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History Courses
hist 101 Introduction to Historical Thinking and Analysis +
Description:
This course is designed to introduce students to the discipline of history, to the way in which primary sources are used to assemble historical narratives and explanations. The course introduces the student to the basic skills of historical thought and analysis, how to read and understand sources, to weigh evidence, evaluate it and place it in a larger context, and to explain why and how past events happened. Each section of the class will be focused upon a particular person, event or theme that will allow students to examine primary and secondary sources and to use the former to evaluate the latter as a means to developing the skills appropriate to a beginning student of history. More Info
Offered in:hist 115L Survey of South Asia +
Description:
This course introduces students to aspects of history, society and culture in early modern and modern South Asia to demonstrate its diversity and richness, and the variety of human experience in this region. This course is designed as a gateway for the Asian Studies major and satisfies Asian History breadth requirements for the History major. More Info
Offered in:hist 125L Jerusalem: Sacred Space, Contested Space +
Description:
This course traces the history of Jerusalem from the Bronze Age to the present. Using a sampling of relevant primary sources (e.g., literary, archaeological, iconographical), students will study the political, physical, and conceptual development of this urban space through its multiple destructions and reconstructions, considering especially the emergence of Jerusalem as a sacred space for Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Students will also give some attention o the political tensions in modern Jerusalem, using the study of the past to inform reflection on the present. More Info
Offered in:hist 150 Food and Empire +
Description:
This course surveys the history of food and empire since 1500. Food literally connects our bodies to global history: what we eat now - and why we eat it - result from centuries of unequal economic, political, and cultural interactions. Food also symbolizes the power relations that have shaped human identities, diets, and health over the last 500 years. Using scholarly writings, fiction, film, and field trips in the Boston area, we will explore how histories of empire and globalization have shaped contemporary foodways and the global politics of food provisioning today. More Info
Offered in:hist 152 Crime, Corruption, and Scandal in Historical Perspective +
Description:
This introductory history class examines an array of events that were widely known in their own eras. Focusing on sensational crimes, instances of deep corruption, and other types of scandals in the past provides insight into our past. The course will pay careful attention to shocking events and people whose outrageous behavior astounded their society. The course will then place these events and people within the wider frameworks in which they occurred, using one to illuminate the other. It is the historical context, after all, that makes the behavior scandalous! From semester to semester specific topics will vary, please contact the History for more information. More Info
Offered in:hist 160L East Asian Civilizations to 1850 +
hist 161L East Asian Civilizations since 1850 +
hist 171 Leeches to Lasers: Medicine and Health in the United States +
Description:
''Leeches to Lasers: Medicine and Health in the United States'' examines the rise of institutional and professional structures in response to health needs and disease, as well as cultural responses to epidemics, illness, and changing norms of well-being in American history. This course is designed for science majors and those who intend to enter the health professions as well as for history majors. More Info
Offered in:hist 173 Baseball and American History +
Description:
This course will focus on the history of baseball from its murky origins in the late 18th and early 19th centuries down through the era of expansion, free agency, and steroids in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The course will discuss the changes in baseball over time; the evolution of the game's rules; famous players, teams, and games; and the impact of baseball on American culture. Throughout the semester, the course will put that discussion of baseball into the larger context of American history. By studying the history of baseball, students will also learn about broader economic, social, and cultural themes in U.S. history, such as the struggles between labor and capital; the effects of urbanization and industrialization; notions of gender and masculinity; the impact of leisure and entertainment; demographic changes such as immigration and geographic shifts in population; the legacy of racial segregation; and the impact of globalization on society. More Info
Offered in:hist 175 Comic Books in America: The History of Comic Books and American Society since 1938 +
Description:
In 1938 a man in a colorful costume appeared on the cover of Action Comics #1, a comic aimed at eight year old boys. Superman went on to become one of the most internationally recognized figures in the world. Since then there have been crime comics, romance comics, science fiction comics, and many other genres; in the 21st century ''Graphic Novels'' appear on the best seller lists and are reviewed in the nation's leading newspapers. This course will examine the history of comic books, and how they have both reflected and influenced American society across more than seven decades. More Info
Offered in:hist 178 Special Topics in History +
Description:
This course offers study of selected topics within this subject. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 182 Touring the City: An Introduction to Public History +
Description:
This course offers an introduction to the study and practice of public history through one of its most beloved forms in Boston: the guided tour. We will use urban heritage tours to explore the theory and practice of public history ore broadly and to examine the state the field. We will explore the intersection of public history and public memory and analyze the interplay between identity, politics, and place in Boston and beyond. Students will gain content knowledge about Boston's urban and working-class history and will have the opportunity to create their own contributions to the local historical landscape. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 185 Mascots, Monuments, Massacres: Native American History in the Public Sphere +
Description:
Who controls history? Whose histories do we celebrate, and at whose expense? Whose historical voices are not represented in the public sphere, and ow does this impact those communities? What is public history? How are dominant historical narratives created and sustained through public institutions, popular culture, and the broader social landscape? In recent times, these questions and related issues have found a renewed urgency. This undergraduate course puts these issues into historical perspective by examining the ways museums, popular culture, historical sites, and other forums of public engagement in the United States have interpreted and represented Native American history. In doing so, we strive to understand how forms of erasure and cultural and historical misrepresentation are continuous with practices of dispossession and other forms of violence enacted on Native peoples in the past. While the questions we ask in this class are examined tin the context of Native American histories, they have a broader resonance concerning the politics of memory and conflicting interpretations of America's past. With its emphasis on site visits, topical and news-worthy themes, critical engagement with popular culture, and opportunities for intellectual inquiry based in Boston's urban setting, the class engages students in the history that surrounds them. This is a hands-on, interactive course designed with the support of the Mellon Foundation. More Info
Offered in:hist 186 Road to Black Lives Matter: History of Violence Towards African Americans +
Description:
This introductory course examines the mistreatment, abusive experiences, and violence towards African Americans due to their race. It specifically traces the overall violent and non-violent means used to control or deter this community from the era of slavery up to present times. The course explores the judicial, individual, and organizational resolutions from groups like the NAACP and BLM and attempts to end this culture of violence. Variables including race, class, gender, and regional location will be considered throughout the course. More Info
Offered in:hist 190G Witchcraft in European History +
Description:
Witches and witchcraft are phenomena found throughout history and throughout the world. This intensive first year seminar revolves around the various ways the idea of witches, people who identified themselves or were identified as witches, and their practices interacted with European society at large and helped shape society, religion, law and culture from about 700 CE until 1700 CE. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 210L Labor and Working Class History in the United States +
Description:
This course examines the history of labor and working people in the United States from the colonial period to the present. It explores the diversity of work and working-class experiences, the history of labor movements, labor conflicts, and the larger processes of social, economic, and political change that have affected work and workers. While work and organized labor receive central attention, the course gives equal consideration to the comparative dimensions of class and cultural identity, race and gender, immigration and ethnicity, family and community, technology, politics, and government policy. We will work to improve our skills in critical reading and writing. Lectures, readings, videos, and discussion explore the actions, opinions, identities, and experiences of diverse women and men. You will work on understanding and interpreting the materials. Short essays, in-class exams, and presentation will provide opportunities to develop your interpretations systematically and polish your writing skills. More Info
Offered in:hist 211 Europe to 1600 +
Description:
A survey of European history from antiquity to 1600, laying particular stress on politics, culture and religion. Major topics include Greco-Roman culture; the early development of Christianity and its impact on the ancient world; the evolution of new political and religious forms in the Middle Ages; the impact of the Renaissance and of European colonization in Africa, Asia, and the Americas; and the Protestant Reformation and Catholic responses to it. Europeans prior to 1600 established values and belief systems that they subsequently sought to impose through conquest, imperialism, missionary efforts, and trade. Thus, the ideas of this period have had an outsized impact on the United States and the world in the 21st century. The course includes critical examination of important primary sources. More Info
Offered in:hist 212 Modern Europe +
Description:
This course addresses the major movements and issues of modern European history, including the Enlightenment, the age of revolutions, industrialization, imperialism, nationalism, global wars, clashes of political systems, and decolonization, among others. It examines how people of different races, classes, and genders in Europe have both been subject to and challenged the dominant systems of their eras. During the last three centuries, Europe has influenced people in all parts of the world. By studying modern Europe we therefore come to understand a great deal about the problems and potential of 21st century society. More Info
Offered in:hist 213 World History to 1800 +
Description:
This course considers the ways that disparate parts of the world were interconnected and interdependent before the modern era. Through studies of the growth of civilizations across the continents, the rise of world religions, the development and later transformations of the silk roads, and the early modern colonial projects of Europe, student swill have opportunities to consider how religion, language, empire, and trade created common spaces for peoples from diverse regions of the world. Topics range from early urbanization in Egypt and Mexico, to the Islamic empire, the Asian world system. Europe's shift from periphery to core, the civilizations of the Americas, and the rise of the African slave trade in the trans-Atlantic context. More Info
Offered in:hist 214 Modern World History +
Description:
This course offers an examination for the processes of modernization and globalization since the late eighteenth century; their connections to imperialism, colonialism, and war; and their relationships to changing perceptions of society, politics, economics, gender, and culture in different regions of the world. More Info
Offered in:hist 219 History of the Mediterranean +
Description:
The Mediterranean is a 'global player' which has made the peoples of three continents participate in a common path for more than 5000 years. The course presents the history of this extraordinary 'border' joining the Middle East, Europe and North Africa; and explores the complex and fascinating circulation of ideas between the East and West and the interaction of multiple cultural, social and religious backgrounds. Topics will include Ancient Egypt, the Greek city-states, the Roman Empire, the birth of Islam and Christianity, the Islamic Golden Age in Africa and Iberia, the Crusades, the Renaissance, the Ottoman Empire and new global scenarios in the 20th century. More Info
Offered in:hist 220 History of European Empires +
Description:
Over the course of the early modern and modern periods, the major European powers set out not only to explore the world, but to claim it. In this course, students will explore the history of modern European imperialism, including in-depth looks at issues and moments such as slavery in the Atlantic world, the Age of Enlightenment, the civilizing mission, the world wars, and the struggles for decolonization. Finally, students will ask how empire continues to manifest in Europe today. Throughout the course of the semester, students will focus upon these important events and themes in the history of European imperialism and decolonization from the perspective of both the colonizers and the colonized, using historical narratives, first-person accounts and commentaries, scholarly analyses, and film to understand this tumultuous subject. This course meets the International Diversity requirement through its incorporation of race and gender as categories of identity in the study of the history of European empires. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 225L Berlin: Crossroads of History +
Description:
An interdisciplinary introduction to modern German history and culture from the late nineteenth century to the present. Using the German capital of Berlin as its focal point, the class examines the varied historical, socio-political, and artistic changes in German culture throughout the twentieth century. Based on a broad range of media - from literature, film, photography, drawing, and other visual arts to music and theater - students will investigate topics such as the aftermath of the German unification of 1871, Berlin's vibrant and provocative culture of the 1920s and early 1930s, the devastating Jewish genocide, the divided city of the Cold War, the collapse of the Wall and the creation of today's Berlin Republic. Taught in English; no knowledge of German necessary. More Info
Offered in:hist 230L Ancient Egypt +
Description:
A survey of the history, art, archaeology, and religion of ancient Egypt. More Info
Offered in:hist 233L The Homeric Warrior +
Description:
This course will be devoted to close readings of a Homeric epic, either the Iliad of the Odyssey, with particular attention to the stresses of combat and homecoming. At the same time, the Homeric epics are important historical sources for understanding the society, economy, religion and warfare of Greece in the Bronze and Archaic Ages, and class time will be devoted to comparing poetry with the archaeological evidence. More Info
Offered in:hist 251L South Asia and the India Ocean World +
Description:
The Indian Ocean region includes Southern and Eastern Africa, the Persian Gulf, South Asia, and parts of Southeast Asia. This course will study the influence of South Asia in the creation of systems of state, and the circulation of goods, labor and capital through this region over two hundred years. This course satisfies the international diversity requirement through focus on the experiences of and interrelationships between participants in the production, trade and consumption of commodities, with a focus on national origin, social class, and the free and unfree and the intersections of these experiences, identities and conditions. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 252 African History to 1800 +
Description:
This course offers an introduction to early African history, focusing on the dynamic cultures and social systems, sophisticated technologies and commercial networks, complex spiritual beliefs and political structures that shaped the continent from earliest times to the 1800s. The course's goal is to put contemporary Africa into deep historical perspective, paying special attention to the efforts of ordinary men and women to control their destinies in an increasingly interconnected world. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 253 African History since 1800 +
Description:
This course surveys the history of Africa since 1800. This tumultuous period encompasses from the end of the Atlantic slave trade through the economic, political, and social complexities of contemporary African life. The course draws on primary sources (maps, travelers' accounts, oral histories) as well as literature, music, and film to explore Abolition and post-Abolition slavery in Africa; 19th-century African states and empires; European imperialism and colonization; gender, class, and racial/ethnic identities in colonial society; education and religious change; African nationalism and independence movements; and post-independence dynamics of globalization, conflict, 'development,' and decolonialism. More Info
Offered in:hist 255L Gods and Slaves: Latin America before 1800 +
Description:
This course introduces students to the history and cultures of early Latin America, an area of the world that includes Mesoamerica (Mexico and Central America), South America, and the Caribbean. In this class we will examine the political, cultural, and social dimensions of the major Pre-Columbian civilizations; the causes and consequences of Spanish and Portuguese colonization; the establishment of New World societies and economies in the sixteenth century; and the vastly divergent forms of mature colonial society across the continent in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. More Info
Offered in:hist 256L Skyscrapers and Shantytowns: Latin America since 1800 +
Description:
This class attempts a wider reckoning of the last two centuries in our ''Latin'' hemisphere, broadening and contextualizing core topics such as slavery and revolution, contraband and informality, inequality and exclusion, economize booms and busts, environmental and technological change, gender and demographic change, migration and mass culture. In addition to these core interpenetrating themes, the class also addresses how history is produced, consumed, and transformed. More Info
Offered in:hist 257L Queer Literature and History in the 20th Century US +
Description:
This course introduces historical approaches to studying queer literature of the 20th century United States. The course highlights the historical work of queer literature through in-depth textual analysis and by studying related historical archives. Units include the Harlem Renaissance, gay literature of the 1960s and 70s, and lesbian pulp. Each unit in the course selects specific archives to pair with literary texts. In addition, students will do independent work on a literary text and archive of their choosing. Through both the required readings and the independent projects, students will engage directly and systematically with the study of creative production and human expression. This is a hands-on interactive course designed with the support of the Mellon Foundation. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 262L American Indian History to 1783 +
Description:
Once relegated to the margins of U.S. history, American Indian histories have emerged as important narratives in their own right and central components to the stories we tell about our own states, regions, and nation. For generations, American Indians have pushed their own priorities and been crucial historical actors in the making of the United States long before this nation came into existence. As part one of a yearlong survey of American Indian history, this course examines the histories of indigenous peoples of North America from their perspective, including the peopling of the Americas; pre-Columbian societies and civilizations; first contact encounters and exchanges with non-Natives; strategies American Indians used to confront expanding European and indigenous powers; and ways indigenous North Americans engaged global markets, diplomacy, and competing empires. More Info
Offered in:hist 263L Modern American Indian Social and Political History: From the American Revolution to Standing Rock +
Description:
This course will examine the varied historical experiences of American Indians from the time of the American Revolution to the present, with a special focus on the 20th century. American Indians (as well as Native Hawaiians and Alaska Natives) are and were actors in history and not just hapless victims of Euro-American imperialism and power. The course will examine the ways Native peoples in the U.S. adapted and responded to the host of stresses that accompanied the rapid and often violent social, cultural, and environmental transformations of the 19th and 20th centuries. More Info
Offered in:hist 265 American History before 1877 +
Description:
Beginning with the history of North America prior to the voyages of Columbus, History 265 examines the impact of Europeans upon indigenous peoples, and studies the evolution of colonial settlements in British North America. It covers the causes and consequences of the American Revolution, the subsequent development of democratic political and social institutions, the emergence of transportation, market and industrial revolutions and the coming of the sectional conflict and Civil War. More Info
Offered in:hist 266 American History since 1877 +
Description:
History 266 begins in the aftermath of the Civil War and Reconstruction and examines the nature and impact of urbanization, immigration, and industrialization. The course then examines the growth of American imperialism and the nation's rise to world power status. It also focuses on cycles of economic change, including the Great Depression and the enormous expansion of the middle class after World War II. The course will also examine the Cold War in both its worldwide impact, such as wars in Korea and Vietnam, and on the domestic front. Finally, the course examines the transformation of society and culture in the second half of the Twentieth Century. More Info
Offered in:hist 271 SURVEY OF AFRO-AMERICAN HISTORY +
Description:
This is an introductory overview of the history of African Americans in the U.S. from slavery to modern times. At the end of the semester, you will be familiar with the problems, achievements, hopes, and desires of African Americans as expressed in their own narratives and through the analyses of historians, sociologists, films, and speeches. This course will cover major themes including African Americans in slavery, work, politics, and the military; the impact of Jim Crow segregation and the Ku Klux Klan; the Great Depression, migrations, and the family; the Civil Rights Movement and contemporary social issues. More Info
Offered in:hist 275L Learning to Labor: Work and Education in US History +
Description:
This course explores the intertwined history of education and work in the United States. We will ask how schools and school systems, arose in the nineteenth-century US, and what purpose the people who ran and attended these schools expected them to serve. We will chart the expansion and specialization of school systems across the country, and ask how schools came to sort workers into jobs, reinforcing racial and gender inequality in the process. Who teaches, and what do they teach? Who trains and employs teachers, and under what conditions? More Info
Offered in:hist 276 This Land is Your Land: A Survey of American Environmental History +
Description:
From the Dust Bowl to current global climate change, from Hoover Dam to acid rain, from the 1927 Mississippi flood to Hurricane Katrina, from Native American agriculture to the recent Farm Bill, this class studies how people have used and changed the North American environment from the colonial era to the present. Through discussion exams, and essays, students will master historical material and build skills in document analysis and written argument. More Info
Offered in:hist 278L Introduction to Native American and Indigenous Studies +
Description:
This course is an introduction to key issues and themes in Indigenous Studies and to issues of concern to native peoples today. The majority of the case studies used will refer to Native American/Indigenous Nations from North America, as these nations have the closest relationships with the modern U.S. and are those to whom we have the greatest responsibilities. Other case studies will be drawn from South and Central America, the Pacific (particularly Hawaii, Aotearoa/New Zealand, and Australia) and Asia. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 280 Special Topics +
Description:
This course offers study of selected topics within this subject. Course content and credits vary according to topic and are announced prior to the registration period. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 285L Food in American Culture +
Description:
This course examines the cultural history and meanings of ''American'' foodways at home and abroad from the colonial period to the present. It considers how nation, region, gender, ethnicity, race, religion, global politics, and corporate America affect food production and consumption. It explores how the histories of immigration, industrialization, suburbanization, and globalization have transformed what, how, where, and why Americans eat, as well as how American food is perceived throughout the world.AMST 285L and HIST 285L are the same course. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 290G Globalization in Historical Perspective +
Description:
The development of the world economy since 1750 and its relationship to other global phenomena: industrialization, social and cultural modernization, imperialism, and the worldwide adoption of the political model of the nation-state. The course provides a foundation in history for the discussion of contemporary issues. Capabilities addressed: Critical reading, critical thinking, clear writing, academic self-assessment, collaborative learning, information technology, oral presentation. More Info
Offered in:hist 301L Ancient Greek History +
Description:
This course provides a survey of the origin, rise and development of ancient Greek civilization from the arrival of the Greeks in Europe until the death of Cleopatra (approximately 1600-30 BC). Emphasis is placed on the rise of the Greek city-state and the spread of Greek culture to the East. More Info
Offered in:hist 302L Roman History +
hist 303L The Archaeology of Ancient Greece +
Description:
This course provides a survey of Greek archaeology and history from the Bronze Age through the Classical Era. Students are introduced to the methods and aims of archaeology. The course begins with the Minoan and Mycenaean eras; the Dark Age and emergency of the full Hellenic era are treated, with emphasis on the city-states of the Greeks. The course makes extensive use of images and surveys the art and architecture of the Greeks in the context of primary literary sources. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 304 Early Middle Ages: Europe 300-1000 +
Description:
The Early Middle Ages covers the period when the great Western monarchies and the social structures and economy that supported them began and the enormous influence of Imperial Rome persisted. Additionally, interaction with a series of invaders as well as relations with the rapidly expanding Islamic states helped to shape Europe geographically, culturally and linguistically. History 304 examines these developments with close analysis of original documents and historiographical analysis. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 305 Later Middle Ages: Europe 1000-1450 +
Description:
The Later Middle Ages examines the story of a backward part of the world. By the year 1000, Europe was a collection of fractious and fragile governments, a scattered population, few towns (with mostly barter economies) and frequent wars. Poor cousins to the magnificent civilizations of Asia and Africa, nevertheless Europeans, in the space of a few hundred years, forged a civilization that more than any other has been able to impose its culture on the rest of the planet. History 305 seeks to explain this by close analysis of original document sand historiographical analysis. More Info
Offered in:hist 306L The Archaeology of Ancient Rome +
Description:
This course provides a methodological approach to roman archaeology as a key to understanding the history and culture of Rome and its empire from the city's origins in about 750 BC through the height and decline of Roman civilization during the first through fourth centuries AD. The course makes extensive use of images and surveys the art and architecture of the Romans in the context of primary literary sources. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 307 Renaissance and Reformation +
Description:
People, ideas, and institutions of fourteenth century through sixteenth century Europe. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 308 The History of Common Law +
Description:
The principles underlying the evolution of law in Western Europe. Emphasis on England during the Middle Ages. Some of the legal concepts and procedures necessary in understanding medieval history and common law. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 311L The Fall of Rome +
Description:
People have been trying to understand the fall of Rome since the fall of Rome. In 200 CE, the Roman Empire was the largest, most diverse, and most powerful state the Mediterranean world had ever seen. By 500, the Western half of the Empire had splintered into smaller kingdoms that would eventually become the basis for modern European states. What happened? This course will examine the political, military, environmental, and social changes of the Empire as it loses territory and transforms into the medieval world. But we will spend just as much time trying to understand what it was like for typical Romans to live through this period. We will study armies and taxes, but also the rise of Christianity, the prevalence of slavery, the shifting gender norms, and the stories that filled the imaginations of people throughout this time. We will discuss major ancient cities like Rome and Constantinople, but we'll also venture out to the edges of the Empire and beyond learning about the Goths, Celts, Sassanians, and more.In addition to learning about the transformation of the Roman Empire between 250 and 800, students will also practice thinking like historians; that is, we will think about possibilities and limitations of the wide range of sources that historians use to piece together what happened and why it matters. How do we know what we know about the past? And why should we care how history is written? More Info
Offered in:hist 312 Cities in Early Modern Europe +
Description:
This course offers a survey of urban life in Europe between 1400 and 1750. The course begins by examining how mercantile culture, religious and ritual life, and political and artistic patronage shaped the urban experience in Florence and Venice. It then proceeds north of the Alps and explores the ways in which German, English, and French urban live influenced and intersected with the development of Protestantism, the wars of religion, the English civil war, and the emergence of absolutism. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 313 Nineteenth Century Europe +
Description:
A political, social and cultural history of Europe from 1815 to 1900, including the history of each major European nation. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 314 Health and Healing in Early Modern Europe +
Description:
This course explores the ways illness intersected with everyday life in Europe spanning the years 1500-1800. Topics include experiences of childbirth, popular medical texts, witchcraft and magic, plague, religious approaches to healing, and ordinary people's understanding of their bodies. A significant amount of class time will be spent discussing and analyzing primary sources, including diaries, recipes, anatomical texts, casebooks, and literature. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 315 Europe 1900-1945 +
Description:
Political, social and intellectual history of Europe from 1900 to 1945. Emphasis on the origins of the World Wars, European totalitarianism, the Great Depression and inter-war societies. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 316 Europe since 1945 +
Description:
Political, economic, social, and intellectual history of Europe with attention to extra-European influences, from 1945 to the present. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 317L Women in Medieval and Early Modern Europe +
Description:
This course is designed to introduce students to the study of European women in the medieval and early modern eras and, more generally, to the challenges and rewards of women's and gender history. Through in-class discussions and writing assignments, the course hones students' ability to analyze, critique, and compare primary and secondary sources. Topics include women's work, writing, religious lives, and relationships. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 318 Advanced Topics in History +
hist 320L Bronze Age Aegean Archaeology +
Description:
This course will cover the Aegean world from the beginnings of human history to the emergence of the language, cities and cultures commonly known as Greek in the 8th century BCE. We will focus especially on the archaeology, art, architecture, economy and societal trends of the Minoans and Mycenaeans. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 322 Shakespeare's London +
Description:
This course draws on artifacts, literature, and first-hand accounts to recover life in London during Shakespeare's time (1550-1650). The course captures various dimensions of life in the bustling city, including reading practices and education, alehouses and coffeehouses, the experiences of the working poor, and urban crime. It addresses how men and women used various kinds or personal writing - from diaries and letters to spiritual journals and recipe books - to construct their day-to-day lives. Class discussion and assignments consider how Londoners chose to record certain information and how varying genres of writing informed resulting accounts. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 324 Russia and the Soviet Union: From the 1917 Revolution to Putin +
Description:
The peasant emancipation from serfdom in 1861 left the overwhelming majority of Russians destitute and disenfranchised. How did the subsequent revolutionary movement that promised social and economic equality transform into such a brutally oppressive system under Stalin? How did the Soviet Union become a world superpower and what were the reasons for its downfall? Through the use of primary documents, this course will attempt to answer these questions and emphasize social history: the ideals, aspirations, and actions of ordinary Soviet citizens. More Info
Offered in:hist 326 Hitler, A Man and His Times +
Description:
This course will cover all aspects of the history of Nazi Germany, including the aftermath of the country's traumatic defeat in the First World War, Hitler's early career as an extremist politician in the 1920s, the rise of the Nazis to power in the early 1930s, the establishment of a totalitarian dictatorship, the road to war, the Nazi conquest of Europe, and the racist ideologies that culminated in the Holocaust. More Info
Offered in:hist 330 The French Revolution +
Description:
This course examines the age of the Enlightenment from the 1700's on, leading to and including the decline and fall of ancien r?gime France to the eruption of the French Revolution, with its various phases and aftermath. Finally, Napoleons rise to power in 1799 and then dramatic fall in 1815 will provide an insightful study of this crucial stage in European history and its influence on the world. Social and intellectual history of the period reflected in literature and the arts is significant in this course also. Consideration will be given to the impact of Enlightenment and revolutionary ideals in other parts of the world such as in the American British and French Atlantic colonies. More Info
Offered in:hist 331 Liberty, Equality, Fraternity? A History of Modern France +
Description:
Far from being a straightforward national history of modern France, this course uses many lenses of Diversity, especially class and religion, to question the validity of the nation's motto (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity) for the people who live in France, as well as to understand the complexities of national identity. France has been especially impactful in shaping ideas about citizenship and national belonging, largely due to its revolutionary history and reputation as a center of intellectual, enlightened thought. Does the nation live up to its promise? We will look at major historical moments, like the Enlightenment, French Revolution, Paris Commune, Dreyfus Affair, World Wars, and decolonization to try to answer that question, noting how the promise of equality for all people within the country has often depended on categories of identity, including class, race, gender, sexuality, and religion. More Info
Offered in:hist 337 Making a 'Second Sex': Women and Gender in Modern European History +
Description:
This course examines the history of Europe from the Enlightenment through the present, using the primary prism of women and gender, with secondary, intersectional lenses of class, ethnicity, race, and sexuality. We will focus on gendered themes such as private vs. public, sameness vs. difference, sexuality, feminism, and women's political roles, and we will look at major moments like the Enlightenment, French Revolution, Imperialism, the World Wars, Eastern Europe, Decolonization and Contemporary Identity. At the same time, we will take an intersectional lens to many of the events of European history, using gender alongside of class (in the Industrial Revolution and the Russian Revolution), race (in imperialism and decolonization), ethnicity (especially in discussions of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans), and sexuality (in the interwar period and in the contemporary period). In so doing, we will demonstrate how a focus on women and gender, with implications in class, ethnicity, race, and sexuality, leads to an essential shift in how we think about the major times and events of European history. Due to these multiple themes and foci, this course satisfies the UMass Boston requirement for International Diversity. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 339 'Naturally Chic': Fashion, Gender, and Nationalism in French History +
Description:
Every piece of clothing we wear has a history, and much of that history can be traced back to France. How did fashion become so entwined with France's politics, economics, and culture? This course will trace fashion's French history, looking at subjects like Marie Antoinette's legendary frivolousness, fashion and war, the rise of the designer, clothing and labor, and how ordinary people have wielded clothing as a mode of self-expression. The class will also examine contemporary questions facing the fashion industry, like cultural appropriation and fast fashion. Through these explorations, we will discover how fashion mirrors French history and how we play a role in fashion history ourselves. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 342 Cinema in Hitler's Germany: Movies, Propaganda, Politics in Weimar and Nazi Germany 1919-1945 +
Description:
This course explores the history of German cinema between 1919 and 1945. The first half of the course will focus on the films of the Weimar Republic - a time of bold artistic experimentation when Germany's film industry was second only to Hollywood in worldwide influence. The second half of the semester will be devoted to the cinema produced in Germany during the Nazi dictatorship, when movies were no longer simply entertainment, but also served as an important form of propaganda. The films of both of these periods will be analyzed as historical sources that illuminate the society that produced them. More Info
Offered in:hist 343 World War II: The Global War +
Description:
The Second World War was certainly the 20th century's seminal and most cataclysmic global event, its effects felt on every continent. Although this course will explore all aspects of the Second World War, it will focus heavily on the role of the United States as part of the Allied cause, including examining the political, social, and industrial aspects of the war on the American homefront. This will include a view both from the ''homefront out'' - how activities in the United States affected events across the world and changed the course of history - and also from ''overseas back'' - how the war changed America and the world, from a foreign and domestic perspective. This course will discuss the impact of the war, as well as how the war has impacted the United States and the world in the years since 1945. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 346 Women & Gender in African History +
Description:
This course looks at major themes in African history - precolonial states, the slave trade, colonialism, nationalism, development - from the point of view of women's experiences and knowledge. How does Africa's past look different when women's voices and lives are put at the center of the story? What can be learned from feminist debates about the relevance of gender in African history, especially prior to colonial rule? Drawing on scholarship, primary sources, life stories, fiction and film, this course will examine women's roles in African history as well as the gender ideologies and practices constraining women's agency in the past and today. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 347 Feast to Famine: Food in African History +
Description:
For a continent long known as the world's poster child for famine, Africa possesses an extraordinarily rich range of food systems, consumption cultures, and culinary histories. For farmers and hunters, diviners and chiefs, missionaries and scientists, aid workers and tourists - food figures in crucial ways. This course explores Africa's diverse foodways since ca. 1800, through case studies that illustrate the critical role of food - in times of abundance and times of scarcity - in ethnic and national identity, health and economic development, and struggles over wealth and power in the colonial and postcolonial eras. More Info
Offered in:hist 349L The Cold War: Rise and Fall +
Description:
This course examines the shifting US and Russian images of each other during the rise and fall of the Cold War. It focuses in particular on the way that issues of difference play out in the US/Soviet/Russian encounter, and on the emergence of public perceptions which linked struggles for racial, gender, and social equality with Communism and its agents. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 350 Mexico since 1850 +
Description:
It is hard to separate modern Mexico from its famous but conflicting stereotypes: massive wealth and crushing poverty, international leadership set against institutional weakness, an openness to the world together with proud localism. At the same time, however, the deeper history of this society makes it harder to separate out these extremes. This class presents modern Mexico beyond these stereotypes, seeking to understand the deeper processes that cause such apparent contradictions. More Info
Offered in:hist 351 Histories of Brazil +
Description:
What makes Brazil so distinctive? Why is it so unequal? How did it become so powerful, seemingly overnight? And, what is it about all that samba, soccer, and carnaval? This course introduces students to the history and contemporary society of Brazil, a large and increasingly important actor in Latin America, the wider hemisphere, and the world. Additionally, the particularities of Brazilian history can illuminate wider questions relating to social change, economic growth and inequality, exclusion and prejudice, creativity and leadership, and the relationship between humans and their environment, among many other questions. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 352 Topics in African History +
Description:
An intensive study of selected themes in African history; although the approach is thematic, attention is given to essential chronology and to regional differences. Topics, which vary from semester to semester, include African economic history; pan-Africanism and nationalism; post-colonial Africa: its prospects, developments, and crises; religion in Africa; and African urban history. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 357 The Vietnam War +
Description:
This course covers the period from 1945 to 1975, with attention to the Vietnamese Revolution and its American and Vietnamese adversaries. Topics include origins of the Cold War and US policy in Indochina; Vietnam's peasant revolution and Communist Party; society, economy, and ideology of the Saigon milieu; the US anti-war movement; and US soldiers and veterans of the Vietnam War era. More Info
Offered in:hist 359L Women in Modern China +
hist 360L Traditional China +
Description:
A survey of traditional China from ancient times to about 1800, with emphasis on cultural, intellectual, and social developments. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 361L The History of Modern China +
hist 363L Modern Japan +
Description:
A historical survey of economic, social, political and cultural developments in Japan from 1800 to the present, special consideration of economic and foreign policy problems. More Info
Offered in:hist 364L India since 1857 +
Description:
This course explores the formation and transformation of colonial systems of control, administration and governance of South Asia and Indian participation in this process from 1857 to 1947. The course begins looking at early colonialism under the East India Company and the resulting revolt of 1857. It goes on to explore a variety of sites and social issues which were governed by the British colonial state and literary, political and militaristic responses to systems and priorities of government. The colonial state and the colonized were engaged, responsive and adaptive towards each other but locked in an unequal relationship underwritten by race and culture. More Info
Offered in:hist 365L Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan in Modern History +
Description:
In 1979, three separate events in three different countries marked the beginning of a new era of politics and religion in western Asia. A revolutionary Islamic government took control in Iran, a religiously-motivated military dictator took power in Pakistan, and the USSR invaded Afghanistan, triggering the Afghan Jihad. This course will explore the history leading up to the events of 1979 in the context of global events and political change and religious thought in Western Asia. It will then go on to examine the consequences of these events as they have played out into the new millennium.HIST 365L and ASIAN 365L are the same course. More Info
Offered in:hist 368 ANTEBELLUM AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY +
Description:
This in-depth study examines African American historical experiences in Antebellum U.S. history. Starting with their origins from West Africa before being transported to the New World in the 1500s, the course explores their cultural, socio-economic, and political experiences as indentured servants; as free people; as slaves; and as freed'' people. It surveys their development from the early colonial era up through the United States era that passed a proclamation freeing them from slavery before the Civil War ended. This course analyzes the impact that regional location, age, ethnicity, skills, and gender had on shaping their history; scrutinizes their roles in the slavocracy, in resistance, and in early U.S. development; gauge how their experiences impacted legislative changes; and understand the unfolding of their identity of blackness and becoming African American. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 371 The American Revolution, 1763-1789 +
Description:
The development of the conflict with Britain, 1763-1776, the Revolutionary War and its effect, the forming of republican institutions for state and federal governments. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 372 The Early Republic +
Description:
Survey and analysis of the early development of the United States as an independent federal republic. Focus is on key issues: civil liberties, slavery and the first emancipation, federalist economic policy, neutrality, war, institutional growth (presidency, congress, judiciary, political parties), and changes in the social, ideological and cultural environment. More Info
Offered in:hist 375 The US Civil War and Reconstruction +
Description:
Causes of the Civil War, its social, political, and ideological history, and the problems and results of Southern Reconstruction. More Info
Offered in:hist 377 The American Progressive Era, 1890-1920 +
Description:
This course covers a volatile period in which Americans came to grips with the social and political consequences of industrial and urban transformation. a generation of reformers and political activists reorganized cities, confronting issues of poverty and dangerous working conditions, and looking to government to regulate the unbridled power of large corporations. Artists challenged European traditions in art, music and literature. The period also saw racial polarization and a new, rights-oriented African American movement. Unprecedented immigration and the massive influx of so-called ''new immigrants' from southern and eastern Europe stirred nativist and racial exclusionist sentiment. More Info
Offered in:hist 378 Colliding Cultures: America in the 1920s +
Description:
This course examines the decade of the 1920s in America, a period of enormous complexity. It includes such topics as the vibrancy of the arts and popular culture, the rise of mass media (radio and film), consequences of Prohibition, the new youth culture, conservative religious and social backlash, anti-immigration legislation, and the economic booms and busts that lead to the Great Depression. We focus on the great migration of southern Blacks to northern cities giving rise to the Harlem Renaissance, and on the deep cultural clashes in religion, ethnic identity, and political ideologies that animated the Scopes trial. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 380 The United States Since 1945 +
hist 384 E Pluribus Unum?: American Immigration and Ethnicity +
Description:
It has been often said that America is a ''nation of immigrants.'' This course will examine why so many individuals have come to America over the years, the experiences of foreign-born people in America, how native-born Americans have received those immigrants, how American immigration laws have changed over the years, and what role ethnicity has played in American society. In doing so, we will utilize a variety of sources, including historical monographs, primary sources, movies, and memoirs. We will pay careful attention to the similarities and differences between the experiences of various immigrant groups over time. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 387 US Foreign Policy since 1898 +
Description:
Survey of United States foreign policy and diplomatic relations with other powers from the turn of the century to the present. Emphasis on domestic sources of foreign policies and on such general topics as war: World Wars I and II, Korea and Vietnam, and the Cold War, and the debate over America''s role in world affairs. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 388 American Soldiers in American Wars: History and Memory +
Description:
This course places the experiences, perspectives, and memories of American soldiers at the center of a historical study of U.S. wars from the Civil War to modern military conflicts. After covering the basic history of each war/conflict, the course will cover various historical interpretations of their origins and causes. The course will place great emphasis on understanding the lived experiences of American soldiers through their journals, letters, diaries, memoirs, interviews, and other primary sources. Finally, the course will also look at historical memory, both through the memories of soldiers themselves and as part of the collective memory of the nation. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 390L Working-Class Boston +
Description:
This course explores the working-class and urban history of Boston across nearly 400 years, with a focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will discuss the ways in which dynamics of race, gender, religion, and citizenship have shaped, and continue to shape, the lives of working people and the city of Boston. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 392 American Women in Biography +
Description:
This course introduces major themes of women's history and historiography through the biographies of individual women. Biography allows us to examine not only the lives and times of individuals, but also the considerations historians tackle in trying to represent a life, and the difficulties inherent in researching women who often did not leave public records. More Info
Offered in:hist 395 The History of Boston +
Description:
A general survey from 1630 to the present, emphasizing the variety of people who gave this seaport its special character and prominence in American history. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 402L History of US Visual Media +
Description:
This course examines the historical, cultural, and aesthetic importance of visual images in shaping ideas about empire, race, gender, sexuality, class, work, and nation in American history, from the mid-nineteenth century through the twenty-first. We will explore how different historical contexts change how and why we look as consumers. We will learn how to interpret and analyze different forms of visual media, including motion pictures, political cartoons, live performance, photographs, and print advertising. More Info
Offered in:hist 411L Post 9/11 Culture: Rumors, Stories and Songs +
Description:
This American Studies course is interested in exploring the cultural legacies of 9/11. This 9/11 class will not be explicitly concerned itself with capital 'P' politics: the real burden of the course has more to do with the construction of a rhetoric of what I call '9/11 culture' in American popular arts than with the motivations, strategies, or outcomes associated with the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 and of Iraq in 2003. Yet the wars shadow every moment of the class. I will begin the class by showing America: A Tribute to Heroes, the celebrity telethon that was broadcast on September 21, mostly to help students begin to understand the rapid deployment of hero as a keyword in our post-9/11 discourse. Throughout the course we will consider keywords and phrases that came to define the era. First responder, hero, terrorist, and so on, will all come under historically-contextualized scrutiny. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 413 Saints, Witches and Heretics +
Description:
This seminar will examine the types of spirituality that were celebrated and the types that were brutally repressed by the Christian churches of late medieval and early modern Europe (1250-1700). It will compare different interpretations of late medieval Catholicism and then turn to Martin Luther, assessing the major theses of his theological vision and why they led to religious division. The course will then consider varied attitudes to saints, witches, and heretics in Catholic and Protestant Europe. Throughout the semester, the course will explore the interrelationship among these three categories and the ways in which they illuminate the Reformation era. More Info
Offered in:hist 433 Mussolini +
hist 440L United States in a Global Context +
Description:
This course will situate the United States in a global context by considering US and non-US perspectives on key events of the twentieth century. Special focus: Public, media/arts as well as government perspectives. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 456 Faith and Politics in Islam +
Description:
This course is an exploration of aspects of faith and politics in Islam. It will trace the spread of ideas of personal reform, rationalism, orthodoxy and Sufi mysticism. The course then looks at the impact of print cultures and new educational institutions in proposing a unified and singular global Muslim identity. The course will also examine devotional and political movements that are central to contemporary Muslim thought. This course satisfies the international diversity requirement by exploring Islamic culture in a global framework, including South Asia, the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Caribbean, and studying the lives, expectations, participation and experiences of women and non-elites in Islamic societies. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 462 A Nation in Turmoil: The United States, 1815-1850 +
Description:
Beginning with the aftermath of the War of 1812 and ending with the ominous Compromise of 1850, this course explores a tumultuous period in United States history marked by the rise of charismatic and controversial politicians; polarizing debates over race, ethnicity, religion, ''reform,'' and individual rights; Manifest Destiny and territorial expansion; economic uncertainty, and far-reaching changes in transportation and communications with promised to unite the nation even as other forces were threatening to tear it apart. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 468 Age of FDR: America in Depression and War +
Description:
The Great Depression of the 1930's was the worst economic disaster in America history, and World War II was a devastating international war. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected president in 1932 in large part due to the depression and spent longer in the White House than anyone else largely due to the onset of war in both Europe and Asia in the late 1930s. This course explores America in the depths of depression and during war: how people went on with their lives, how different groups were affected by depression and then war, and how the government under FDR responded to economic disaster followed by total war. Modern America came out of this era; government intervention to stabilize the economy, a greatly increased military presence around the world, and a vastly larger middle class were all the result of policies put into place in the 1930s and 1940s. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 478 Special Topics Seminar in History +
Description:
Course content is announced during the advance registration period. Course material is consistent with other departmental seminar offerings. More Info
Offered in:- TBA
hist 481 Research & Methods: Senior Research Methods in History +
Description:
This course is for advanced History majors focused on historical research and writing. While the topic of study varies, all sections of the seminar emphasize the close study of primary and secondary sources and the composition of an original research paper. More Info
Offered in:hist 487 Cooperative Education/Internship, History +
Description:
Through the cooperative education/internship program majors in the history department are placed in paid work assignments or non-paying internships which relate to studies in applied history. Work periods are generally six months and begin in either January or July. The study plan should include appropriate reading and writing assignments. More Info
Offered in:hist 488 Independent Reading +
Description:
Guided reading and research; may be used in departmental honors program. More Info
Offered in:hist 489 Independent Reading +
Description:
Guided reading and research; may be used in departmental honors program. More Info
Offered in:hist 490 Honors Thesis +
Description:
A major research paper written under the supervision of a member of the department and defended before an Honors Committee. More Info
Offered in: