentina, Chile, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to find an alternative to the traditional model of dependence on the United States, to critiques by intellectuals such as Jose Marti and Jose Enrique Rodo at the turn of the century and Eduardo Galeano and Subcomandante Marcos today will be discussed.?

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 281

Suburbia: from Hartford to Orange County

This course will introduce students to the study of American suburban history and contemporary realities in comparative perspective. We will examine the origins and evolution of the suburban ideal, from earlier European precedents, to the "garden city" and "street car" trolley & train suburbs of the 19th century, to the automobile suburbs, and to the "post-suburban" communities that have emerged since the late 20th century. Geographical coverage will extend from Hartford to Orange County, California. Topics include race and class, gender and sexuality, and the politics of space and place, among others. This is a fully interdisciplinary course. Sources include works from history, anthropology, literature, geography, built environment, philosophy, and cinema, for example, starting with a look at "The Truman Show" (1998).

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 291

French Politics and Culture 1715-1815: Enlightenment and Revolution

This course begins with an examination of the central themes of the French Enlightenment and contrasts them with the politics of court life under Louis XV and Louis XVI. It will then explore the causes and the trajectory of the Revolution (1789-1799) through the use of primary documents. We will consider the shifts from absolutism to constitutional monarchy to radical republic in terms of the development in France of a modern political culture. The course will conclude with a discussion of Napoleon’s rise to power in 1799 and the meaning of the Napoleonic Empire, which collapsed at Waterloo in 1815, as well as a consideration of the legacy of the French Revolution in politics today.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 299

What is History? Historiography and Historical Methods

A study of the character and range of activities undertaken by historians. Students will critically evaluate the way in which historians treat evidence and draw conclusions. Topics considered will include an introduction of some of the subdisciplines within the field and an examination of a number of important exchanges on matters of substance and method currently under debate among historians.
This course open to History majors only.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 300

Historiography

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 301

History as Text, Text as History: America in the Long 19th Century

This discussion course will examine topics in the intellectual and cultural history of the "long 19th century" (1789-1914) in the United States, with emphasis on relations among culture (ideas, values, myths), society, and political economy (structures of production and power). We will use works of literature, film, and propaganda as channels of inquiry into the historical record, and we will assess the evidentiary value and "representativeness" of the texts we analyze. All the works we examine will be ones that were designed to make history as well as to reflect on it. They will include titles by Franklin, Tocqueville, Martineau, Douglass, Pennington, Stowe, Bellamy, Riis, and Griffith.

1.00 units, Lecture

SOCL 301

History of Hartford

The post-Civil War history of Hartford is a history of the initial triumph of entrepreneurial power and civic will and the subsequent loss of certain forms of urban wealth. Mark Twain called the city the "center of all Connecticut wealth." Despite considerable poverty, in 1876, Hartford still boasted the country's highest per capita income and is now ranked as among the nation's poorest cities. This seminar explores the processes of cultural and social transformation that resulted in these differences. We seek to understand Hartford's late 19th and 20th century political culture and political economy. Topics include: the distribution of capital in industry, housing, charity, and welfare; the racial, ethnic, religious and class composition of the city's men and women residents; urban politics, racial and ethnic antagonisms, and the history of attempts at social change in the city; the modes of artistic and literary expressions that arose over time. Sources for study include readings drawn from other urban histories; documents and primary sources drawn from Hartford's rich archival and museum collections; the portrayal of the city in photography and film. Students will construct projects based upon research and interaction throughout the city. A speakers program and off-campus work supplement the course. (Same as History 835-03.)

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 302

Germany to 1815

In 1815, while such other major European countries as England and France had grown into centralized, relatively modern nation-states, Germany remained a loose conglomeration of independent and generally underdeveloped kingdoms, duchies, and free cities. Indeed, before Napoleon there were 300 of them, and it is more fitting to speak of "German Central Europe" in 1815 than of "Germany." The purpose of this course is to understand why. Topics include the formation of the "Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation" in the tenth century, the Investiture Controversy (which greatly weakened the German emperors), the German Renaissance, the Lutheran Reformation, the Thirty Years' War, the nature of the Hapsburg monarchy, the rise of Prussia, and the effect of the Napoleonic Wars on the German states. Readings will include both primary and secondary works.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 303

"Jacksonian" America, 1828-1848

An exploration of the politics and culture of America, 1828-1848. Topics will include the Second American Party System; the public career of Andrew Jackson; Protestant revivalism; abolitionism; the women's rights movement; the politics of slavery and race; westward expansion; the culture of "democracy" and competitive capitalism. Readings will include works on the political and moral controversies of the day.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 304

Jacksonian Am 1828-1848

An exploration of the politics and culture of Jacksonian America, 1828-1848. Topics will include the Second American Party System; the public career of Andrew Jackson, Protestant revivalism; abolitionism; the women's rights movement; the politics of slavery and race; westward expansion; the culture of "democracy" and competitive capitalism. Reading will include works on or by leading figures such as Frederick Douglass, Henry Clay, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and "Old Hickory" himself. History 201 is highly recommended but not required.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 304

Renaissance Italy

This course explores the origin, distinctiveness, and importance of the Italian Renaissance. It is also about culture, society, and identity in the many “Italies” that existed before the modern period. Art, humanism, and the link between cultural patronage and political power will be a focus, as will the lives of 15th- and 16th-century women and men. Early lectures will trace the evolution of the Italian city-states, outlining the social and political conditions that fostered the cultural flowering of the 1400s and 1500s. We will consider Florence in the quattrocento, and subsequently shift to Rome in the High Renaissance. Later topics will include the papacy’s return to the Eternal City, the art of Michelangelo and Raphael, and the ambitions of the warlike and mercurial Pope Julius II. Italy was a politically fragmented peninsula characterized by cultural, linguistic, and regional differences. For this reason, other topics will include: the fortunes of Venice, the courts of lesser city-states like Mantua and Ferrara, the life of Alessandra Strozzi, and the exploits of the “lover and fighter” Benvenuto Cellini. We will also look at representations of the Renaissance in film.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 305

Disease, Race & Colonialism in the Americas

History of Disease, Race and Colonialism in the Americas. Colonialism in the Americas has traditionally been studied from different historiographical perspectives. However, what Arjun Appadurai has called the number in the colonial imagination has usually been excluded from serious attention. This course will place issues about numbers in the colonial imagination and key processes at the center of major historical problems of the period between the 1490s and 1820s. These will focus especially on the introduction of European diseases, and the categorization and counting of colonized peoples into races. Among the questions to be addressed are: How many peoples lived in the Americas before Columbus? How do we know? How many died from imported diseases? How do we know? How many enslaved Africans did the Europeans transport to the Americas? How do we know? How did colonial officials count different races? Why was this important?

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 306

History of Anti-Semitism

This seminar will study the history of anti-Semitism in European culture. We will consider the evolution from pre-modern religious anti-Judaism to modern racial anti-Semitism and how such animus can coexist with tolerant attitudes towards Jews and Judaism. The course readings will be largely primary sources supplemented by some articles and monographs.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 307

Russia to 1881

An introduction to Russian history from earliest times through the death of Tsar Alexander II. This course explores the social, cultural, and political development of medieval and early modern Russia; the significance and impact on Russian society of the revolutionary reforms of Tsar Peter the Great; the flowering of Russian learning and culture under the “enlightened” Empress Catherine the Great; Russian imperial aspirations in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; and the social upheavals and revolutionary movements of the nineteenth century that paved the way for the October Revolution of 1917. Emphasis is on intellectual, cultural and social history, particularly of the 18th and 19th centuries.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 308

Rise of Modern Russia

Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 310

Germany

A survey of German history from 1815 to 1945. Topics will include the Vormarz Period, Bismarck, Wilhelmine Germany, the Weimar Republic, and the Third Reich

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 311

Cultures, Communities, and Change in Colonial America

This course explores the history of colonial North America from the earliest European settlements through the end of the French and Indian War, with an emphasis on the colonies’ cultural diversity. While it will focus on the thirteen British colonies, it will also pay attention to colonization in Florida, New Mexico, and Louisiana; moreover, this class will study Colonial America as part of the Early Modern Atlantic World. Major themes we will examine include the transfer of European and African cultures, ideas, and institutions to North America; the effects of colonization on Native American communities and cultures; the role of religion in the colonial settlements; slave trade and labor; conflict and cooperation between the various ethnic and social groups; regional differentiation; and the emergence of an American identity.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 312

Formative Years in American History, 1793-1815

An examination of the causes and course of the American Revolution; the confederation period; the framing of the Constitution; and the political and diplomatic history of the early republic. Special attention will also be given to the institution of plantation slavery and the paradoxical relationship between the ideals of republicanism and human bondage in the South.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 313

The Twentieth Century Black Freedom Movement

Popular interpretations of the Civil Rights Movement focus on the “heroic period,” stretching roughly from 1954 to 1965. During these eleven heady years, the movement was dominated by individuals who had adopted nonviolence as a strategy and integration as a goal. It is certainly not wrong to focus on their actions. The “heroic period” witnessed the most enduring victories of the black freedom struggle: the destruction of Jim Crow segregation and the achievement black citizenship. But mass social movements do not spring forth fully formed from the ground. Why were African Americans able to secure these remarkable victories in the late 1950s and 1960s? What other strategies and goals did African Americans adopt in their struggles for freedom? How did nonviolent integrationists come to dominate the movement during the heroic period? What has become of their victory? In an effort to answer these questions, we will spend considerable time exploring African Americans struggles for freedom before and after the heroic period. Additionally, we will attempt to situate the twentieth century black freedom struggle within the struggles of colonized people for self-determination the world over. African Americans have often viewed themselves as members of “the black world,” the African Diaspora, and the “Third World,” depending on time and place. If we are to understand the twentieth century black freedom struggle, we must understand the ways its participants imagined themselves and the world around them.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 314

Form Yrs:1763-1815

An examination of the causes and course of the American Revolution; the Confederation period; the framing of the Constitution; and the political and diplomatic history of the early republic. Special attention will also be given to the institution of plantation slavery in the South, and the paradoxical relationship between the ideals of republicanism and human bondage in the South.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 315

Star Trek and 1960s America

For many, the 1960s were the “final frontier,” as young people, African-Americans, women, conservatives, members of the “New Left” and many others struggled to re-imagine their lives and the life of their nation. Originally intended as a “Wagon Train to the Stars,” Star Trek came to embody the 1960s spirit, both reflecting and reflecting on the many pressing issues of the day. This course will examine important issues in the 1960s from Vietnam to the counterculture, from race to shifting sexual norms, from new technology to workers’ rights, through the television show that explored the “strange new worlds” of its time.

1.00 units, Lecture

WMST 315

Women in American Histry

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 316

The Pacific War in Film

The war between Japan and the United States and its allies that raged across the South Pacific, Southeast and Northeast Asia from 1941 to 1945 remains one of the most destructive in human history. Although this conflict is typically viewed along with the European war against Nazi Germany and fascist Italy as part of the wider Second World War, perceptions on both sides of the Pacific about the fundamental cultural and racial difference and inhumanity of the enemy added a dimension of animosity to the conflict that still colors the way “the war” is remembered to this day. In addition to examining the historical causes and course of the conflict, we will explore how the combatants and the meaning of the conflict have been portrayed and remembered, during the war itself and since then, in film, the medium through which most non-combatants have come to appreciate and remember the conflict. Viewing and discussing films on the war produced in a variety of countries and historical contexts -- from wartime propaganda films to the most recent big-budget war movies -- will be a required part of this course.

1.00 units, Lecture

WMST 316

Families in Amer History

An exploration of American families, past and present, that draws on a wide range of historical and literary sources. Topics will include: changing ideals and realities of American family life; racial, religious, class, and ethnic variations; and shifting gender and generational relationships. The culminating project for the course is a family history, based on oral interviews and other sources.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 317

Amer Culture 1815-1914

A topical study in intellectual and cultural history, concerning issues of the American experience as perceived by major observers and literary writers, both American and foreign, of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 318

Reform Mvmts 20th C Amer

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 318

Gender and Sexuality in Middle Eastern History

This course takes constructions of femininity and masculinity and related representations of male and female sexuality in both the pre-modern and modern Middle East, with an emphasis on the Arab world, as its focus. Through theoretical readings and primary sources, both written and visual, we will explore the ways in which gender and sexuality have shaped political, economic, and cultural life in the Middle East.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 319

Women in American Histry

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 319

Gender, Heresy & Resistance in Medieval Europe

How did medieval people and communities define themselves and what happened when new forms of identity were created? What happened when individuals and communities came into conflict with other groups as they expressed these new identities? Case studies will focus on, among other topics, the history of women, such as Joan of Arc, who redefined traditional female identities, and heretical and peasant movements that challenged the leadership of the Church and elite landlords.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 320

Families in Amer History

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 321

Revolutionary France:1715-1799

This course examines the causes, trajectory and consequences of the French Revolultion: 1789-1799. Topics covered include the Court Society, the Republic of Letters, the Financial Crisis of the Crown, the Revolutionary Elite, the Course of the Revolution, its Marxist Interpretation, and Jacobin Ideology.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 325

American Slavery, 1790-1865

Drawing on a wide and diverse variety of sources—seminal works of scholarship, travelers’ accounts, planters’ diaries, works of fiction, and slave reminiscences—this course will attempt to draw a balanced portrait of slavery in the American south in the years prior to the Civil War. Readings will include substantial selections from historians such as Phillips, Stampp, and Genovese, pro-slavery writings, and a variety of hostile contemporary accounts. The class will be discussion-centered and writing intensive.

1.00 units, Lecture

AFHI 327

Hist of Africa to 1800

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 327

History of Modern North Africa

Since the 19th century, Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia have found themselves bound up in an intricate series of networks connecting them to Europe to the north, the Middle East to the east and in some instances West Africa to the south. Colonialism and a common colonizer produced similar conditions and concerns in each of the three countries while notions of Arab nationalism, pan-Islamism and Islamic reform joined these countries to their neighbors to the east. However, neither the colonial experience nor the responses to Arab nationalism and Islamic reform were uniform. In this course we will explore these commonalities and differences in the historical experiences of Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia and then go on to examine their different efforts to gain independence from their colonial handlers and the different experiences the countries have undergone since independence.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 330

The Western Impact on Modern Japan

A history of modern Japan's contact with and reactions to the West. Topics will cover knowledge of the West under the seclusion policy, Perry's impact, the policy of Bunmei Kaika (civilization and enlightenment), Westernization and repercussion, and Japanese intellectuals and the West.

1.00 units, Lecture

AFHI 331

Africa in 19th Century

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 331

History of Human Rights and Africa

This course begins with an exploration of the historical development of human rights. Examining how human rights have operated in a global system, we will look at how rights existed for various cultures in Africa before the creation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. While we will address the legal and philosophical dimensions of human rights, this course will focus on the intellectual history of the experience and practice of human rights in Africa.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 334

Provinces of Roman Empire

A history of the first two centuries of the provinces of the Roman Empire, including the processes of acquisition and Romanization, and the survival of regional cultures. Important themes include social conditions, economic opportunities, religious and political change. Extensive use of archaeological evidence.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 336

Modern Jewish History

This course will examine major trends in Jewish history since 1789. There will be particular emphasis on Jewish society in Eastern Europe and the breakdown of orthodox hegemony. Topics will include the Haskala, the Bund, the development of Zionism, the interwar period in Eastern Europe, the Holocaust, and the State of Israel. The approach will be primarily that of intellectual history with emphasis on the secular aspects of Jewish history.

1.00 units, Lecture

JWST 336

Modern Jewish History

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 338

Medieval Britain:Law & Government 1066-1688

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 339

Modern Mexico, Historical Origins

This course is a survey of Mexican history from the colonial period under Spain to the aftermath and consequences of the Mexican Revolution in the 1910s and 1920s. However, most of the course’s time will be dedicated to the post-Independence period after 1821. The “modern” period extends from the post-Cardenas period (after 1940) to the recent economic crisis of the late 1970s as a result of plummeting oil prices. This latter period will be considered in a more “topical” than a chronological way. Emphasis will be placed on understanding the post-Cardenas political system; the border economy with the United States and industrialization; Mexican immigration to the United States; and the contours of deepening Mexican agrarian capitalism.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 340

Leonardo and Machiavelli: Renaissance Geniuses

This course considers the life and times of two Renaissance figures: Leonardo da Vinci and Niccolò Machiavelli. They hailed from the same part of Italy, and their paths may have crossed in the troubled early-16th century. Although each would experience his share of successes and reversals, their fortunes would differ greatly. Leonardo went on to fame in the court of the French king, while Machiavelli was imprisoned and condemned to live in exile and isolation. What do their lives tell us about the Renaissance, and the significance of genius in history? Viewed together, the works and achievements of Leonardo and Machiavelli present extraordinary range and diversity: from paintings, sculptures, anatomies, tanks and flying machines, to political theory, satire, citizen militias, and visions of diverting the course of the Arno river. Students will explore the Renaissance through the words and ideas of both figures, as well as through the observations and remembrances of others, such as Giorgio Vasari and Arcangela Tarabotti.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 341

Medieval Worlds

This course will explore several fundamental topics in medieval history including the Christianization of Europe, the nature and growth of lordship, chivalric culture, the Crusades, the formation of royal government, the treatment of Jews, heretics, and women. Weekly readings will be drawn from primary sources such as chronicles, letters, treatises, and legal records. We will also read contemporary scholarly debates on these topics. Students will meet with the instructor in pairs on a weekly basis for approximately one hour. At each of these sessions, one student will present a five-page paper based on the weekly reading while the other is responsible for a thoughtful and constructive critique. Students will alternate between presenting and critiquing the other's paper for a total of five papers and five critiques. This course is designed for students who wish to work intensively on their writing and rhetorical skills in partnership with other students and the professor.

1.00 units, Tutorial

HIST 345

Warring States: The United States and Vietnam

Probably no set of events in the post-war history of the United States has so torn the fabric of American political life and values as the war in Vietnam. The war tested American foreign and military policy aims in Asia and became the object of a soul-searching national controversy that engaged the energies of millions of Americans and tried the collective conscience of the nation. For the Vietnamese people, the war was a harsh experience that evoked sacrifice and suffering in the name of revolution and independence. Vietnam’s struggle with the United States represented in symbolic and practical terms an attempt to resolve questions of national identity and sovereignty that were the legacy of foreign domination and an ambiguous encounter with European culture and society. This course will examine the Vietnam War through a variety of historical materials including monographs, documents, novels, and memoirs. Films and guest-lectures will supplement the core readings. Readings will include: George Herring, America's Longest War; John Lewis Gaddis, Strategies of Containment; James Carroll, American Requeiem; Truong Nhu Tang, A Viet Cong Memoir; and Tim O’Brien, If I Die in a Combat Zone.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 348

Race in America

The dual purpose of this course is to explore the meaning of race in American history and the influence of American history on race. The course is designed primarily as an introduction to the multicultural histories of African Americans, Asian Americans, Chicanos/as, and Native Americans. We will focus on how geography, environment, expansion, class, gender, imperialism and capitalism have affected race in America.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 349

Black Women’s Social Movement Activisms

In this course we will examine social movements of the post-emancipation United States from the perspective of black women activists. By looking at such movements as anti-lynching, progressive education, Back to Africa, suffrage, legal civil rights, black power, feminism, welfare rights, and GLBT liberation/queer rights, we will trace and analyze how black women’s activisms are a continuous and constant force in U.S. history. Along the way, we will also contemplate and discuss how the trajectory of U.S. history changes when we look at the past from the perspective of black women.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 350

Civil War Era 1845-1877

An exploration of the causes of the American Civil War, including a detailed study of slavery, abolitionism, the development of Southern sectional consciousness, conflict over the Western territories, the disintegration of the national party system and the rise of the Republicans, Lincoln's election, and the secession crisis of 1860-61. The political and military history of the wartime period will also be examined, as will the post-war struggle to reconstruct the Union and define the status of four million newly freed black Americans.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 350

Civil War Era, 1845-1877

An exploration of the causes of the American Civil War, including a detailed study of slavery, abolitionism, the development of Southern sectional consciousness, conflict over the Western territories, the disintegration of the national party system and the rise of the Republicans, Lincoln’s election, and the secession crisis of 1860-61. The political and military history of the wartime period will also be examined, as will the post-war struggle to reconstruct the Union and define the status of four million newly freed black Americans.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 351

Slavery and Race in America, 1790-1865

A selective examination of the social and political history of African-Americans from the Missouri Compromise till the end of the Civil War, and of the battle over plantation slavery which ended with the passage of the 13th amendment in 1865. Topics will include the black community in the North; the rise and progress of the abolitionist movements; plantations, slavery, and pro-slavery politics in the South; slave rebellion and resistance; the emergence of the "Free Soil" movement and the creation of the Republican Party; the abolition of slavery during the Civil War; and the career of the black soldier. A basic knowledge of antebellum and Civil War history is essential.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 352

The Coming of the Civil War, 1830-1861

An exploration of the origins of the American Civil War, with emphasis on such topics as slavery, race, abolitionism, growing Southern sectional consciousness, the struggle over slavery in the western territories, the dissolution of the national party system and the rise of the Republicans, the secession of seven states following Lincoln's election, 11th-hour efforts at compromise, and the Fort Sumter crisis. Lectures and discussion. Not open to students who have taken History 350. The Civil War Era.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 354

The Civil War and Reconstruction, 1861-1877

This course examines not only the military dimensions of the war years but also such topics as politics in the Union and the Confederacy, the presidential leadership of Lincoln and Jefferson Davis, women in the Union and Confederate war efforts, and the struggle over emancipation. The latter part of the course considers post-war political, social, and economic developments, including nearly four million African Americans' transition from slavery to freedom, the conflict over how to reconstruct the former Confederate states, the establishment of bi-racial governments in those states, and the eventual overthrow of Reconstruction by conservative white "Redeemers." Lectures and discussions.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 355

The Bible in History

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 358

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

The “decline and fall” of Rome was a complicated and lengthy process. This course will examine the many aspects of that process, including the crisis of the Empire in the third century A. D., the recovery under Diocletian and Constantine, the evolution in the fourth century of a new, stable Empire, and the new crises of the fifth and sixth centuries that resulted in the emergences of the proto-medieval states in the West and the Byzantine Empire in the East. Social and economic developments will receive special emphasis throughout. The reading will consist of primary sources in translation and some interpretative material.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 359

Gender and Colonialism in Africa

Gender relations were a key arena of struggle among men and women in colonial Africa. This course considers the ways in which gender ideologies and practices – both European and African – shaped the colonial encounter and were reconfigured by it. It examines how European and African gender ideologies influenced the design and implementation of colonial policies and considers the differing ways in which African men and women responded to colonial change, including the rise of cash cropping, mining, and labor migration, the establishment of customary law, Christian missionizing, and European reform efforts. Case studies of moments of gender crisis will elucidate the experiences of ordinary men and women as well as elites and officials during the rapid changes brought on by colonialism.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 361

Interpreting the American Dream

A critical inquiry into the ways in which Americans of diverse characteristics have thought about the promise of America

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 362

The Samurai Warrior in History, Myth, and Reality

The samurai were as important for Japan’s historical and cultural transformation as they are misunderstood. This course aims at separating the myth from the reality of the samurai, by examining the history of Japanese warriors and the culture they created, from their lowly origins in antiquity through their rise to hegemony during the 13th through 18th centuries, to their eventual disappearance as a distinct class in the 19th century. We will also examine the evolving image of the samurai warrior and his supposedly rigid moral code of conduct, as it appears in literature and film, from some of the earliest appearances of such images right up to today. Our purpose in examining these images of the samurai is not only to distinguish myth from reality, but also to explore the political purposes such images have been put to in legitimating samurai rule prior to the 20th century, and in informing Japanese views of themselves and non-Japanese views of Japan in the years since.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 363

Living on the Margins of Modern Japan

This course explores the histories and identities of groups that, for a variety of reasons, have not been considered part of “mainstream” Japanese society. Among these are ethnic minorities, such as the Ainu, Okinawans, and resident Koreans, and social minorities, such as the descendants of former outcastes groups who are referred to collectively as the Burakumin. In addition to these groups, we will also explore the nature of groups viewed as outside of the mainstream by dint of the lifestyle they lead or the circumstances that have been forced upon them, such as the yakuza (gangsters), ultra-rightwing activists, residents of slums, and others. Through such an exploration, we will come to challenge the perception, all-too-common both inside and outside of Japan, that Japanese society is homogeneous. We will also look into how this illusion of homogeneity has been constructed, and what the consequences are for those who find themselves marginalized in the process.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 365

World War II

This course will investigate political, social, and cultural aspects of World War II in Europe and the Soviet Union. Topics will include the breakdown of the Versailles system, the interrelationship of military and social change, genocide, resistance movements, and the impact of war on European culture.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 366

History of the Book

This course is designed to give students an extensive introduction to issues in the history of the book, including: the origins of writing, the transition from roll to codex, medieval literacy and book technology, the impact of printing, the nature of reading in early modern Europe, and the future of the book in the digital age.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 369

Empires in Antiquity

This course will be an analytical and comparative study of the major imperial states of the classical world, specifically Persia(Achaemenid, Parthian and Sassanid), the Athenian Empire, various Hellenistic empires, the Roman Empire and Han China. The bulk of our investigation will center on the ancient Mediterranean but we will be discussing Han China as part of a greater Eurasian perspective, as well as to provide a valuable comparative framework. We will consider issues such as administrative techniques, the role of the military, religion, imagery and iconography, imperial rhetoric, relations with subject peoples, and architecture and urban design. Sources will include literary, epigraphic, artistic and archaeological evidence as well as both modern studies of specific ancient empires and theoretical treatment of empires generally.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 370

Mobs, Masses, and Democracy in America

“There are in fact no masses,” writes the cultural critic Raymond Williams. “There are only ways of seeing people as masses.” This intellectual and social history course will examine ways of “seeing people as masses” in the United States since the American Revolution. By studying changing interpretations of mobs, masses, and social movements, we will inquire into changing ideas about American democracy, the character of “the people,” and ways of communicating with them. Particular topics will include the role of “the crowd” in the era of the Revolution; images of riots, strikes, lynch mobs, theater audiences, and other kinds of collective behavior in the 19th century; criticism of the mass society, mass culture, and the mass media (movies, radio, TV, advertising) in the 20 century; and ideas about the causes and effects of social movements. Course materials will include novels and films in addition to more traditional types of primary documents. This is a core course for the Studies in Progressive American Social Movements minor.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 372

Post War Europe: From Genocide to the Struggle for Human Rights

This course explores European culture and politics from 1945 through the present, surveying sources in fiction, memoir, film and the arts. Themes include the problems of reconstruction and memory, Marxism and communism and the social-democracy, civil liberty, sexuality and immigration. The Cold War, the New Left, the invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia, the collapse of the Berlin Wall and of the Soviet Union, the welfare state, “Americanization,” racism, ethnocentrism and nationalism, all offer instances of cultural and political conflict. This course includes lectures, discussion and a film program.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 374

Alexander the Great

This course covers the life and times of Alexander the Great, a man who was able to subjugate most of the known world, but failed to erect a lasting political structure. When he died at the age of 33 years, he left a vast empire to be torn to pieces by his successors. However, his achievements were more than military, and his colonists built cities in places as far from Greece as modern Afghanistan, creating a new world in which Greek culture flourished.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 377

After Empire

This course is open to students returning to Trinity from study abroad in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Cape Town, Trinidad and Australia, or from study in other regions formerly-governed by and influenced by British imperialism. Students planning future study in these locations are also welcome. This course addresses the modern history of British colonialism, immigration to and from the UK, liberation, racism, imperial decline, and the impact of wider global cultures upon contemporary urban life. How have the political cultures, demographics and economics of empire and its downfall, transformed the present-day UK? How has the legacy of British rule helped to shape dissent, political struggle and cultural patterns in territories and amongst peoples of the former empire? Students will reconsider and reflect upon their mutual and conflicting encounters with the imperial legacy. They will interact with members of the Asian, Middle Eastern, African, West Indian and Irish communities in Hartford and its region. Readings, film, and an engagement with the arts, assist in this examination of student experiences. How does study abroad alter our critical understandings of Britain’s continuing sense of global entitlement, seen through the lens of the aspirations and perceptions of her former subjects and their descendants?

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 378

Puerto Rico

This course will examine, from an interdisciplinary perspective, the historical formation of a colonial society and a people we now call "Puerto Ricans" by focusing both on the island and on the immigrant communities in the U.S. We will study the island's history from the ancient, pre-Hispanic era, through some four centuries of Spanish rule (1508-1898), as well as in the one hundred years of American colonial rule in the twentieth century. How were "Puerto Rico/Puerto Ricans" constituted as colonial subjects under these two vastly different imperial regimes? From slave plantations to hinterland peasant communities; from small towns to modern, industrial cities in the island; from colonial citizens in the island to immigrant, "minority" outsiders in inner-city neighborhoods in the U.S., the historical experiences of Puerto Ricans have forced upon them multiple understandings of who they must be but also allowed them to work out their own, often conflicting, definitions of "Puerto Rican".

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 378

Puerto Rico & Puerto Ricans: Colony, Nation & Diaspora

This course will examine, from an interdisciplinary perspective, the historical formation of a colonial society and a people we now call “Puerto Ricans” by focusing both on the island and on the immigrant communities in the U.S. We will study the island’s history from the ancient, pre-Hispanic era, through some four centuries of Spanish rule (1508-1898), as well as in the almost one hundred years of American colonial rule in the twentieth century. How were “Puerto Rico/Puerto Ricans” constituted as colonial subjects under these two vastly different imperial regimes? From slave plantations to hinterland peasant communities; from small towns to modern, industrial cities in the island; from colonial citizens in the island to immigrant, “minority” outsiders in inner-city neighborhoods in the U.S., the historical experiences of Puerto Ricans have forced upon them multiple understandings of who they must be but also allowed them to work out their own, often conflicting, definitions of “Puerto Rican.”

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 379

The Cuban Revolution: Historical Origins

Few events in Latin American and Caribbean history have captured the imagination of supporters and prompted a more visceral reaction by opponents, both inside and outside the region, than the Cuban Revolution of 1959. To understand Cuba’s revolutionary experience, with its combined nationalist and socialist claims and visions, requires more than short-sighted, simplistic explanations. This course will examine Cuban history since the late eighteenth century in an effort to comprehend the context in which the revolution emerged and the constraints within which the island’s revolutionary regime has operated since the 1950s. The formation of Cuba’s white Creole elite; its intensive experience with African slavery and the island’s two wars of independence against Spain in the 19th century; its conversion into an American semi-colonial territory after 1898 and the failed revolution of 1993 will be among the topics discussed, along with a detailed examination of the revolutionary period since 1959.
This course is only open to juniors, seniors and graduate students.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 381

E Pluribus:Uniting US

"E Pluribus Unum" ("Out of Many, One") reads the familiar motto on U.S. coins. The "pluribus" of American society and culture, divided by class, race, gender, religion, region, is a familiar condition. The "unum" has been variously a myth, an ideal, and a problem. This course will scrutinize wars, social movements, the expansion of government, suburbanization, the proliferation of mass culture, immigration, and other phenomena, to learn how they have affected the competing pulls of plurality and unity in recent U.S. history. Most of the "readings" (which will include artifacts other than bos) and most assignments will be in primary materials. Since this course will presume survey-level conversancy with the basics of recent American political and economic history, there is a prerequisite: History 202 or its equivalent.
C- in History 202 or equivalent.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 382

Vietnam in the American Imagination

What is the national "Vietnam Syndrome", and was it really "kicked" after the first Iraq War, as proclaimed by the first President Bush? Why did the war generate unprecedented attention to "PTSD" and soldiers' post-war adjustment problems? Why was "Rambo II" the most popular "Vietnam" movie of all time, at home and abroad? Why has Vietnam service - or service avoidance - figured so regularly in national political campaigns for more than a decade? What have veterans themselves made of their wartime experiences? This half-credit course will address these and related questions by using a wide variety of materials - including Hollywood films, novels, memoirs, poetry, song, theater, paintings, photography, public monuments, guest speakers, children's literature, as well as standard historical texts - to compare the "official" scholarly history (or histories) of the war, with the way the war has been represented and remembered in popular culture and public discourse. The course will meet once a week in the evening on a seminar basis, and is designed to complement "Warring States: The United States and Vietnam" (HIST 345), which describes the war as "a set of events" that, more than any other in the post-WWII period, tore "the fabric of American political life and values." Enrollment limited, with preference to those taking "Warring States".

0.50 units, Lecture

HIST 384

Jews and Christians in Medieval Europe

This course will examine the history of Jewish-Christian relations in medieval Europe. It will study theories of anti-Judaism, shifts in Christian attitudes following the 1096 Crusade massacres, the role of the Church, Christian stereotypes of Jews, conversion from Judaism to Christianity, protection and persecution by royal governments, local violence, expulsions, the Inquisition as well as the specific experiences of Jews in England, France, and Spain. The course will also draw on comparative material from Christian interaction with Muslims and heretics, as well as material on the Jewish experience with medieval Islam. The course will be taught from primary source materials with supplementary readings from secondary scholarship.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 385

Women & Work in America

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 386

Brit&Amer: Race/Imm/Emp

Slavery, colonization, revolution and economic alliances in the Atlantic world have involved the British Isles with North America from the 17th century. We explore anti-slavery and anti-apartheid in both countries, from the Amistad episode of the 19th century to South Africa in the 20th. For four centuries, English, Scots, Welsh and Irish immigrants swelled the North American cities and farmlands while immigrants from across the empire came in increasing numbers to Britain. Two 20th century wars united the two nations, while class and racial differences resulted in their participation in shared domestic and global conflicts. Demands for national independence, sexual liberation and racial justice rocked both societies in the postwar era. These themes are explored through historical documents, literature, film and drama. This is a thematic survey designed for students from several disciplinary backgrounds.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 386

Beyond Samba, Futebol, and Favelas: The Making of Afro-Brazilian Subjectivities

Ranked fifth in the world in total population, Brazil has the largest number of people of African descent to be found outside of continental Africa. In the late 16th century, Brazil was instrumental in the construction of an agricultural plantation system based on African slavery. Over the next 300 years, Brazil imported more Africans as slaves than any other region in the Western hemisphere. It was also the last country in the Americas to abolish slavery, in 1888. The purpose of this course is to introduce students to the history of Brazil, examining changes and continuities in Brazilian history from the colonial period to the present day by focusing on the experiences of Afro-Brazilians. We will examine how colonial heritages affected Brazil's emergence as a modern nation-state, placing particular emphasis on the evolution and transformation of various power relationships during the 19th and 20th centuries. Moreover, we will also explore forms of Afro-Brazilian culture, power, and resistance. The course will stress methods of historical research by working with a variety of primary sources, including travel narratives, films, paintings and photographs, newspapers, census figures, diaries, etc. Portuguese is not required to enroll in the course.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 387

Everybody's Protest Novel

Americans don’t just have social protests and reform movements, they write fiction to convince others of the rightness of their cause. This course, based on reading, lecture, and discussion, considers the context and the impact of several protest novels and plays in American history, examining the issues they protested, the means of persuasion they used, and their success (or failure). The social movements and protest fiction we will discuss will change from year to year, but will include classics such as Uncle Tom's Cabin(slavery); The Jungle(industrial working conditions); Native Son or To Kill a Mockingbird(racism); or The Crucible(McCarthyism).

1.00 units, Lecture

WMST 389

Women & Work in America

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 391

Media and Methods: Engaging African History through Literature and Cinema

This course is organized around texts produced by African writers and filmmakers commenting on African histories. Students will discuss novels and films in tandem with historical scholarship on cultural, political, social, and economic histories of 20th-century Africa. The course will give students an opportunity to think about issues of representation, authorship, and the strengths and limitations of various mediums of historical narration.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 392

European Encounters with the East

When Columbus set sail to find a route to the East by traveling west in 1492 he took along a copy of Marco Polo’s famous journal and kept an eye out for traces of the Terrestrial Paradise as well as for evidence of the monstrous, quasi-human races that every geographer knew were to be found in exotic eastern lands. Legend, religious beliefs, and cultural attitudes have colored encounters, both real and imagined, between Westerners and the peoples and cultures of the East for centuries. This course will examine a selection of those encounters from the ancient to the modern eras. Topics will include accounts of the East by Greek and Roman geographers, medieval travelers and traders such as Marco Polo, participants in the Crusades, and agents of European imperialism.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 394

The Making of Modern Cambodia: From Angkor to Pol Pot

During the era of French rule in Cambodia (1883 to 1953), French scholars and colonial administrators strove to re-discover the Angkorean past. Simultaneously, they buttressed elements of traditional administration and the royal system to perfect a scheme of colonial domination. This course examines France’s selective use of Khmer history and the political legacy bequeathed to Norodom Sihanouk and his successors.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 394

Tibet & China: The Consequences of Unsought Unification

This course will examine the parallel histories of Tibet and China up to 1950 and their convergence soon after the founding of the People's Republic of China. Tibet's relationship with China was never simple dependency nor were ethnically Tibetan lands organized according to the template for local government devised by Chinese dynastic states. Tibetan political and religious elites, traders, farmers, and nomads formed a pattern of life on the high plateau in virtual isolation from the political currents of Chinese life. Today, however, Tibet's unique folkways, religion, and culture are increasingly at risk as the Tibetan Autonomous Region is influenced by Chinese settlement, forms of political organization, new patterns of education, and ambitious economic blueprints. The course will be launched by two weeks of intensive study on Trinity's ampus in Hartford (June 20--June 30). During these two weeks, participants will meet daily to discuss a group of core readings. In addition, films and other relevant materials that cast light on Tibet's historical engagement will be introduced. On July 1, the class will leave Hartford for three weeks (our return to Hartford will be on July 25) in the PRC and Tibet. During this phase of the course we will visit Beijing, Chengdu and its environs, Lhasa, Shigatse, Gyantse, and Reting. One trek and informally organized hikes will be integrated into the travel schedule. A detailed itinerary will be geneated by mid-March. This course can be taken together with Professor Laura Harrington's course, Buddhism in Tibet: Yesterday & Today for a second summer school credit.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 396

River Cities of China: The History of Urban Culture along the Yangtze

Throughout Chinese history, the Yangtze River and the cities in its basin have played a formidable role. The river was a channel of trade and political influence: Cities that formed on its banks were marketing centers, hubs of cultural activity, and administrative centers. The importance of the Yangtze was reinforced in the 20th century, and since the reforms mounted in China from the 1980’s the river and its cities have taken a place at the core of China’s economic miracle. This course will examine the historical emergence of the cities we visit during the summer and their transformation from the era of the Opium War to the present.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 399

Independent Study

Submission of the special registration form, available in the Registrar’s Office, and the approval of the instructor and chairman are required for enrollment.

1.00 units min / 2.00 units max, Independent Study

HIST 401

Korea and Japan in Historical Perspective

This course provides students with an overview of the history of relations between Korea and Japan, and the cultural, social, political, and economic impact these close but often contentious “Asian neighbors” have had upon each other from ancient to modern times. Through extensive readings and class discussions, students will also gain a detailed understanding of the historiography of Korean-Japanese relations and the debates that still inform the ways the Japanese and Koreans—both North and South—view one another today. The course requires the production of a significant research paper on a topic to be decided upon in consultation with the instructor. No prior coursework in Korean or Japanese history is required, but students with no background in the histories of these countries will be asked to do additional reading to obtain a better understand of the historical contexts encountered in the regular readings.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 402

Transnationallism: The New Global Histories

We explore the new trend in global, "transnational" historical approaches through the close examination of several recent history books whose authors adopted its methods. The texts cover several time periods and several world regions. We will pursue the works' archives, authors and arguments to acquire a deeper knowledge of contemporary shifts in thinking in the profession and the ways that short and long studies--including those that students can produce--take advantage of a global approach. We will also look for the limitations inherent in such inclusive scholarly ambition. Readings include: L. Colley, S. Pennybacker, M. Rediker, S. Amrith and A. Mukherji and I. Hofmeyr. The seminar will meet intermittently in conjunction with the term's speakers' series in African Studies and the Indian Ocean, though it fully engages Euro-American material. Some of the works' authors will appear on campus.
This course is open to junior History majors only.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 407

Subcultures Amer History

This seminar explores the relationship in America between selected subcultures (groups with at least a partially distinct and autonomous culture) and "mainstream" society using the perspective of gender. In particular, the course focuses on the different ways men and women of these groups view American values and interact with American society. Subcultures include: Puritans, Native Americans, blacks, immigrants and the working class, with an emphasis on the 19th and the early 20th centuries.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 412

History of Hartford

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 424

Race & Ethnic 20th C Am

This course examines how Americans have defined race and ethnicity over time as well as the historical experiences of non-whites and immigrant groups in the 20th century. In what ways are ethnic and black experiences similar? In what ways are they different? Undergraduates who wish to enroll in this course must obtain permission of their adviser and the instructor.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 431

America Goes to Sea

This lecture course studies the rise of maritime America from colonial times to the present. From the first voyages of exploration and discovery, the course traces the evolution of great American maritime industries such as shipbuilding, overseas commerce, whaling and the fisheries, and steam navigation. The course considers the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, the new navy, and American involvement in World Wars I and II. It closes with discussion of current problems facing our maritime communities. Course includes field trips to historic Boston and Newport, and a 2-day sea voyage aboard the New Bedford-built schooner Ernestina. Two hour tests and a final examination constitute the basis for evaluation.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 441

Maritime History Seminar

This course will investigate an array of important considerations in maritime history, employing a variety of contrasting approaches to the field. We will examine many different sources during our investigation including primary documents and classic works of literature. Discussion and workshops will consider seaborne empires, naval warfare, maritime technology, sea voyaging, race, gender, and community.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 448

Connecticut Historical Society Internship

The Connecticut Historical Society offers graduate internships to matriculate American Studies students in five key areas: Museum Collections, Library, Public Programs, Exhibitions, and Technology. Interested students should contact the Office of Graduate Studies for more information.

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 451

Democracy, Coups, and Human Rights in Latin American History, 1960s -2009

This seminar explores the modern history of the overthrow of democratically elected regimes in Latin America by military and civilian organized violence. We will explore key cases, from the Dominican Republic and Brazil in 1963 and 1964, through Chile in 1973 and Argentina in 1974, El Salvador in 1979, Venezuela in 2002, and Honduras in 2009. What explains these violent changes of government? What have been the implications for these societies? For human rights? For US- Latin American relations?
Course is open to Senior History Majors only.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 451

Occupied by Nazis: France under the Germans during WWII

During the Second World War, France experienced the so-called "dark years" when it was divided and occupied by Nazi Germany. This course assesses the political, social, economic, and cultural order imposed by the Nazis. What kind of occupation regime did the Nazis construct? It then grapples with the choices individuals made at this crossroads in French history. Was France a nation of collaborators or a nation of resisters? What did it mean to collaborate and what did it mean to resist? Looking at a wide range of issues from rationing to mass deportations, we will address how historians, writers, and filmmakers have tried to make sense of this troubled period.
Course is open to Senior History Majors only.

1.00 units, Seminar

WMST 457

Subcultures Amer History

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 460

Tutorial

Submission of the special registration form, available in the Registrar’s Office, and the approval of the instructor and chairman are required for enrollment.

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 466

Teaching Assistantship

Submission of the special registration form, available in the Registrar’s Office, and the approval of the instructor and chairman are required for enrollment.

0.50 units min / 1.00 units max, Independent Study

HIST 490

Research Assistantship

Submission of the special registration form, available in the Registrar’s Office, and the approval of the instructor and chairman are required for enrollment.

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 498

Senior Thesis/Research Seminar

A two-semester senior thesis including the required research seminar in the fall term. Permission of the instructor is required for Part I.

2.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 499

Senior Thesis/Continuation

Submission of the special registration form, available in the Registrar’s Office, and the approval of the instructor and chairman are required for each semester of this year-long thesis.

2.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 800

Historiography

This course explores various genres of historical writing and debate. It focuses upon works of European and American historians from the modern period. Students learn to distinguish among schools and methods, and study the ways in which historians use source materials and archives. This is an unusually intensive reading course with several writing and library assignments.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 801

America in the 1960s

This course will examine the major social and political developments that shaped the decade. Topics will include: the liberal impulse and policies of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations; the Great Society; urban decline and rebellion; the Civil Rights Movement; the student movement; the Vietnam War; the counter-culture; and the rise of a conservative movement in American politics and life.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 802

The North Atlantic World

This seminar presents a comprehensive view of the North Atlantic region in the period from about 1600 to the outbreak of the American Revolution. This course will explore three broad themes: identity, social structures, and conflict. Students will first meet the peoples of the larger North Atlantic society, giving special attention to the interaction of indigenous peoples; Spanish, Dutch, French, and English colonizers; and enslaved Africans. Readings and discussion will examine the transnational character of trade, culture, religion, migration, communication, law, and governance - in spite of national policies that discouraged such interaction. But, most strikingly, the North Atlantic region was a competitive and, even, dangerous environment. Wars of conquest, piracy and buccaneering, repression and exploitation, and internecine colonial warfare were dominant features of its history in the early modern period.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 804

Topics in European Educational Ideas and Practices since the Renaissance

This course will survey the various educational philosophies and pedagogical theories, as well as, the institutions of education themselves, in Europe as they developed from the 18th century to the present.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 807

The First Global Culture: Greater Britain From Jamestown to New Delhi

"We shape our buildings, and afterwards they shape us," Winston Churchill declared in 1943. The relationship between architecture and society has always been crucial to a full understanding of any civilization. The built environment is the most obvious and permanent form of a nation's cultural history. Members of this course will examine the human and natural forces that have molded buildings and will reflect on architecture as an expression of contemporary political and social ideas. From the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries, Britain grew to be the dominant global power, revolutionizing the face of the world and exporting its culture to every continent. This course will cover the British Caribbean, Bahamas, Bermuda, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, India, and the North American colonies from Canada to Georgia. There will be one field trip to Historic Deerfield, Massachusetts on a Saturday.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 811

Urban America in the Age of Revolution

Urban life in the United States has roots in the colonial past. This seminar will study the role of the colonial city in the story of the Amrican Revolution. With an emphasis on Boston, Newport, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston; the course will begin with a profile of the colonial America city and its place in the Atlantic world. Students will then look at the impact of two mid-18th-century colonial wars on urban life and search for traces of tensions assoicated with the growth of cities in the Anglo-American political crisis of the 1760s and 1770s. The seminar will examine the part played by each of these urban centers in the War for Independence and conclude with an assessment of their postwar prospects in the new American nation.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 813

Opening Am Socty 1815-48

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 813

Colonial New York City

This course will trace the history of New York City from its Dutch beginnings in 1623 through the English takeover in 1664 to the British evacuation at the end of the American War for Independence. More than anywhere else in Dutch and British North America, colonial New York was the embodiment of economic forces that shaped the Atlantic world in the early modern period. The city’s turbulent history is rich in larger-than-life characters and dramatic shifts in fortune. Following lines of inquiry revealing New York’s economic, social, political, cultural, and racial past, students will discover much about the character of the present-day metropolis in the 160-year history of the tiny colonial city perched at the tip of Manhattan.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 814

Europe Renaissance to Reform, 1450-1650

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 817

Am Cit 20C:Strtcar-Edge

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 817

World War I

This course will examine: 1) the origins/causes of World War I; 2) the war’s major battles/military operations, and 3) the social, political, economic, psychological and artistic/cultural effects of the war--both during and after the conflict. Focus issues include the Fischer controversy regarding Germany’s war guilt, the effects of new military technologies, and the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of the war. Assigned readings include first-hand accounts of soldiers in the field. Note: Enrollment is limited to 15 students.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 818

Work & Wrkng Class in US

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 818

Modern Italy, 1848-1948

An examination of 19th and 20th century Italy with particular emphasis on the problems unique to Italian history and society. Topics include the Risorgimento and Unification, Liberal Italy, Church-State relations, World War I, regional divisions, Fascism, World War II and the postwar Republic.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 819

Italian and European Fascism

This seminar will focus on the rise and fall of the Italian Fascist movement and regime from 1914-1945. It will place Italian Fascism within the context of both modern Italian and European history. Specific topics include World War I and the rise of fascism, fascism as a response to Bolshevism, fascism as a form of "Totalitarianism," the development of anti-fascism, women and the fascist regime, World War II, the Holocaust, and the Armed Resistance. We will also compare Italian Fascism to German Nazism and the influence of both on similar movements in Europe. Due attention will be given to the historiography and current interpretations of fascism. (Listed both as Modern Languages 333-25 and Italian 333-06.)

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 820

Europe and the Napoleonic Wars, 1799-1815

A course will focus on the historical problem of the impact of the French Revolution abroad and the reasons for the Napoleonic wars.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 821

Ireland in the 20th Century

This seminar will trace Ireland’s transformation from a quasi-colonial fixture within the United Kingdom to an autonomous and fully independent member of the European community. Beginning with the Easter Rising of 1916, students will examine the principal stages of this journey toward nationhood: the Anglo-Irish War, the Irish Civil War, the establishment of a working democracy, the struggle for economic independence, Ireland’s neutrality during World War II, the declaration the Irish Republic, entrance into the European Community, and Ireland’s emergence at the end of the century as a modern European society. Woven throughout this story is the unresolved problem of Northern Ireland. Students will see Ireland as a case study of the process of decolonization and nation building.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 822

History of Hartford

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 825

World War II

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 826

Natnlzing Amer 1932-1960

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 828

The Gilded Age:1865-1900

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 828

The Gilded Age: 1865-1900

The transformation of the United States into an urban industrial nation, with special attention to the social and cultural effects of industrialization. The course will begin by examining Reconstruction, but will concentrate on the years after 1877. Extensive readings in original source materials, including several novels, as well as in analytic histories.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 829

Suburbia: From Hartford to Orange County

This seminar addresses American suburban history in comparative perspective. We will examine the origins and evolution of the suburban ideal, from earlier European precedents, to the "garden city" and "street car" trolley and train suburbs of the 19th century, to the automobile suburbs, and to the "post-suburban" communities that have emerged since the late 20th century. Geographical coverage will extend from Hartford to Orange County, California. Topics will include the bearing of differing racial, class, gender, and sexual-orientation identities on Americans' experience with suburban living as well as the politics of space and race.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 831

Cross Cultural Encounters in Early America

Beginning with first encounters and ending with the American Revolution, this course examines cross-cultural encounters between Native and British people in early America. While focused on North America, more specifically on the eastern coast and backcountry, we will draw on recent and classic scholarly works in different disciplines and use a comparative approach to better understand the experiences at hand. We will consider key sites of cross cultural interaction, contestation, and negotiation - war, trade, land, slavery, labor, captivity, adoption, travel, disease, spirituality, sex, marriage, and family. The course will emphasize both the creative and destructive aspects of cross cultural encounters, and will work to balance British with Native perspectives while recognizing the diversity of these communities. Whenever possible African experiences will also be included.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 833

The Crusades

This seminar will explore the Crusades of medieval and early modern Europe through extensive reading of primary sources: chronicles, letters, and treatises. We will examine the origins of the Crusades; the religious culture of sanctified violence; military technology, strategy and battles; relations among Christians, Muslims, heretics, and Jews; the nature of the Crusader states in the Middle East; and the role crusading played in the Reformation and the age of exploration. We will also consider modern uses of Crusade history, rhetoric and images.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 834

Early America

This seminar examines the people, cultures, and societies of early America from first settlement to the eve of the American Revolution. We will focus on New England while simultaneously exploring the full scope of European exploration and colonization (particularly Spanish, French, Dutch, and English enterprises). We will pay close attention to Native American responses, the development of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade, gender roles and family, challenges to colonial rule, and regional diversity in political, social, and economic structures. A major emphasis of the class will be on understanding colonists as real people through readings, discussions, and optional trips to living museums. The course will also explain the intellectual, social, and political changes that transformed colonists from diverse and independent colonies into Americans with a shared revolutionary and nationalistic sensibility.

1.00 units, Seminar

PBPL 834

Am Cit 20C:Strtcar-Edge

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 836

Piracy and the Rise of International Law

The pirates and buccaneers of the early modern period helped to shape the political, economic, and social structure of the Atlantic World. They also played a role in the formation of international law. On the oceans of the world, the emergence of Spain as a political and economic superpower in the early-16th century bred waves of French, English, and Dutch interlopers, contraband slave traders, seaborne raiders, freebooters, and privateers eager to thwart her attempt at hegemony and expropriate her wealth. Their success gave rise to a multinational and cross-cultural underworld of violence and crime on the high seas that flourished nearly unchecked from the early-17th century until the opening decades of the 18th century. This course will examine how the suppression of piracy required cooperation among maritime states, the extension of the rule of law to the high seas, and an effective enforcement mechanism.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 837

Subcultures Amer History

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 838

Race & Ethnic 20th C Am

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 839

Race and Ethnicity in 20th-Century America

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 840

Pacific War 1931-1952

Many Japanese historians argue that the Second World War began on September 18, 1931 when Imperial Army units occupied southern Manchuria. This course examines the consequences of Japan's occupation of China's northeastern provinces and Tokyo's rejection of membership in the League of Nations following its condemnation of the Japanese invasion and call for a return to the status quo ante bellum. The subsequent birth of Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo shattered the political and territorial status quo in interwar East Asia and placed Japan on a collison course with the United States and Great Britain. Subsequently, Japanese expansionism in north and south China and the formation of an increasingly close relationship with Italy and Germany accelerated the deterioration of peace in East Asia and paved the way for widened warfare and the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Topics to be examined will include the Japan's response to Chinese nationalism, Japanese perceptions of Versaille order as it impinged upon East Asia, Japan's theory and practice of "total war," the effect of the Pacific War on European colonial empires in east and south Asia, and the consequences for Japan of losing the Pacific War

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 841

Maritime History Seminar

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 843

Performance and Race in Latin American & Caribbean History

Race has historically been a fundamental category in the historical analysis of the past in the Americas. The Americas since 1492 has been a cauldron of racial mixing of Europeans, Africans and Indigenous peoples. The process, through colonialism and after Independence has been studied from different angles, from the relevance of race for social mobility to its role in communal solidarity and rebellions, and its relevance to national identities, official and subaltern. This is course will look at the relationship between race and diffierent kinds of individual and collective behaviors in the history of the Americas involving the performance of music, rituals, festivals, theatre, dance, and sports. The general questions addressed are: what conceptions of race are deployed in performances at given historical periods? How does the context matter if is the colonial period or after Independence? What are the answers if the regions contextualized are different? Mexico? Trinidad? Uruguay? How does gender affect answers to these questions?

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 847

Dead Presidents:Gender, Race, and Ideolgy in the Early Republic from Jefferson to Taylor

This course examines the development of the early American republic from Thomas Jefferson to Zachary Taylor. We will look at the role of American Presidents had in shaping national understanding of slavery, Indians, the political role fo women and other important issues. By using a combination of primary sources form legislation to private letters as well as aptly chosen secondary readings, this course explores the first decades in the history of a nation - a vibrant time of liberty, genocide, and, occasionally, justice

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 850

Women in American Histry

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 851

The Empire of Liberty from Jefferson to Polk, 1801-1848

An exploration of American territorial expansion from the acquisition of Louisiana to the age of “Manifest Destiny” and the war with Mexico.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 854

Amer in Age Washington

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 857

Aviation History: America's Dream of Flight

American aviation occupies much the same cultural niche – and place in our imaginations – occupied for centuries by seagoing vessels and seafaring. Aviation’s story is in many ways the story of America in the 20th century, Americans being the first to succeed at powered flight, and emerging after WWII as the preeminent sky power of the world. Utilizing a varied range of sources and an interdisciplinary approach, the course will examine some of the social, cultural, technological, military, and commercial aspects of America’s “love affair” with flying. A field trip to the New England Air Museum (near Bradley Airport) will be included, and an original research paper will be required.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 862

The American Civil War through Literature

This graduate-level seminar investigates the causes and consequences of the Civil War using a variety of nineteenth-century writings from memoirs and letters to novels and poems. We will explore different and often competing ideas about slavery and freedom, state and nation, individual rights, and family which, in many cases, were transformed by the conflict and which, in turn, forever changed American life. Understanding these issues will provide a means for serious interrogation of the way in which modern historians frame the Civil War and suggest new ways to think about the military, social, and cultural milieu of the late nineteenth century. Authors studied will include: Mary Chesnut, Frederick Douglass, Ulysses Grant, Henry Timrod, Walt Whitman, and others.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 865

Science in Early Modern Europe

This seminar considers what has traditionally been called the “Scientific Revolution”. Students will explore a number of topics related to the expanding horizons of scientific inquiry in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Major themes will include: science and religion, science and the arts, science and travel, patronage, and also the tensions between observation and authority. We will also consider the coexistence of other practices – such as magic and astrology – that were only subsequently written out of the picture. Assignments will be focused on reading primary sources, including the works of Galileo, reading interesting new scholarship, and completing a research paper on a topic of choice.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 866

Prosperous Years 1900-29

Topics in the culture and political economy of the years 1900-1929, including progressive movements, labor organization struggles, the rise and fall of the Left, the suffrage campaign and its aftermath, immigration and Americanization, the World War home front, migrations and communities of African-Americans, and the impact of the mass media.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 866

U.S. in Prosperous Years 1900-1929

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 868

Problems in Modern Chinese History

This seminar course explores some of the key problems, or questions, about the formation and development of Modern China, from the founding of the Qing Dynasty through the middle of the twentieth century. For example, we will examine the nature of Manchu government and autocracy, the means of peasant mobilization in the nineteenth and twentieth century, and the influence of western thought on Chinese intellectuals. This course combines aspects of historiography with a focus on contentious areas of debate in the field of Modern Chinese history. The course is appropriate for advanced undergraduates with a background in Modern Chinese history (History 242 or equivalent) and graduate students, with or without a background.

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 871

Women & Islam:Hist Perspective

By restricting education and employment for females, the current Taliban leaders of Afghanistan have focussed world attention on issues of women's rights in the Islamic world. But Taliban policies are not representative of Islamic societies today, and have evolved in the distinctive historical context of modern Afghanistan. Taking this contemporary issue as a starting point, we will look at the diverse experiences of Muslim women across the centuries, focussing primarily on the Middle East. We will examine the ways in which Islamic laws and practices have sometimes liberated and sometimes restricted women in different times and places, beginning in the early Islamic period (c. 600-1000 AD). In the modern era (c. 1800-present), we will consider the changing roles of women and their rights and responsibilities, in familial, political, and economic affairs. We will also study Middle Eastern feminist movements. Two questions will recur: first, is there a unifying framework for gender relations in Islamic societies, past and present, or is there too much diversity to generalize? Second, how variable is feminism by culture, and are there distinctive Middle Eastern or Islamic feminisms?

1.00 units, Seminar

HIST 878

Independent Research in American Maritime Studies

Independent Research involves the preparation of a major research paper of your choice under the direction of the Institute's faculty, making use of resources in the Mystic Seaport Museum collection and the G. W. Blunt White Library collection of 65,000 books and 700,000 manuscript pieces, supplemented as needed by other collections. Participants must be qualified to do original research at the graduate level, using manuscripts and other primary sources.
Prerequisite: History 831, American Goes to Sea or equivalent, and prior agreement with director on research topic.

1.00 units, Independent Study

AMST 891

America Goes to Sea

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 892

The Maritime Way of Life

Using classic works of literature, this seminar studies in-depth several important aspects of the maritime way of life, including seaport communities, the social world of the sailing ship, the complex structure of authority at sea; the voyage as a test of character and personal growth, and the impact of steam technology on the age of sail. The course requires class discussion, extensive readings, films, and three essays.

1.00 units, Lecture

HIST 892

The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Union

This course will study the rise and fall of the Soviet Union. We will begin with an examination of Lenin and the origins of Bolshevism and consider the reasons for the Russian Revolution. The seminar will then analyze Stalinism as a political and social phenomenon . The last part of the seminar will study the attempts of Stalin's heirs to deal with his legacy and will try to explain the connections between de-Stalinization and the final collapse of the Soviet Union. All students will be asked to do an oral book report, participate in class and write a 20 page final paper as well as a few 2-3 page reaction papers. Readings will include secondary and primary sources, as well as Soviet literature. There will also be a selection of relevant Soviet films.

1.00 units, Seminar

AMST 893

Ind Res Maritime Studies

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 893

Jews & Judaism in the European Imagination

No Course Description Available.

1.00 units, Lecture

AMST 894

Museums and Communities Internship

Matriculated American Studies students have the opportunity to engage in an academic internship at an area museum or archive for credit toward the American Studies degree. For detailed information, contact the Graduate Studies Office.

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 898

Connecticut Historical Society Internship

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 953

Research Project

The graduate director, the supervisor of the project, and the department chair must approve special research project topics. Conference hours are available by appointment. Contact the Office of Graduate Studies for the special approval form. One course credit.

1.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 954

Thesis Part I

Thesis Part I is an investigation and report on an original research topic. Conference hours are available by appointment. Registration for the thesis will not be considered final without the thesis approval form and the signatures of the thesis adviser, graduate adviser, and department chair. Please refer to the Graduate Studies Catalog for thesis requirements. Contact the Office of Graduate Studies for the special approval form and the thesis writer's packet. Two course credits. (The two course credits are considered pending in Part I of the thesis; they will be awarded with the completion of Part II.)

2.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 955

Thesis Part II

Continuation of History 954. Two course credits.

2.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 956

Thesis

No Course Description Available.

2.00 units, Independent Study

HIST 999

Connecticut Historical Society Internship

The Connecticut Historical Society offers graduate internships to matriculated History students in five key areas: Museum Collections, Library, Public Programs, Exhibitions, and Technology. Interested students should contact the Office of Graduate Studies for more information.

1.00 units, Independent Study