Undergraduate Catalog
History
Chair: Elliott Young
Administrative Coordinator: Debbie Richman
Historians study the past, yet they never become disconnected from the present. What we are and will be is rooted in what we were. In uncovering the past, historians reveal to us the political, cultural, and economic elements that have shaped our world. This is how we write and teach history at Lewis & Clark. Our curriculum is global in scope, inviting students to compare the traditions of various cultures and countries. We offer sufficient depth in the history of the Americas, Europe, and Asia to allow students to develop sophisticated knowledge of these regions in the modern and premodern eras. Moreover, our emphasis on research and writing equips our students with skills appropriate to a wide range of pursuits.
A critical understanding of how history is crafted is as important as learning historical details. The development of research and writing skills is one of the main objectives of the department’s program. All majors take a unique methods course called Historical Materials, which focuses on how to find and use historical documents—books, manuscripts, periodicals, newspapers, maps, photographs—as research tools. In a second required course called Reading Colloquium, students read the best literature in a field selected by the instructor and come to grips with the variety of ways history is written and interpreted. In the history research seminar, majors conduct intensive research on a particular topic and present their findings to their classmates in the form of a thesis. This series of courses prepares students to use research and writing skills in whatever career they choose and equips them to be discerning students of history throughout the course of their lives.
Resources for Nonmajors
All of the department's course offerings are open to nonmajors. Preference is given to majors and minors for enrollment in HIST 300 Historical Materials, HIST 400 Reading Colloquium, and HIST 450 History Seminar.
The Major Program
The department curriculum focuses on three primary geographical fields: the Americas, Asia, and Europe. Students are strongly encouraged to enroll in the introductory sequences as a foundation for more advanced study in these concentrations. History majors are required to complete some work in each of the three fields in order to obtain a breadth of historical understanding. Most introductory sequences are offered at the 100 level. The entry-level U.S. sequence (HIST 234A and HIST 234B) is offered at the 200 level and is open to first-year students.
The department counsels students to take courses in related fields of language, literature, fine arts, social sciences, and international affairs to deepen their understanding of their area of concentration.
Major Requirements
A minimum of 40 semester credits (10 courses), distributed as follows:
-
HIST 300 Historical Materials
-
HIST 400 Reading Colloquium
-
HIST 450 History Seminar
-
Seven other history courses. At least one must be in Asian history, one in European history, and one in the history of the Americas. At least one of the seven courses must be in premodern Asian, European, or Latin American history, or in religious studies:
HIST 110 Early East Asian History HIST 120 Early European History HIST 141 Colonial Latin American History HIST 210 China's Golden Age (Tang and Song) HIST 221 Tudor and Stuart Britain, 1485 to 1688 HIST 227 Medieval Europe, 800 to 1400 HIST 259 India in the Age of Empire HIST 288 China in the News: Socio-Anthropological and Historical Perspective on Modern China HIST 320 Humanism in Renaissance Europe HIST 324 Saints and Bureaucrats RELS 251 Medieval Christianity RELS 373 Reformations of the 16th Century
At least two of the seven courses must be at the 300/400 level, excluding HIST 300 Historical Materials and HIST 444 Practicum.
Students may apply a maximum of 4 semester credits from HIST 244/HIST 444 toward the major. HIST 218 Perspectives on the Vietnam War may be counted toward either the Asian or American history requirement.
The following courses may be used as electives for the major:
Economics
| ECON 255 | Technology, Institutions, and Economic Growth | |
| ECON 256 | The Industrial Revolution |
Latin American Studies
| LAS 200 | Latin American Cultural Studies |
Religious Studies
| RELS 251 | Medieval Christianity | |
| RELS 253 | Religion in American History to the Civil War | |
| RELS 254 | Religion in Modern America, 1865 to Present | |
| RELS 340 | Women in American Religious History | |
| RELS 373 | Reformations of the 16th Century |
Minor Requirements
A minimum of 24 semester credits (six courses), which must include:
- HIST 300 Historical Materials
- HIST 400 Reading Colloquium or HIST 450 History Seminar
- At least one course at the 300 level, excluding HIST 300 Historical Materials
- Two additional history courses, each one from a different geographical concentration: Asian history, European history, and history of the Americas
Honors
Each year the department invites meritorious students with an overall GPA of at least 3.500 to participate in the honors program. Students choose a faculty member with whom they want to work on a research project. The program may involve a major paper based on primary source materials or an extensive review and evaluation of the secondary literature in a particular subject area. Students present the project to the department. Following an oral examination, the department determines whether to grant honors on graduation.
Practicum Program
Because history is useful in a variety of careers, the department encourages students in the junior or senior year to participate in a practicum. History practica have placed students in a variety of settings, including the museum and library of the Oregon Historical Society, publishing companies, land-use-planning agencies, historic preservation organizations, and other enterprises needing the skills of a person knowledgeable in the liberal arts and trained in history.
The practicum is usually an off-campus experience designed by the student in conjunction with an off-campus supervisor and a faculty supervisor according to departmental guidelines. Arrangements on and off campus must be made with the appropriate supervising persons in the semester prior to enrollment.
Faculty
Andrew Bernstein. Associate professor of history. Japanese history. Ph.D. 1999, M.Phil. 1996, M.A. 1994 Columbia University. B.A. 1990 Amherst College.
David A. Campion. Dr. Robert B. Pamplin Jr. Associate Professor of History, ROTC coordinator. British and South Asian history. Ph.D. 2002, M.A. 1997 University of Virginia. B.A. 1991 Georgetown University.
David H. Galaty. Assistant professor with term of humanities. Ph.D. 1971 Johns Hopkins University. B.A. 1964 Trinity College.
Susan L. Glosser. Associate professor of history, director of East Asian Studies Program. Chinese history. Ph.D. 1995 University of California at Berkeley. M.A. 1985, B.A. 1983 State University of New York at Binghamton.
Maureen Healy. Associate professor of history. European history, women's and gender history, war and genocide. Ph.D. 2000, M.A. 1994 University of Chicago. B.A. 1990 Tufts University.
Reiko Hillyer. Assistant professor with term of history. U.S. South, African American history, history of the built. Ph.D. 2006, M.Phil. 2001, M.A. 1999 Columbia University. B.A. 1991 Yale University.
Jane H. Hunter. Professor of history. U.S. history, post-Civil War, women's history. Ph.D. 1981, M.A. 1975, B.A. 1971 Yale University.
Benjamin W. Westervelt. Associate professor of history. Medieval and early modern European history. Ph.D. 1993 Harvard University. M.T.S. 1985 Harvard Divinity School. B.A. 1982 Brandeis University.
Elliott Young. Associate professor of history, chair of the Department of History. Latin American and U.S.-Mexico Borderlands history. Ph.D. 1997, M.A. 1993 University of Texas at Austin. B.A. 1989 Princeton University.
Courses
HIST 110 Early East Asian History
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Early histories of China and Japan from earliest
origins to the 13th century. Prehistory; early
cultural foundations; development of social,
political, and economic institutions; art and
literature. Readings from Asian texts in
translation. The two cultures, covered as
independent entities, compared to each other and
to European patterns of development.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 111 Making Modern China
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: Key events and institutions in China from the 13th
to the 20th century through primary sources
(philosophical and religious texts, vernacular
fiction, contemporary accounts and essays,
translated documents). Social and familial
hierarchies, gender roles, imperialism, contact
with the West, state-society relations,
nationalism, modernization.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 112 Making Modern Japan
Faculty: Bernstein.
Content: History of Japan from the start of the Tokugawa
shogunate to the end of the 20th century. Tokugawa
ideology, political economy, urban culture;
intellectual and social upheavals leading to the
Meiji Restoration; the Japanese response to the
West; rapid industrialization and its social
consequences; problems of modernity and the
emperor system; Japanese colonialism and
militarism; the Pacific war; postwar developments
in economy, culture, politics.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 120 Early European History
Faculty: Westervelt.
Content: Social, intellectual, political, and economic
elements of European history, 800 to 1648. Role of
Christianity in the formation of a dominant
culture; feudalism and the development of
conflicts between secular and religious life.
Contacts with the non-European world, the
Crusades, minority groups, popular and elite
cultural expressions. Intellectual and cultural
life of the High Middle Ages, secular challenges
of the Renaissance, divisions of European culture
owing to the rise of national monarchies and
religious reformations.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 121 Modern European History
Faculty: Healy.
Content: Social, intellectual, political, and economic
elements of European history, 1648 to the present.
The scientific revolution, Enlightenment, national
political revolutions, capitalism, industrial
development, overseas imperial expansion. The
formation of mass political and social
institutions, avant-garde and popular culture, the
Thirty Years' War of the 20th century, bolshevism,
fascism, the Cold War, and the revolutions of
1989.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 141 Colonial Latin American History
Faculty: Young.
Content: History of Latin America from Native American
contact cultures through the onset of independence
movements in the early 19th century. Cultural
confrontations, change, and Native American
accommodation and strategies of evasion in dealing
with the Hispanic colonial empire.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 142 Modern Latin American History
Faculty: Young.
Content: Confrontation with the complexity of modern Latin
America through historical analysis of the roots
of contemporary society, politics, and culture.
Through traditional texts, novels, films, and
lectures, exploration of the historical
construction of modern Latin America. Themes of
unity and diversity, continuity and change as
framework for analyzing case studies of selected
countries.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 209 Japan at War
Faculty: Bernstein.
Content: In-depth study of the causes, dynamics, and
outcomes of the wars fought by Japan in Asia and
the Pacific from the late 19th century through
World War II. The trajectories of Japanese
imperialism, sequence of events leading to the
attack on Pearl Harbor, social impact of total
war. Japan's wartime culture as seen through
diaries, newspaper articles, propaganda films,
short stories, government documents. Short- and
long-term effects of the atomic bomb and the
American occupation of Japan.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 210 China's Golden Age (Tang and Song)
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: The Tang and Song dynasties, 7th to the 13th
century. Transition from one dynasty to the next.
Changes in the elite classes, transformation of
women's roles, rulership and landholding,
philosophical developments, aesthetic expression.
How these developments defined the issues and set
the context for China's contact with the West and
its emergence into the modern world. Literature,
religious texts, art, dress, biographies, and
political and philosophical essays.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 211 Reform, Rebellion, and Revolution in Modern China
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: The commercial revolution of the 12th century and
the cultural flowering and political structures of
Ming and early Qing dynasties (1367 to 1800) that
shaped China's response to Western invasion. Major
peasant rebellions, elite reforms, and political
revolutions of the last 150 years including the
Opium War, Taiping Rebellion, Hundred Days Reform,
Boxer Rebellion, collapse of the Qing dynasty,
Nationalist and Communist revolutions.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 213 Chinese History Through Biography
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: Political, economic, and cultural history of
China, traced through the lives of individual
Chinese, including the mighty and the low:
venerable philosophers and historians, powerful
women, mighty emperors, conscientious officials,
laboring women and men, evangelizing missionaries,
zealots of all political persuasions. Sixth
century B.C.E. to late 20th century, with emphasis
on the 19th and 20th centuries. Lectures cover the
historical milieu in which the various subjects
lived. Through class discussion and essay
assignments, students unite their knowledge of
particular individuals and the broad sweep of
events to form a rich and lively familiarity with
Chinese history.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 217 The Emergence of Modern South Asia
Faculty: Campion.
Content: The social, economic, and political history of the
Indian subcontinent from the 18th century to the
present. The cultural foundations of Indian
Society; the East India Company and the expansion
of British power; the experience of Indians under
the British Raj; Gandhi and the rise of Indian
nationalism; independence and partition;
postcolonial South Asian developments in politics,
economy, and culture. Thematic emphasis on the
causes and consequences of Western imperialism,
religious and cultural identities, and competing
historical interpretations.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 218 Perspectives on the Vietnam War
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: A broadly humanistic and introductory perspective
on the problem of the Vietnam War. Root causes of
the war from Vietnamese and American perspectives;
the nature of the war as it developed and
concluded. The war as a problem in American
domestic politics.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 219 Ancient Rome: From Republic to Empire
Faculty: Kelly.
Content: A history of Rome from the foundation of the Roman
Republic in the late 5th century B.C. to the end
of the Severan dynasty in 235 A.D. Special
emphasis on Rome's political transformation from a
republic to an empire and the effect of this
transition on Roman civilization. Topics include
Roman conquest and imperialism, religion, contact
with other Mediterranean cultures, class conflict,
law and governance, slavery, and family structure.
The interpretation of primary source materials
(especially ancient historical writings) and the
problems of reconstructing the history of a
civilization that flourished 2,000 years ago.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 221 Tudor and Stuart Britain, 1485 to 1688
Faculty: Campion.
Content: The development of the British Isles from the late
medieval period to the Glorious Revolution. The
church and state in late medieval Britain; the
English and Scottish reformations; Elizabeth and
her realm; the evolution of monarchical and
aristocratic power under the Tudors and Stuarts;
Shakespeare, Milton, and the English literary
renaissance; the conquest and settlement of
Ireland; Cromwell, the Puritans, and the English
Civil War; life in the villages and the growth of
the mercantile economy; the Glorious Revolution
and the shaping of constitutional monarchy.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 120 recommended.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 222 Britain in the Age of Revolution, 1688 to 1815
Faculty: Campion.
Content: A history of Britain and its people from the
Glorious Revolution to the end of the Napoleonic
War. The end of absolutism and the rise of the
constitutional monarchy; the Augustan Age: arts,
letters, and religion; the Atlantic world and
British overseas expansion; the Enlightenment and
scientific revolution; the American Revolution and
its aftermath; union with Scotland and Ireland and
the creation of the British national identity; the
revolution in France and the wars against
Napoleon; the beginnings of the Industrial
Revolution.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 121 recommended.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 224 The Making of Modern Britain, 1815 to Present
Faculty: Campion.
Content: The history of Britain from the Industrial
Revolution to the present. Industrialization and
its social consequences; the shaping of Victorian
society; the rise and fall of the British Empire;
the Irish question and the emancipation of women;
political reform and the rise of mass politics;
Britain in the age of total war; popular culture,
immigration, and the making of multicultural
Britain. Themes include the growth of the social
and economic class structure, the shaping of
national and regional identities, cultural
exchanges with the empire. Extensive use of
primary sources, literature, music.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 121 recommended.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 225 Europe in the Age of the French Revolution
Faculty: Healy.
Content: Social, economic, and intellectual origins of the
revolution of 1789; major developments in France;
the spread of revolution to the remainder of
Europe. European responses to the threat of
revolution, defeat of the Napoleonic armies, the
attempt to return to normalcy after 1815.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 121 recommended.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 226 20th-Century Germany
Faculty: Healy.
Content: Origins and consequences of World War I; attempts
to develop a republican government; Nazism;
evolution of the two Germanies after 1945 and
their reunification. Readings on relationship
between individual and state, pressures for
conformity, possibility of dissent.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 227 Medieval Europe, 800 to 1400
Faculty: Westervelt.
Content: Social, intellectual, political, and cultural
elements of European life during the period from
about 800 to 1400. Emphasis on Christianity as a
dominant aspect of public life; feudalism and
other forms of economic and social life;
developing conflicts between secular and
ecclesiastical institutions; emergence of European
nation-states; contacts with the non-European
world; high medieval culture.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 120 recommended.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 228 Middle East in Modern Times
Faculty: Powers (Religious Studies)
Content: The Middle East, its religious and cultural
contributions, indigenous empires, and outside
imperialists. The region's strategic significance
as the connecting link to three continents.
Effects on the region of the discovery of oil in
the 20th century. The impact of nationalism on
each nation's viability in the region, economic
dilemmas, pressing national problems.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Every third year, summer only.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 229 The Holocaust in Comparative Perspective
Faculty: Healy.
Content: The Nazi genocide of European Jews during World
War II in comparison to other cases of
20th-century mass violence in countries such as
Armenia, Cambodia, the former Yugoslavia, and
Rwanda. Nazi Germany serves as the principal case
study for discussion of the broader question: What
has made possible the organization and execution
of mass violence against specific ethnic and
religious groups in a wide variety of societies
around the world over the past century? Includes
examination of strategies for the prevention of
future incidents of mass ethnic violence.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 231A U.S. Women's History, 1600 to 1980
Faculty: Hunter.
Content: The diverse experiences of American women from the
colonial era to the recent past. Changing
ideologies from the colonial goodwife to the cult
of true womanhood. Impact of Victorianism,
sexuality and reproduction, the changing
significance of women's work. Origins of the
women's rights movement, battles and legacy of
suffrage, history of 20th-century feminism,
competing ideologies and experiences of
difference.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 233 History of New York
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: An overview of the urban history and urban
structure of New York. Emphasis on examining the
process of continuity and change of New York from
the colonial period to the 20th century. Offered
on New York program.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing and acceptance into the New York study
abroad program is required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 234A United States: Revolution to Empire
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Introduction to the United States. How the young
American nation coped with major changes and
adjustments in its first century. Emergence of
political parties; wars with Indians and Mexico,
and expansion into a continental nation; the
lingering problem of slavery; the rise of industry
and urbanization; immigration; the development of
arts and letters into a new national culture.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Annually, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 234B United States: Empire to Super Power
Faculty: Hunter.
Content: The power of the United States in the world, from
the Spanish-American War to Iraq. American
economic growth and its consequences. The federal
government and the people. Mass society and mass
marketing. Changing political alignments, the
policy elite, and "political will." The welfare
state, women's and minority rights.
Prerequisites: None. AP History strongly recommended.
Usually offered: Annually.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 235 History of the Pacific Northwest
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Historical development of the Pacific Northwest
over the past 200 years. Native American cultures,
Euro-American exploration and settlement, fur
trade, missions, overland emigration, resource
development, the question of regionalism.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 239 Constructing the American Landscape
Faculty: Hillyer.
Content: Political, social, economic, and aesthetic forces
that have helped shape ordinary built
environments: farms, fast-food restaurants, theme
parks, sports stadiums, highways, prisons, public
housing. Patterns of economic growth and decline,
technological innovation, segregation,
gentrification, capital migration and
globalization, historic preservation, and changing
ideologies about nature and the city.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 240 Race and Ethnicity in the United States
Faculty: Hillyer.
Content: Investigation of the history of categories of race
and ethnicity in the United States, primarily
focused on the historical production of
conceptions of racial and ethnic difference.
Examines the origins, uses, and mutations of
ideologies of race and ethnicity, as well as how
these ideologies intersect with empire and
nationalism, sexuality and gender, capitalism and
labor relations, and scientific knowledge.
Considers both chronological and thematic
approaches. Examines scholarly work, visual
culture, and memoir. Open to all students.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required, unless section number is
preceded by an "F."
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 242 Borderlands: U.S.-Mexico Border, 16th Century to Present
Faculty: Young.
Content: The concept and region known as the Borderlands
from when it was part of northern New Spain to its
present incarnation as the U.S.-Mexico border.
Thematic focus on the roles of imperialism and
capitalism in the formation of borderlands race,
class, gender, and national identities. The
transformation of this region from a frontier
between European empires to a borderline between
nations.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 244 Practicum
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Experience in historical research, writing,
interpreting, or planning. Specifics vary
depending on placement with sponsoring agency.
Eight credits may be applied to graduation
requirements, but only 4 may be applied to major.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing and consent required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 1-4.
HIST 259 India in the Age of Empire
Faculty: Campion.
Content: The political, cross-cultural, and social
development of the Indian subcontinent from the
classical civilizations of late antiquity to the
beginnings of colonial rule in the 18th century.
The artistic and architectural achievements of
Indo-Islamic civilization; the Mughal Empire and
regional polities; religious and cultural
syncretism; the influence of contact with the
West. Special emphasis on the historical
antecedents of contemporary debates about regional
identities, state formation and fragmentation, and
the origins of colonial rule.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 261 Global Environmental History
Faculty: Bernstein.
Content: Introduction to major historical shifts in the
relationship(s) between humans and their
environment from prehistoric times to the present.
Focuses particularly on Asia, Europe, and North
America and covers such topics as the invention of
agriculture, shifting conceptions and portrayals
of nature, the exchange of biota between
continents, responses to natural disasters, the
ecological impact of the industrial revolution,
and the 20th-century environmental movement.
Exploration of the social, cultural, and political
dimensions of environmental change through the
work of environmental historians and a wide range
of primary sources, including literature, artwork,
philosophical texts, government documents,
newspaper articles, and scientific data.
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 288 China in the News: Socio-Anthropological and Historical Perspective on Modern China
Faculty: Glosser, Hubbert.
Content: Rarely a day goes by in the realm of contemporary
American news that does not find China center
stage. Whether through accolades of its
avant-garde architecture, Olympic gold medals, and
booming economy or critiques of its environmental
practices, "neocolonialist" relationship with
Africa, or domestic human rights, China has
garnered an important space in the American public
imaginary. China is a rapidly rising world power
in an international arena witnessing the
increasing economic instability and declining
economic hegemony of Western nations, and its
engagement in the global realm matters. We are
interested in looking at China in the news in two
different ways. First, this course will think
topically about China as news. What is happening
today in China both domestically and
internationally that is worthy of international
coverage? What are the historical precedents for
such events and processes? How does understanding
both the historical record and contemporary
cultural formations help us to comprehend the
significance of their current manifestation?
Second, this course will think theoretically about
China in the news. How is China represented in
American media sources? What are the contours,
influences, and ramifications of these
representations? How do historical precedent and
contemporary culture affect these representations?
Prerequisites: None.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 299 Independent Study
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Opportunities for well-prepared students to design
and pursue a substantive course of independent
learning. Details determined by the student and
the supervising instructor. May be repeated for
credit.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing and consent required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 1-4.
HIST 300 Historical Materials
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Materials and craft of historical research.
Bibliographic method; documentary editing; use of
specialized libraries, manuscripts, maps,
government documents, photographs, objects of
material culture. Career options in history.
Students work with primary sources to develop a
major editing project. Topical content varies
depending on instructor's teaching field.
Enrollment preference given to history majors and
minors.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required.
Usually offered: Annually.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 310 China Discovers the West: Silk, Jesuits, Tea, Opium, and Milk
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: The nature and extent of China's contact with
other countries, including the silk roads to
Middle Asia in the first millennium B.C.E.,
Jesuits and the influx of Spanish-American silver
in the 16th century, British tea and opium trade,
and Chinese intellectual experiments with social
Darwinism, anarchism, communism, and the nuclear
family ideal. Primary sources showing foreign and
Chinese perceptions of the content and
significance of these exchanges.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 311 History of Family, Gender, and Sexuality in China
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: Development of family structure, gender roles, and
sexuality in Chinese history, explored through
oracle bones, family instructions, tales of
exemplary women, poetry, painting, drama, fiction,
and calendar posters. Key movements in the
transformation of family and gender from 1600
B.C.E. to the 20th century. Close readings of
texts to explore how social, economic, religious,
and political forces shaped family and gender
roles.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 313 Religion, Society, and the State in Japanese History
Faculty: Bernstein.
Content: Japanese religious traditions and their impact on
social and political structures from ancient times
to the present. Examination of the doctrinal and
institutional development of Buddhism,
Confucianism, Shinto, and Christianity, as well as
the creation and suppression of more marginal
belief systems. Issues include pilgrimage, spirit
possession, death practices, millenarianism,
militarism, abortion, eco-spiritualism, and
religious terrorism. Sources include canonical
scriptures, short stories, diaries, government
records, newspaper articles, artwork, films.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 316 Popular Culture and Everyday Life in Japanese History
Faculty: Bernstein.
Content: Popular culture as the site of social change and
social control in Japan from the 18th to the 20th
century. Religion and folk beliefs, work and
gender roles, theatre and music, tourism,
consumerism, citizens' movements, fashion, food,
sports, sex, drugs, hygiene, and forms of mass
media ranging from woodblock prints to modern
comic books, film, television. Concepts as well as
content of popular and mass culture.
Prerequisites: HIST 112 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 320 Humanism in Renaissance Europe
Faculty: Westervelt.
Content: Writings by major figures in the humanist movement
from the 14th to the 16th century. Social,
political, intellectual contexts of humanism in
the university and Italian city-state; ideal of
return to sources of classical culture; civic
humanism; interplay between Christian and secular
ideals; relationship between Italian and northern
forms of humanism; relationship between
Renaissance humanism and the Protestant
Reformation; comparative experience of Renaissance
humanists and artists.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 323 Modern European Intellectual History
Faculty: Healy.
Content: Approaches to the problem of ethical values in
19th- and 20th-century European thought, including
Marxist, social Darwinist, Nietzschean, and
Freudian perspectives; existentialism;
postmodernism. Readings in philosophical,
literary, artistic works.
Prerequisites: HIST 121 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 324 Saints and Bureaucrats
Content: Charism and bureaucracy in the careers of Ignatius
of Loyola, founder of the Jesuits, and Teresa of
Avila, of the Discalced Carmelites. Ignatius and
Teresa as mystics, theologians, founders and/or
reformers of religious orders, believers. Impact
of national origin, social status, gender on their
careers and on early modern Catholicism.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 120 or RELS 373 recommended.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 325 History of Islam in Europe
Faculty: Healy.
Content: The history of Islam in Europe from the medieval
period to the present, focusing on various
encounters between European Christians and
Muslims. The crusades, Christian and Muslim
presence in Iberia, Ottoman conquest in
southeastern Europe, European colonial conquest,
the role of Islam in post-1945 decolonization, and
questions about Muslim immigration and European
identity.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 326 History of Soviet Russia
Faculty: Healy.
Content: Examines tensions (political, social, cultural) of
the final decades of the Romanov dynasty and
traces the collapse of the 300-year-old empire
during the First World War. Focus is largely on
the 20th century. Topics include the Russian
Revolution, "Soviet Man" (Homo Sovieticus),
Stalinism, collectivization, terror, the "Great
Patriotic War," Cold War culture, the
Sovietization of Eastern Europe, the Brezhnev era,
reforms of the Gorbachev period, the end of the
Soviet Union, and legacies for Russia and the
other successor states. Attention throughout to
gender, family, nation, and concept of the
individual in relation to the collective.
Prerequisites: None. HIST 121 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 328 The British Empire
Faculty: Campion.
Content: The history of British overseas expansion from the
early 17th century to the end of the 20th century.
Theories of imperialism; Britain's Atlantic trade
network; the Victorian empire in war and peace;
collaboration and resistance among colonized
people; India under the British Raj; Africa and
economic imperialism; the effects of empire on
British society; the creation of the British
Commonwealth; the rise of nationalism in India,
Africa, and the Middle East; decolonization and
postcolonial perspectives. Extensive readings from
primary sources.
Prerequisites: HIST 121 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 331 American Culture and Society: 1880 to 1980
Faculty: Hunter.
Content: Formation of modern culture from the late
Victorian era to the "me decade." The influence of
consumer culture, popular psychology, mass media,
changing definitions of work and leisure in the
development of a modern self. Origins and impact
of the gender and race revolutions, relationship
of "high" and "popular" culture. Readings in
primary and secondary sources.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 335 History and Culture of American Indians
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Purposes of archaeology and its contributions to
the understanding of North American prehistory,
the culture-area hypothesis, relations with tribes
from colonial times to the present, Native
American responses. Federal Indian policy and its
evolution over the past 200 years.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 336 Wilderness and the American West
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: History of the trans-Mississippi West, including
Euro-American perceptions of North America, issues
of progress and preservation, and environmental
history. Role of the federal government;
contributions of minorities, women, and men in
shaping the trans-Mississippi West. Voices of
those who have sought to develop and conserve the
West.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 345 Race and Nation in Latin America
Faculty: Young.
Content: Social thought about race and nation in Latin
America. The Iberian concept of pureza de sangre,
development of criollo national consciousness,
20th-century indigenista movements. Linkages
between national identities and constructions of
race, particularly in the wake of revolutionary
movements. Freyre (Brazil), Marti (Cuba),
Vasconcelos (Mexico), and Sarmiento (Argentina)
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 347 Modern Mexico: Culture, Politics, and Economic Crisis
Faculty: Young.
Content: Origins and development of the modern Mexican
nation from independence to the contemporary
economic and political crisis. 1811 to 1940:
liberal-conservative battles, imperialism, the pax
Porfiriana, the Mexican Revolution,
industrialization, and institutionalizing the
revolution. 1940 to the present: urbanization,
migration to the United States, the student
movement, neoliberal economics and politics,
disintegration of the PRI (Institutional
Revolutionary Party), and the new social
rebellions (Zapatistas, Popular Revolutionary
Army, Civil Society). Constructing mexicanidad in
music, dance, film, and the cultural poetics of
the street and the town plaza.
Prerequisites: HIST 141 or HIST 142 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 348 Modern Cuba
Faculty: Young.
Content: Development of the modern Cuban nation from the
independence movement of the mid-19th century to
the contemporary socialist state. Focus on how
identity changed under the Spanish colonial, U.S.
neocolonial, Cuban republic, and revolutionary
states. 1840s to 1898: wars of independence,
slavery, transition to free labor. 1898 to 1952:
U.S. occupation and neocolonialism, Afrocubanismo,
populism. 1952 to the present: Castro revolution,
socialism, U.S.-Cuban-Soviet relations.
Prerequisites: HIST 142 recommended.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, fall semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 388 What's for Dinner
Faculty: Glosser.
Content: Cross-cultural examination of the history and
cultural, political, and economic power of food.
Topics include the power and politics exercised
through ethnic/racial, gender, and class
differences in food consumption; ways in which
people express their religious, ethnic, class,
gender, and regional identities through food;
nostalgia for the food ways of the past and ideas
about the food of the future; the history of
manners and the cultural value of food etiquette;
and "nutritionism," or why we think certain things
are good for us. Materials include scholarly and
popular books and essays, as well as primary
sources.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Alternate Years, spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 400 Reading Colloquium
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Reading and critical analysis of major
interpretive works. Organized around themes or
problems; comparative study of historical works
exemplifying different points of view,
methodologies, subject matter. Focus varies
depending on instructor's teaching and research
area. May be taken twice for credit. Enrollment
preference given to history majors and minors.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Junior standing or consent of instructor required.
Usually offered: Annually.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 444 Practicum
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Same as HIST 244 but requiring more advanced work.
8 credits may be applied to graduation
requirements, but only 4 may be applied to the
major.
Prerequisites: None..
Restrictions: Sophomore standing and consent required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 1-4.
HIST 450 History Seminar
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Work with primary documents to research and write
a major paper that interprets history. Topical
content varies depending on instructor's teaching
field. Recent topics: the Americas; the United
States and Asia; European intellectual history
since 1945; women in American history; Indian
policy on the Pacific slope; World War II, the
participants' perspectives; the British Raj;
cultural nationalism in East Asia. May be taken
twice for credit. Enrollment preference given to
history majors and minors.
Prerequisites: HIST 300.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing or consent required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
HIST 499 Independent Study
Faculty: History Faculty.
Content: Same as HIST 299 but requiring more advanced work.
May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites: None.
Restrictions: Sophomore standing and consent required.
Usually offered: Annually, fall and spring semester.
Semester credits: 4.
Programs of Study