Catalogue 2022-2023 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]
History Department
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Chair: Sumita Choudhury;
Professors: Nancy Bisaha, Robert K. Brigham, Sumita Choudhury, Rebecca Edwards, James Merrell, Lydia Murdoch, Ismail O. D. Rashid, Joshua Schreierab;
Associate Professors: Michaela Pohl, Wayne Soon;
Assistant Professors: Daniel Mendiola, Allison Puglisi, Ashanti Shih.
ab On leave 2022/23
Advisers: The department.
Major
Correlate Sequence in History
History: I. Introductory
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HIST 103 - How We Got Here Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as CLCS 103 and RELI 103 ) This course is a dynamic introduction to the ways in which texts, traditions, concepts, and institutions throughout history have brought us to the moment in which we currently exist, and how they prepare us to meet the challenges of the future. No matter how “modern” an issue may seem—be it race, money, gender, violence—the roots or echoes of a deeper past are always there in ways that bear examining. By starting with the distant past and bringing our questions forward in time, we can find a space to explore and discuss tough issues that often polarize people today. Sources may include selections from the Bible, medieval epic, and the arts. This course has several Vassar faculty guest speakers who work on these issues in the modern period, and it also features practitioners in various fields beyond academia who discuss how their undergraduate studies in the humanities and social sciences shaped their lives. Students all have the chance to attend a dinner with one of the speakers outside of class. Nancy Bisaha, Marc Epstein.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 104 - Asian American History Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 104 ) This course provides an introduction to the history of East, South, and Southeast Asian migrations and settlement to the United States from the late 18th century to the present. Major themes include labor, migration, community formation, U.S. imperialism, religion, legal exclusion, racial segregation, gender and sexuality, cultural representations, and political resistance. Students engage with Asian American voices and key concepts in ethnic studies, as we explore the incredible diversity of experiences that make up Asian American history. Throughout, the course challenges students to contend with the category “Asian American” and argues that Asian American stories are crucial to understand U.S. history and American race relations more broadly. Ashanti Shih.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 115 - Russian Revolutions: Metropolis and Borderlands Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course offers an introduction to radical movements in the late Russian Empire and the early Soviet Union. We look not only at the groups who took power in Petrograd and Moscow in 1917 but beyond, to discover a broad array of causes and revolutionary processes in the non-Russian borderlands and across the empire. The course examines local dynamics, changing ideas about women, the roles ethnic identities play in resistance movements, and the shape of class conflict in non-Russian societies. We also consider how clichés, propaganda, and strategic silences are used to define and control this history. Topics include the assassination of the Tsar in 1881, Russian and non-Russian revolutionary parties, the Central Asian uprising of 1916, Russia’s cities in 1917, and some of the events and outcomes of the post-revolutionary war. Michaela Pohl.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 116 - The Dark Ages Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
Was early medieval Europe really Dark? In reality, this was a period of tremendous vitality and ferment, witnessing the transformation of late classical society, the growth of Germanic kingdoms, the high point of Byzantium, the rise of the papacy and monasticism, and the birth of Islam. This course examines a rich variety of sources that illuminate the first centuries of Christianity, the fall of the Roman Empire, and early medieval culture showing moments of both conflict and synthesis that redefined Europe and the Mediterranean. Nancy Bisaha.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 117 - High Middle Ages
1 unit(s)
This course examines medieval Europe at both its cultural and political height. Topics of study include: the first universities; government from feudal lordships to national monarchies; courtly and popular culture; manorial life and town life; the rise of papal monarchy; new religious orders and spirituality among the laity. Relations with religious outsiders are explored in topics on European Jewry, heretics, and the Crusades. Nancy Bisaha.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 124 - Europe 1945
1 unit(s)
On May 8, 1945 the Second World War ended in Europe. After six years of fighting, millions of soldiers and civilians had been killed. The Nazi genocide had led to the brutal murder of millions of Jews and other minorities. Some of Europe’s most magnificent cities lay in ruins, while some twenty million refugees, expellees, or displaced persons wandered the highways in search of shelter and security. Readings explore the roots of the war, and how European countries dealt with the destruction, the questions of guilt, collaboration and resistance, and the challenge to create a peaceful Europe in the emerging Cold War order. Maria Höhn.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 125 - Infamy on Trial: Famous Trials in Early Modern Europe Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course examines several of the most famous trials of Europe’s early modern period (1500-1700). Each trial allows us to explore how communities and individuals responded to the changing nature of European society during this period of upheaval. Through cases involving all sorts of people—men and women, peasants and kings, we have access to conflicting understandings of authority, family, religion, and gender. The trial of Galileo challenged contemporary understandings of what it meant to be a Christian while the execution of King Charles I raised questions about kingship. By studying criminal cases, we engage with a rich selection of primary sources, such as trial records, contemporary accounts, and private papers. Through these readings, the class investigates how early modern people interpreted crime and justice during moments of crisis. Sumita Choudhury.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 128 - Europe 1945 - Rethinking History
0.5 unit(s)
On May 8, 1945 the Second World War ended in Europe. After six years of fighting, millions of soldiers and civilians had been killed. The Nazi genocide had led to the brutal murder of millions of Jews, and other minorities. Some of Europe’s most magnificent cities lay in ruins, while some twenty million refugees, expellees, or displaced persons wandered the highways in search of shelter and security. Readings for this class explore how European countries dealt with the aftermath of the war, as well as the questions of guilt, collaboration, and resistance. In particular, readings and discussions focus on the tension between history and memory as Europeans tried to come to terms with the war. Maria Höhn.
Second six-week course.
One 2-hour meeting.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 143 - Russia, Ukraine, and the Steppe
1 unit(s)
This course introduces students to the history of the Russians and their neighbors on the Eurasian Steppe, a vast region that stretches from Ukraine to Kazakhstan. Topics include the relations between Russians and Ukrainians and nomadic and semi-nomadic people (Tatars, Kazakhs, Cossacks), the great steppe empires, the imposition of serfdom, the uprisings of the steppe (1660s and 1916), and the complex mix of violence and development that was unleashed in the Soviet period, including famines, forced cultural change, and industrialization. We will also consider the connections between the cultural and political history of this region and current events, such as the creation of a new Eurasian Union. Course materials include history texts, memoirs, fiction, newspapers, Soviet and post-Soviet films, and maps. Course participants practice writing regularly, with an emphasis on discussing and constructing arguments, finding and using evidence, and comparing perspectives and points of view (American, Russian, Ukrainian, Central Asian). Michaela Pohl.
Open only to first-year students; satisfies the college requirement for a First-Year Writing Seminar.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 150 - Revolution, Evolution, and the Global Nineteenth Century Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as CLCS 150 and GNCS 150 ) The world as we know it largely came into being during the nineteenth century. Marked by social, political, cultural, and technological transformations, the nineteenth century witnessed the emergence of modernity out of the instabilities of change. Railways crisscrossed continents; European empires expanded; agricultural laborers flocked into mushrooming urban centers; and the enslaved, the colonized, and the disenfranchised around the world fought for liberty and citizenship. In this course, we consider these and other nineteenth-century transformations in a global context by focusing on the interconnections between North America, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Our investigations are organized around five core areas: revolutions, emancipations, evolution and progress, popular culture, and the domestic sphere. Students analyze a variety of sources, including novels, plays, short stories, photographs, early films, paintings, periodicals and pamphlets, government documents, letters, music, and scientific works. The course is team taught with occasional guest lectures. Lydia Murdoch and Susan Zlotnick.
Three 50-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 151 - British History: James I (1603) to the Great War
1 unit(s)
This course explores the central developments in Britain from the age of Shakespeare to the age of total war. We study the political and scientific revolutions of the seventeenth century, the eighteenth-century rise of commercial society and the “British” nation, and the effects of industrialization on Britain’s landscape, society, and politics. The course concludes by exploring how the First World War transformed British society. Lydia Murdoch.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 152 - Smallpox: The Biology and History of a Disease
1 unit(s)
(Same as BIOL 152 , STS 152 and GNCS 152 ) Smallpox was one of the deadliest diseases in history: it killed millions, often leaving survivors scarred or blinded. Its eradication in 1980 also marks one of the great medical victories of the modern era. This course examines smallpox from both biological and historical perspectives. Students explore the workings of the virus, the effects of the disease, the popularization of inoculation in the eighteenth century, Edward Jenner’s development of the cowpox vaccine and how it protects, and efforts to enforce vaccination globally through some of the earliest state public health initiatives. We also investigate the nineteenth-century origins of the anti-vaccination movement with particular attention to its class, anti-imperial, and religious underpinnings. Lydia Murdoch.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 160 - American Moments: Rediscovering U.S. History
1 unit(s)
This is not your parents’—or your high school teacher’s—American history course. No textbook: Instead we read memoirs, novels, newspaper articles, letters, speeches, photographs, and films composed by a colorful, diverse cast of characters—famous and forgotten, slaves and masters, workers and bosses. No survey: Instead we pause to look at several illuminating “moments” from the colonial era through the Civil War to civil rights and the Cold War. Traveling from the Great Awakening to the “awakening” that was the 1960s, from an anticolonial rebellion that Americans won (1776) to another that they lost (Vietnam), the course challenges assumptions about America’s past—and perhaps also a few about America’s present and future. The Department.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 161 - Violent Economies: Rewriting the American West Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course considers themes in the history of the United States and its trans-Mississippi frontiers. Among these are resource exploitation and cycles of boom and bust; violence and accompanying ideologies of race, class, gender, religious faith, and property rights; dispossession of native peoples and their survival, resistance, and resilience; and the emergence of an ethos of environmental conservation. To examine these issues, we investigate histories of the West from the California Gold Rush through twentieth-century dam-building and firefighting. Along the way, we compare these to other kinds of storytelling, including eyewitness accounts, fiction, and mythmaking. Rebecca Edwards.
Open only to first-year students; satisfies college requirement for a First-Year Writing Seminar.
Three 50-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 163 - A History of American Foreign Relations Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course examines the foreign relations of the United States from the 19th Century to present day emphasizing the motivations, objectives, and tactics of U.S. policy makers. The course will focus on America’s role in the Spanish-American War; its embroilment in two world wars; its Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union; its wars in Korea and Vietnam; its response to human rights abuses and mass atrocities; and its leadership in the global war on terror. Robert Brigham.
Open only to first-year students; satisfies the college requirement for a First-Year Writing Seminar.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 164 - Environmental History of Latin America Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as ENST 164 and LALS 164 ) This course explores the history of Latin America by centering the environment. Beginning with examples in the ancient Americas and continuing through the colonial and national periods, this course explores how human ideas about the environment, along with tangible regimes for exploiting “natural” resources, have shaped the history of Latin America. Class materials draw from a range of academic, literary, and primary sources, and class discussions cover topics such as: the flora and fauna of the ancient Americas; organisms and landscapes of the “Spanish Conquest”; ranching, farming, and export agriculture; mining, drilling, and extractivist industries; hurricanes, volcanoes, and “natural” disasters; urbanization, pollution, and climate change; and debates over environmental protections and human rights. Accordingly, this course addresses the questions: what discourses, representations, and ideas have shaped the meaning of the environment in Latin America? How has the environment shaped broader meanings of Latin America itself? And what is at stake today for the people of Latin America today as governments, corporations, and NGOs take different approaches to environmental issues? Daniel Mendiola.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 168 - Introduction to African American History Semester Offered: Spring and Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 168 ) This course introduces students to major themes and debates in African American history, starting with their African origins and leading into the twenty-first century. It explores African American experiences through a variety of primary source materials, including letters, speeches, newspaper articles, posters and autobiographies. Through lecture and class discussion, students interrogate how race, class, gender, sexuality and ability have shaped African American experiences over time. The primary objective is to help students develop a solid understanding of the political, social, economic and personal lives of African Americans from their arrival in the colonies through today. Specific topics covered include African antecedents, colonial and antebellum slavery, the abolitionist movement, African American free people, the Civil War, Emancipation, Jim Crow segregation, the modern freedom struggle, popular culture, and the contemporary experience. Allison Puglisi
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 174 - The Emergence of the Modern Middle East
1 unit(s)
An exploration of the Middle East over the past three centuries. Beginning with economic and social transformations in the eighteenth century, we follow the transformation of various Ottoman provinces such as Egypt, Syria/Lebanon, and Algeria into modern states, paying careful attention to how European colonialism shaped their development. We then look at independence movements and the post-colonial societies that have emerged since the middle of the twentieth century, concluding with study of colonialism’s lingering power—and the movements that confront it. Joshua Schreier.
Open only to first-year students; satisfies the college requirement for a First-Year Writing Seminar.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 175 - Mandela: Race, Resistance and Renaissance in South Africa Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 175 ) This course critically explores the history and politics of South Africa in the twentieth century through the prism of the life, politics, and experiences of one of its most iconic figures, Nelson Mandela. After almost three decades of incarceration for resisting Apartheid, Mandela became the first democratically elected president of a free South Africa in 1994. It was an inspirational moment in the global movement and the internal struggle to dismantle Apartheid and to transform South Africa into a democratic, non-racial, and just society. Using Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, as our point of departure, the course discusses some of the complex ideas, people, and developments that shaped South Africa and Mandela’s life in the twentieth century, including: indigenous culture, religion, and institutions; colonialism, race, and ethnicity; nationalism, mass resistance, and freedom; and human rights, social justice, and post-conflict reconstruction. Ismail Rashid.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 178 - The Global Cold War
1 unit(s)
The Cold War was a political, ideological, military, and social conflict that engulfed the major powers—the United States, Soviet Union, and China–from 1945 until 1989. Yet it also involved peoples and states throughout the global south. This course examines the history of the Cold War for the purpose of illuminating powerful military, political, economic, social, and ideological dynamics that continue to shape global power. Robert Brigham.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS
History: II. Intermediate
The prerequisite for courses at the 200-level is ordinarily 1 unit in history. -
HIST 214 - The Roots of the Palestine-Israel Conflict
1 unit(s)
(Same as JWST 214 ) An examination of the deep historical sources of the Palestine-Israel conflict. The course begins some two centuries ago when changes in the world economy and emerging nationalist ideologies altered the political and economic landscapes of the region. It then traces the development of both Jewish and Arab nationalism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries before exploring how the Arab and Jewish populations fought—and cooperated—on a variety of economic, political, and ideological fronts. It concludes by considering how this contest led to the development of two separate, hostile national identities. Joshua Schreier.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 216 - History of the Ancient Greeks
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 216 ) This course examines the history and culture of the ancient Greeks from the emergence of the city-state in the eighth century BCE to the conquests of Alexander the Great in 335 BCE. In addition to an outline of the political and social history of the Greeks, the course examines several historical, cultural, and methodological topics in depth, including the emergence of writing, Greek colonialism and imperialism, ancient democracy, polytheism, the social structures of Athenian society, and the relationship between Greeks and other Mediterranean cultures. Students both read primary sources (for example, Sappho, Tyrtaios, Herodotus, Thucydides, Aristophanes, and Plato) and examine sites and artifacts recovered through archaeology; the development of students’ critical abilities to evaluate and use these sources for the study of history is a primary goal of the class. Barbara Olsen.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 217 - History of the Ancient Romans
1 unit(s)
(Same as GRST 217 ) This course examines the history of the ancient Romans from the foundation of their city around the eighth century BCE to the collapse of their Mediterranean Empire in the fifth century CE. The course offers a broad historical outline of Roman history, but focuses on significant topics and moments in Roman history, including the Republican aristocracy, the civil and slave wars of the Late Republic, the foundation of the Empire by Caesar Augustus, urbanism, the place of public entertainments (gladiatorial combats, Roman hunts, chariot races, and theater) in society, the rise of Christianity, the processes of Romanization, and barbarization, and the political decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Students read primary sources such as Plautus, Cicero, Livy, Tacitus, and Suetonius, and secondary accounts dealing with important issues such as slavery, religious persecution and multiculturalism. Students also examine important archaeological sites and artifacts. The development of students’ critical abilities to evaluate and use these sources for the study of history is a primary goal of the class.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 221 - Medieval Science and Technology Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as MRST 221 and STS 221 ) Science and technology: the very words seem synonymous with “modernity.” Yet, crucial developments in scientific knowledge and application occurred during the Middle Ages, forming the foundation for the Scientific Revolution. This interdisciplinary course offers an introduction to science and technology in medieval Europe and the Mediterranean world, exploring the influence of classical, East Asian, and Arab learning, and the rise of empiricism and experimentation. Through readings, discussions, and hands-on activities, we examine developments in monasteries, universities, castles, and farms. Topics may include beer making, beekeeping, alchemy, siege warfare, watermills, astrology, plagues, and medicine. Nancy Bisaha, Christopher Smart.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 222 - The Politics of Borders Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 222 and LALS 222 ) This course interrogates the normative construction of nation-state borders and the meaning of nation-state borders. We do so from the United States/Mexico border, and utilize a comparative approach, relating Latinx Studies to critical Indigenous feminist perspectives. While focused mainly on the United States landmass the course also critically foregrounds Native/Indigenous land and sovereignty to reconceptualize the United States as a settler colonial, imperial state. Utilizing the knowledges of Latinx and Indigenous thinkers, students trace the construction of modern borders and productively reframe assumptions around immigration/migration, citizenship, nationalism and indigenismo/Indigeneity.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 225 - Renaissance Italy Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 225 ) This course examines the history of Italy between 1300 and 1565. Italian intellectual, political, and religious history is emphasized, but some attention is also given to cross-cultural, gender, and social history. Looking beyond Italy, we also consider developments in Byzantium and the Ottoman Empire and their impact on Italy and Europe. Topics to be covered include the Black Death, the rise of humanism, the Renaissance papacy, and the Catholic Reformation. Finally, throughout the course, we question the meaning of the term “Renaissance”: is it a distinct period, a cultural movement, or an insufficient label altogether?
Two 75-minute periods.
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HIST 226 - Northern Europe in the Renaissance, c. 1300-1550 Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
As a famous scholar has argued, the north witnessed a long “autumn of the Middle Ages,” holding tightly to medieval ideals of chivalry, pageantry, and piety – precisely at the same time Italy seemed to be forging ahead into modernity. Yet by the end of the period, Northern states overshadowed Italy politically, economically and, increasingly, culturally. This course examines Northern Europe during this remarkable period of transformation. The Hundred Years War, the Black Death, the Tudors, French and German state building and court life, and urban society in Flanders, are addressed along with the poetry of Chaucer, the humanism of More and Erasmus, and the doctrine of Luther. In turn, we examine the complex meanings of the terms “Renaissance” and “Reformation” and the relationship between them. Nancy Bisaha.
Two 75-minute periods.
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HIST 229 - Paris and London: Society and Culture in the Early Modern City, 1500-1800
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 229 ) Between 1500-1800 European society experienced upheavals caused by cataclysmic events such as the Reformation and major shifts in economic and political organization. And it was Europeans living in urban areas – Europeans of different social status, faith, and ethnicities – who experienced these changes most intensely. This course investigates how two of the most dynamic cities in early modern Europe, London and Paris, changed from essentially medieval cities to urban metropolises. We look at the changing material, religious, and political conditions of London and Paris over two centuries and explore how the peoples of these two cities articulated and made sense of such changes. The central focus of the class will be examining how the identities of Parisians and Londoners as urban dwellers underwent transformations during this period.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 231 - Algeria/France:Race, Religion & Citizenship
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 231 ) Since the early modern era, slavery, colonialism, commerce, piracy, and migration have woven the Mediterranean together in both peace and in horrifying violence. This broad, multipolar web of conflict and communication has served as the context in which multiple French and Algerian identities have careened into modernity. Constant references to local and cross-Mediterranean “others” have shaped the very meanings of such key terms as “emancipation,” “republic,” “Islam,” “progress,” and “civilization.” Even today, debates on issues ranging from women’s clothing to secularism to immigration to anti-Semitism echo with this long and contested history.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 235 - Ending Deadly Conflict Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as INTL 235 ) This course uses historical case studies to identify practical ways to end conflict and build sustainable peace. It is concerned with the vulnerability of the weak, failed and collapsed states, with post conflict periods that have reignited into violence, and problems of mediating conflicts that are unusually resistant to resolution. Of particular interest will be the role that third party intermediaries and global governance institutions have played in bringing about a negotiated end to violence. Major topics may include: the Paris Peace Accords, South Africa’s truth and reconciliation commissions, the Good Friday Agreement, Israel-Palestine negotiations, the Dayton Peace Accords ending the Balkans wars, and negotiations to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Robert Brigham.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 236 - The Black Freedom Struggle Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 236 and WFQS 236 ) This course considers the thought and organizing of Black activists in the Civil Rights Era. Importantly, Black activists did not all speak with one voice: they often disagreed on the path forward for Black Americans. For that reason, this course explores the diversity of Black political visions from roughly 1930 to 1980: liberalism, feminism, communism, nationalism, and combinations thereof. We devote special attention to the role of religion and spirituality in shaping Black social movements. Toward the end of the course, we consider how Black activists’ objectives shifted after Jim Crow’s end. Class readings consist of both historical and creative texts. Allison Puglisi.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 237 - Gender and Sexuality in African America Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 237 and WFQS 237 ) African American history is also the history of gender and sexuality. As structural racism imposed sexual rules on Black Americans, they responded with their own creative expressions of gender and sexuality. The course begins by exploring how experiences of slavery differed across gender, Black women articulated abolitionism, and legislation against interracial desire shaped American politics. We then consider an array of twentieth-century Black feminist, trans, and queer movements: the National Welfare Rights Organization Combahee River Collective, STAR, and more. Allison Puglisi.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 241 - Asian American Women and Gender History Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 241 and ASIA 241 ) This course focuses on Asian American women as key historical actors and the use of gender analysis to re-examine major themes in Asian American history: immigration, labor, communtiy formation, cultural representations, feminist political organizing, sexuality, and marriage and family life. We also touch on the “queering” of Asian American history, as well as ideas of masculinity and the intersections of sexuality and racialization for Asian American men. Course materials emphasie Asian American women’s voices and include memoirs, poetry, film, oral histories, and artwork in addition to traditional academic texts. Students explore different types of archives and methodologies to evelop a final reserch project of their choice. Ashanti Shih.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 242 - The Russian Empire to 1812 Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course introduces major events and issues in the history of the Russians and their neighbors to the South and East. The main themes each week include the formation of Russia’s autocracy and nobility, Eurasian family/clan politics and cultural practices, and the connection between expansion and repression. Topics include the great steppe empires, Russia as part of the Golden Horde (1240-1480), the era of Ivan the Terrible and his conquest of the Tatars of the Volga, the Time of Troubles, the conquest of Siberia, the imposition of serfdom, westernization and globalization of the Russian Empire under Peter the Great, relations with the Ottoman Empire under Russia’s female tsarinas, the conquest of the Caucasus, and the history of the Cossacks. Michaela Pohl.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 243 - Russia and the Soviet Union, 1861-2000 Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
This course explores how Russians and their neighbors (Ukrainians, Poles, Kazakhs, and others) collectively encountered the age of revolutions and socialism. The beginning and the end of the Soviet Union in 1917 and in 1991 pitted national dreams against socialist ideology and Western-style shock therapy, and both were followed by decades of economic troubles and political chaos. Topics include the emancipation from serfdom, the Bolshevik revolution, Stalinism, the Communist Party and the purges, the victory over the Nazis in World War II, reforms under Khrushchev and Gorbachev, the fall of communism, oligarchic politics, and the rebirth of Russia and the war in Chechnya under Yeltsin and Putin. Michaela Pohl.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 245 - Medicine, Health and Diseases in East Asia Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 245 and STS 245 ) From the globalization of acupuncture to the proliferation of biobanks to the fight against the deadly SARS virus, the history of East Asian medicine and society has been marked by promises and perils. Through examining the ways in which East Asians conceptualized medicine and the body in their fight against diseases from a myriad of sources, this course critically examines the persistence, transformation, and globalization of both “traditional medicine” and biomedicine in East Asia. Topics covered include the knowledge of nature as embedded in the changing categorization of pharmaceuticals, the contestation over vaccination and the definition of diseases, the construction of gender and sexuality in medicine, the importance of religion in healing, the legacies of colonialism in biopolitics and biotechnology, the development of healthcare systems, and the imaginations of Asian medicine in the West. Wayne Soon.
Two 75-minute periods.
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HIST 246 - World War II in East Asia Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 246 ) The Second World War was transformative for Japan and China. At the height of its conquest, the Japanese Empire ruled over more than 130 million people, even as it struggled to deal with controversies and scarcity. China became one of the Big Four Allied Powers as state building and resistance persisted in unoccupied areas. This class examines how the Second World War shaped the everyday lives of East Asians and foreigners through speeches, memoirs, fiction, oral histories, documents, and films. In addition, this course explores the contexts, contingencies, and legacies of wartime events and issues. This includes the Nanjing massacre, the Chinese, Koreans, and Taiwanese resistance to and collaboration with the Japanese, Japan’s wartime mobilization, the internment of Japanese-Americans in the United States, the role of wartime science and technology, the gendered and racial underpinnings of wartime labor, the rise of the Chinese Communist Party, and the U.S. government’s decision to release atomic bombs in Japan. Wayne Soon.
Two 75-minute periods.
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HIST 247 - Albert Einstein
1 unit(s)
(Same as STS 247 ) This course explores the complex life and work of the iconic scientist of the 20th century. Using recent biographical studies and a wide range of original sources (in translation), Einstein’s revolutionary contributions to relativity and quantum mechanics, his role in Germany in the opposition to the rise of Nazi ideology and anti-Semitism, and his work as a political and social activist in the United States are examined. Students are encouraged to make use of Vassar’s Bergreen Collection of original Einstein manuscripts. José Perillán.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 249 - Global Science and Empire 1800-Present Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 249 and STS 249 ) Why has science been considered a “tool of empire’? How has scientific knowledge shaped and been shaped by colonial experiences? How did Indigenous and local peoples variously participate in and resist encounters with colonial science? This course explores these questions as we survey the relationship between science and empire from the early nineteenth century to the present. Rather than take a comprehensive approach, students engage with a series of case studies from around the globe that touch on various scientific disciplines and practices–such as anthropological exhibitions across the British empire, American colonial medicine in the Philippines, scientific forestry in Japanese-occupied Korea and Taiwan, and mapping in postcolonial India–to learn how science has been used both for imperial control and as a means of envisioning postcolonial futures. Other major themes include scientific exploration; collecting and classifying; race, gender, and sexuality; Indigenous knowledge; postcolonial science; and, finally, the contemporary conversation around “decolonizing’ the sciences and scientific institutions. Throughout the course, students engage with visual, material, and textual sources, including visits to campus collections. Ashanti Shih.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 251 - A History of American Foreign Relations
1 unit(s)
This course examines the foreign relations of the United States from the 19th century to the present day emphasizing the motivations, objectives, and tactics of U.S. policy makers. The course will focus on America’s role in the Spanish-American War; its embroilment in two world wars; its Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union; its wars in Korea and Vietnam; its response to human rights abuses and mass atrocities; and its leadership in the global war on terror. Robert Brigham.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 254 - Victorian Britain Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 254 and GNCS 254 ) This course examines some of the key transformations that Victorians experienced, including industrialization, the rise of a class-based society, political reform, and the women’s movement. We explore why people then, and historians since, have characterized the Victorian age as a time of progress and optimism as well as an era of anxiety and doubt. Lydia Murdoch.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 255 - The British Empire
1 unit(s)
This course is an introduction to British imperialism from the mid-eighteenth century to the twenty-first century, with particular attention to imperial encounters involving Britain, the Atlantic world, South Asia, and Africa. The main theme of the course is the way in which historical constructions of gender, race, and class not only aided in the establishment of imperial control, but also influenced subsequent imperial and national identities. We examine British motives for imperialism, the transition from trade empires to more formal political control, the late nineteenth-century “Scramble for Africa,” decolonization, and the long campaign for civil rights in Britain. Students engage current historical debates, practice the skills of historical analysis, and produce a final research paper on a topic of choice. Lydia Murdoch
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 257 - Comics and History Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
In this intensive study we research and draw cartoons about history in the broadest sense. Topics can include public history, self-discovery, memory, trauma work, nostalgia, and comedic, ironic, or fantasy reworkings of past events. Course participants research settings and images, illustrations, fashion, and propaganda from the culture and era in question and develop a plot and dialogue. The work involves reading a cartooning manual, drawing on paper or digitally, and considering how comics aesthetics, layout, and composition contribute to constructing a historical narrative. Students submit drafts, critique them in class, and re-submit inked versions of the previous week’s page. The final project is a 10-page mini comic. Michaela Pohl.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 260 - Sex & Reproduction in 19th Century United States: Before Margaret Sanger Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as WFQS 260 ) Focusing on the United States from roughly 1800 to 1900, this course explores sex and reproduction and their relationship to broader transformations in society, politics, and women’s rights. Among the issues considered are birth patterns on the frontier and in the slave South; industrialization, urbanization, and falling fertility; the rise of sex radicalism; and the emergence of “heterosexual” and “homosexual” as categories of identity. The course examines public scandals, such as the infamous Beecher-Tilton adultery trial, and the controversy over education and women’s health that was prompted by the opening of Vassar College. The course ends by tracing the complex impact of the Comstock law (1873) and the emergence of a modern movement for birth control. Rebecca Edwards.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 263 - Conquest and Borderlands in Colonial Latin America Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as LALS 263 ) This course explores the history of colonial Latin America by centering conquests and borderlands. Beginning with examples in the ancient Americas and continuing through the end of the 18th century, this course explores the ideas, practices, and experiences that shaped the long-term processes of conquering territory, as well as the parallel processes of creating “borderlands” in the places that conquering powers failed to reach. Class materials draw from a range of academic, literary, and primary sources, and class discussions cover topics such as: the Aztec Empire and its war with the Spanish; the Canary Islands and early precedents of Spanish conquests; the Philippines and Latin America’s Asian borderlands; the indigenous Comanche Empire and North American borderlands; the afro-indigenous Mosquito Confederation and Caribbean borderlands; and the indigenous Mapuche Nation and South American borderlands. Accordingly, this class addresses the questions: what is a conquest? What are borderlands? How have conquests shaped the history of Latin America? How do borderlands call into question traditional narratives of conquest? And what is at stake in questioning conquest narratives today? Daniel Mendiola.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 265 - Cold War America
1 unit(s)
Following the Second World War, many Americans expected the United States to create a better world abroad and a more equitable society at home. We examine those expectations along with the major social, political, cultural, and economic changes in the United States from1945 until the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, including the dawn of the cold war, McCarthyism, suburbanization, high mass consumption, civil rights and the Black Power movement, the Vietnam War, and the Reagan years. Robert Brigham.
Two 2-hour periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 268 - Religion, Repression, and Resistance in Latin America
1 unit(s)
(Same as ANTH 268 and HIST 268 ) What was it like to live in a society where crimes of thought and religious transgressions were prosecuted and punished? How did various populations confront and resist inquisitorial activities? What is the legacy of the Inquisition in the Americas? This course addresses these and other questions through a focus on the Latin American Inquisition and Extirpation (ecclesiastic attempts to reform or destroy Precolumbian indigenous religions). The course tracks the emergence of Inquisition tribunals in Mexico City, Lima, and Cartagena after 1571, and the Catholic Church’s prosecution of indigenous idolatry and sorcery. It focuses both on trends in prosecution, torture, and punishment, and on the dynamic responses of those who were either targets or collaborators: indigenous peoples, Jews, Africans, female healers, people of mixed descent, and Protestants. Towards the end of the course, based on students’ interests, we also review other select case studies of religious control and resistance in Latin America. Students proficient in Spanish or Portuguese are encouraged to work with primary sources. David Tavárez.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 269 - Gender and African American History
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 269 and WFQS 269 ) Using primary documents and secondary sources, this course explores African American history through the lens of gender, sexuality, and family. Themes might include the transition from slavery to freedom; women’s labor (paid and unpaid) in the workforce, family, and community; and African American women’s struggles for equality. Among the topics to be considered are Black Freedom movements and feminist / womanist movements since Emancipation, giving special attention to intersectionalities of race and gender, and to histories of African American LBGTQ+ experiences. Shelby Pumphrey.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 272 - Modern African History Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 272 ) Africa has experienced profound transformations over the past two centuries. Between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Africans lost and regained their independence from different European colonial powers. This course explores the changing African experiences before, during, and after European colonization of their continent. Drawing on primary sources, film, memoirs, and popular novels, we look at the creative responses of African groups and individuals to the contradictory processes and legacies of colonialism. Particular attention is paid to understanding how these responses shape the trajectories of African as well as global developments. Amongst the major themes covered by the course are: colonial ideologies, African resistance, colonial economies, gender and cultural change, African participation in the two world wars, urbanization, decolonization and African nationalism. We also reflect on some of the contemporary developmental dilemmas as well as opportunities confronting post-colonial Africa. Ismail Rashid.
Two 75-minute periods.
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HIST 274 - Early America, 1500-1750 Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
Without ignoring the Pilgrims, Pocahontas, and other popular icons of colonial times, this course puts them into a larger context of what unfolded between 1500 and 1750 when three worlds bordering the Atlantic—western Europe, west Africa, and eastern North America—first came together. The new American world that emerged from this momentous encounter was at once stranger and more interesting than conventional wisdom would have it. Slaves who became free and Indians who became Puritan, con men who tricked gullible colonists and pious folk who heckled learned ministers—these and other forgotten actors join the usual suspects (Saints and witches, John Smith and Benjamin Franklin) on a crowded colonial stage. While keeping in mind that the genesis of America today can be found in that long-ago era—the tangled roots of race relations, the curious blend of materialism and lofty ideals, the boisterous political culture, the freedom for self-fashioning—we take early America as much as possible on its own terms rather than on ours. James Merrell.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 275 - Revolutionary America, 1750-1830 Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
In 1815 John Adams asked Thomas Jefferson: “Who shall write the history of the American Revolution? Who can write it? Who will ever be able to write it?” “Nobody,” Jefferson replied. As these two men knew, the American Revolution ranks high among history’s mysteries. Why did a prosperous people get so mad about a modest tax increase? How did a scattered, squabbling array of colonies, who felt closer to Great Britain than to one another, unite sufficiently to declare independence from the “mother country” in 1776? How did they then defeat the greatest military power of the age while also contending with dissension in their own ranks, rebellious slaves in their midst, and powerful Indian nations at their backs? How, having won independence, did the victors avoid tyranny, civil war, or re-colonization while other Americans—poor men, white women, Native peoples, the enslaved—busily tested the elasticity of the phrase “all men are created equal”? Exploring these questions, we also keep in mind a historian’s recent observation that this era “bequeathed us many of the values and institutions…that are now sites of important political, social, and ideological conflicts.” James Merrell.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 276 - Democracy in America? Parties, Politics and Grassroots Change, 1828-1912 Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
Focusing on the nineteenth-century United States, this course traces political struggles over continental conquest, slavery, industrialization, and nation-building. Key topics include expansion and conflict in the trans-Mississippi West; the rise of the Republican Party and sectional conflict; Emancipation and post-Civil War struggles over the scope and role of government; and struggles that accompanied the emergence of modern corporate capitalism. The course explores relationships among formal politics (parties and elections), public policy, and grassroots movements for change, such as abolitionism, labor, and agrarian protest. Rebecca Edwards.
Two 75-minute periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 277 - America 1890-1990 “The Rise and Fall of “The American Century”
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 277 ) In 1941, Henry Luce, publisher of Time and Life magazines, proclaimed the twentieth as “America’s century.” At mid-century, many Americans agreed with Luce’s view of the US as the preeminent global power By the 1980s, however, believing their country was in decline, more and more Americans began losing confidence in America’s greatness.
Using primary sources that range from political pamphlets to Hollywood film, presidential speeches to oral interviews, this course looks at America’s rise to prominence after 1890 and the nation’s so-called decline nearly a century later. We pay particular attention to the social and political changes marking the growth of progressive reform from the 1890s to the 1970s, then trace the rise of conservatism during the final decades of “the American century.” Miriam Cohen.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 278 - Women’s History of Latin America
1 unit(s)
(Same as LALS 278 and WFQS 278 ) This course explores the history of Latin America by centering women. Beginning with examples in the ancient Americas and continuing through the colonial and national periods, this course explores how the ideas, representations, experiences, and actions of women have shaped Latin American history. Class materials draw from a range of academic, literary, and primary sources, and class discussions cover topics such as: women in Aztec and other ancient societies; “La Malinche” and women of the Conquest; witchcraft and women in colonial religion; Sor Juana, Gabriela Mistral, and women of Latin American literature; women and 20th-c. activism; and indigenous women in Latin America today. Accordingly, this course addresses the questions: what cultural, economic, and political conditions have shaped how women in Latin America experienced the world? How have women had agency in shaping the meaning of Latin America? And what is at stake for Latin American women today in debates over issues such as economic development, migration, and human rights? Daniel Mendiola.
Two 2-hour periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 279 - The Viet Nam War
1 unit(s)
An examination of the origins, course, and impact of America’s involvement in Viet Nam, emphasizing the evolution of American diplomacy, the formulation of military strategy, the domestic impact of the war, and the perspective of Vietnamese revolutionaries. Robert Brigham.
Two 75-minute periods.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 287 - American Empire: The Nineteenth-Century West Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 287 and GNCS 287 ) This intensive invites students to explore a theme in the United States’ creation of a trans-Mississippi empire between the 1840s and the 1940s.Those themes include violence, war, and dispossession of native peoples; trans-Pacific immigration; encounters with Western environments; railroads and raw materials; politics and grassroots movements; women and families; and the mythology of conquest. After shared readings on each theme, students choose directions for individual projects. Conditions permitting, the course includes a field trip to a museum in New York City. Rebecca Edwards.
One 2-hour period and individual conferences with the instructor.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 290 - Community-Engaged Learning Semester Offered: Fall and Spring
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Individual or group field projects, especially in local, state, or federal history. May be taken either semester or in summer. The Department.
Prerequisite(s): An appropriate course in the department.
Corequisite(s): An appropriate course in the department.
Permission required.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 297 - Readings In History
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: OTH -
HIST 298 - Independent Work Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Permission required.
Course Format: OTH
History: III. Advanced
Prerequisite for advanced courses is ordinarily 2 units of 200-level work in history, or by permission of the instructor. Specific prerequisites assume the general prerequisite. -
HIST 300 - Thesis Preparation: Sources, Methods, and Interpretations Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
As a yearlong independent research project, a senior history thesis can be an exhilarating but also challenging experience. Many questions must be considered: How do I clearly define my research question? How do I locate my work within the existing scholarship in my field? Where are the most relevant sources? How do I organize and interpret the information that I have uncovered? This seminar provides the opportunity for students to grapple with these questions and to prepare for writing their senior history thesis. Through a common set of readings and workshops, students develop clear research ideas and questions, locate necessary sources, become acquainted with different historical methods, and discuss strategies for different stages of the process. The seminar also provides a community in which students share their experiences, approaches, and ideas about researching and writing their theses. The Department.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
Yearlong course HIST 300-301 .
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 301 - Senior Thesis Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
This 1-unit course, which builds on the work done in HIST 300 , culminates in the completion and submission of a thesis that is approximately 10,000 words long. The Department.
Yearlong course HIST 300 -301.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 302 - Senior Thesis
1 unit(s)
This 1-unit course, which builds on the work done in HIST 300 , culminates in the completion and submission of a thesis that is approximately 10,000 words long. The Department.
Same as HIST 301 , for students who are completing the thesis out of cycle. Please note that 302 cannot be taken simultaneously with HIST 300 .
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 303 - Senior Thesis
1 unit(s)
This 1-unit course, which builds on the work done in HIST 300 , culminates in the completion and submission of a thesis that is approximately 10,000 words long. Same as HIST 301 for students who are completing the thesis in one semester. Please note that 303 is taken simultaneously with HIST 300 . Rebecca Edwards, Wayne Soon.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 310 - Mao’s China in the World: War, Science and Legitimacy
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 310 ) This class examines the history of China’s recent past from 1949 to the present, with an emphasis on the relationship between China and the world. We explore the strategies of Mao Zedong and his comrades in winning and consolidating power, the efforts of the Chinese Communist Party in gaining global legitimacy for the People’s Republic of China vis-à-vis the Republic of China in Taiwan, the critical role of science, medicine, and technology in the Chinese economy and society, and the ways in which gender, class, and race underpinned the revolutionary experiences of the Chinese. This class also pays particular attention to Mao’s legacies on China and the world. Upon completion of the course, students gain the tools to critically examine the growth of contemporary China in the context of its dynamic past. Wayne Soon.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 312 - Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Chinese Diaspora Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 312 ) This seminar explores how members of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Chinese diaspora maneuvered challenges of empire, colonialism, war, and revolution to thrive economically in the 19th and 20th centuries. This class also contextualizes the recent protests around the world against China’s interventions into Taiwan and Hong Kong’s autonomy within the longer histories of Taiwan and Hong Kong’s interaction with the Dutch, Japanese, and British empires, Chinese nationalism, and America’s Cold War interests. It also examines how the Chinese diaspora have negotiated issues of identities, healthcare, and migration in their quest for autonomy. Wayne Soon.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 314 - History of Asian American Social Movements Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as AMST 314 and ASIA 314 ) This seminar uses primary and secondary sources to explore the history of social movements by and for Asian Americans. After brief discussion of early forms of resistance and organizing, the course focuses primarily on social movements during and after the “Asian American movement” arose in the long 1960’s. Topics include struggles for ethnic studies. Yellow Power and recognition for “Brown Asians,” antiwar, Redress (reparations for Japanese American WWII incarceration), fair working conditions, Asian American feminisms, gay marriage, environmental justice, and anti-Asian violence and #StopAsianHate. Throughout the course, we ground Asian American activists and their ideas in their transnational dimensions,including Third World Liberation and anticolonial ideaologies, and we explore their solidarities with other liberation movements such as Civil Rights, Black Power, and Indigenous sovereignty. For the final project, students work together to create our own archive and interpreation of Asian American student activism at Vassar College. Ashanti Shih.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 315 - Crusading and the Holy Land (1095-1204)
1 unit(s)
The First Crusade, called in 1095 by Pope Urban II, heralded profound changes in medieval society. The Crusades affected faith and war for Muslims, Christians, and Jews, and redefined relations in the Mediterranean. Warfare and colonization, however, also fostered productive contacts and cultural exchanges between Europe and Asia with increased trade and travel. Back in Europe it led to new theories of government, papal power, and holy war; a growth in epic poetry and romance; new styles of castle and church building; and increased urbanization. This course focuses on the first century of crusading and the establishment of Latin rule in the Holy Land. It critically engages primary sources written by Franks, Arabs, Jews, and Byzantines, as well as cutting-edge scholarship on the Crusade Era. Nancy Bisaha.
Recommended: HIST 116 or HIST 117 .
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 326 - Machiavelli: Power and Politics Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as URBS 326 ) This course examines the life and writings of one of the most fascinating and misunderstood thinkers of the early modern era. By situating Machiavelli (1469-1527) against the backdrop of his times, we gain insight into the Florentine Republic, Medici rule, the papacy, and devastating invasions of Italy by French, Spanish, and German armies. We also explore cultural movements like the study of antiquity by humanists and the rise of vernacular writing and bold new forms of popular expression and political discourse. Several of Machiavelli’s works are read, including his letters and plays, The Prince, The Discourses, The Art of War, and The Florentine Histories, as well as some of the major modern interpretations of Machiavelli in historiography and political thought. Nancy Bisaha.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 336 - Black on Earth: Race, Gender, and the Environment Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 336 , ENST 336 , and WFQS 336 ) This seminar operates on the notion that structural racism and environmental degradation are historically related–and that Black Americans have confronted the two together. Over the course of the semester, we interrogate how different Black activists have done so, from the Antebellum period to the present day. We consider how enslaved people drew from nature in their resistance to slavery, as well as the role of pollution, environmental disasters, and gentrification in twentieth-century organizing. Toward the end of the course, we explore the concepts of environmental justice and ecofeminism. Allison Puglisi.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 337 - The Rise and Fall of Nazi Germany
1 unit(s)
This course explores the Third Reich by locating it within the peculiar nature of German political culture resulting from late unification and rapid industrialization. Readings explore how and why the Nazis emerged as a mass party during the troubled Weimar years. The years between 1933 and 1945 are treated by focusing on Nazi domestic, foreign, and racial policies. Maria Höhn.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 342 - Stalinism
1 unit(s)
This seminar explores the transformation of the USSR and its borderlands under Stalin, with special emphasis on the impact of terror, dislocations, and compressed economic change on specific national groups (Russians, Ukraine, Central Asia). Topics include Stalin’s ideology and vision of the Soviet people, the impact of Stalinism on politics in Europe, collectivization and industrialization, the experiences of the “enemies of the people,” resistance and dissent, and achievements and legacies. The course concludes with an examination of post-Soviet public memory and discussions of the Stalinist past. Michaela Pohl.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 351 - Problems in U.S. Foreign Policy Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
Using historical case studies, this seminar examines some of the major foreign affairs dilemmas U.S. policy makers have faced since 1945. Major topics include: containment; modernization; nation building; limited war; détente; human rights and humanitarian intervention; and democracy promotion. Robert Brigham.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 354 - History and the Politics of Grief Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as GNCS 354 ) How is the recognition of grief linked with modern ideals of rights and citizenship? In this intensive, students examine the mourning rituals—funerals, cemeteries, dress, postmortem photographs, relics, and jewelry—that proliferated and took on new meanings in nineteenth-century Britain, marking new ways of embodying and visualizing grief. Along with literary and personal expressions of loss, we explore how public commemorations of the dead gained political value in movements and moments such as factory regulation, abolition of slavery, urban reform, child welfare, and the First World War. We begin the semester with discussion of common readings and analysis of material objects from Vassar’s Loeb Art Center. Students then undertake supervised work on independent research projects (which may explore connections between the long nineteenth-century and present-day mourning practices), peer reviews, and presentations. Lydia Murdoch.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: INT -
HIST 355 - Childhood and Children in Nineteenth-Century Britain Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as GNCS 355 and WFQS 355 ) This course examines both the social constructions of childhood and the lived experiences of children in imperial and domestic Britain during the long nineteenth century. We analyze new ideals of childhood arising at the beginning of this period and explore how these ideals—of childhood innocence and dependence, for example—applied to the experiences of actual children in vastly different ways. Thus, a main theme of the course is how age categories intersect with racial, class, gender, and national identities. Topics include the relationships between children and adults, child labor, sexuality, gender, education, welfare, and the ways in which ideals of childhood upheld imperialism. The course takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of childhood; we examine a variety of primary sources ranging from parliamentary reports and memoirs to photographs and children’s literature. Lydia Murdoch.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 363 - Bordering the Americas Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
(Same as LALS 363 ) This course examines the creation and proliferation of national bordering regimes throughout the Americas. Beginning in the late colonial period and continuing to the present, the course evaluates how the meanings and practices of borders have changed over time, as well as how the borders have impacted the lives and livelihoods of real people. Class materials draw from a range of academic, literary, and primary sources, and class discussions will cover topics such as: the role of borders and migration in creating nation states; the role of Asian exclusion in changing the meaning of borders throughout the Americas; the evolution of migration enforcement tactics the targeting of asylum seekers; migrant caravans and the history of forced migration in Central America; grass roots efforts at protecting migrants; and alternative approaches to borders based on free migration and universal rights. Accordingly, this course addresses the questions: why has constraining migration come to be one of the most salient meanings of borders today? How has this affected people? How have people in different places and times contested borders? And what is at stake in how we construct borders today? Daniel Mendiola.
Two 2-hour periods.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 364 - Race, Class & Gender in the United States
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 364 and WFQS 364 ) This course examines how African Americans have navigated the intersectionality of race, class, and gender at several moments in American history. Topics might include the slave experience, abolitionism, black mobilization in the union movement, or the quest for civil and social justice. To deepen their understanding of one of these topics, students write research papers, using primary documents and secondary sources. Shelby Pumphrey
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 366 - American Encounters: Natives, Newcomers, and the Contest for a Continent
1 unit(s)
Moving past today’s fixation on Pocahontas and John Smith, Squanto and the Pilgrims, this course will examine the Native response to the invasion of North America, focusing on peoples living east of the Mississippi River before the early 19th century, the era of ‘Removal’ that marked the beginning of the end of Indian Country. Confronting the challenges in the way of understanding the Native experience (lack of evidence, modern stereotypes, loaded language), we will combine scholarly works with Native writings, explorers’ accounts, treaty texts, captivity narratives, and films to consider the central arenas where Indians engaged foreigners from beyond the eastern horizon, from trade and missions through war and diplomacy to ideas of “race” and notions of gender. James Merrell.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 367 - Strategic Thinking in Global Affairs
1 unit(s)
(Same as POLI 367 ) This seminar explores strategic thinking to attain large ends with limited means. We examine a historical set of instances in which individuals, groups, and/or nations have attempted to harness political, military, diplomatic, economic, environmental, legal, and scientific resources to advance national and global interests. Because strategic thinking requires the art of reconciling ends and means, we also examine how a range of people and groups with various levels of power balance what they think and want with the constraints that they face. Robert Brigham.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instructor.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 369 - Social Citizenship in an Urban Age
1 unit(s)
(Same as EDUC 369 and URBS 369 ) During a 1936 campaign speech President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that in “1776 we sought freedom from the tyranny of a political autocracy.” Since then “the age of machinery, of railroads; of steam and electricity; the telegraph and the radio; mass production and mass distribution—all of these combined to bring forward a new civilization and with it a new problem … . For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality.” Therefore, the President concluded, government must do something to “protect the citizen’s right to work and right to live.” This course looks at how Americans during the twentieth century fought to expand the meaning of citizenship to include social rights. We study efforts on behalf of labor laws, unemployment and old age insurance, and aid to poor mothers and their children. How did these programs affect Americans of different social, racial, and ethnic backgrounds? How did gender shape the ways that people experienced these programs? Because many Americans believed that widening educational opportunities was essential for addressing the problems associated with the “new civilization” that Roosevelt described, we ask to what extent Americans came to believe that access to a good education is a right of citizenship. These issues and the struggles surrounding them are not only, as they say, “history.” To help us understand our times, we look at the backlash, in the closing decades of the twentieth century, against campaigns to enlarge the definition of citizenship. Miriam Cohen.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 374 - The African Diaspora
1 unit(s)
(Same as AFRS 374 ) This seminar investigates the social origins, philosophical and cultural ideas, and the political forms of Pan-Africanism from the late nineteenth century to the end of the twentieth century. It explores how disaffection and resistance against slavery, racism and colonial domination in the Americas, Caribbean, Europe, and Africa led to the development of a global movement for the emancipation of peoples of African descent from 1900 onwards. The seminar examines the different ideological, cultural, and organizational manifestations of Pan-Africanism as well as the scholarly debates on development of the movement. Readings include the ideas and works of Edward Blyden, Alexander Crummell, W. E. B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey, Amy Garvey, C.L.R. James, and Kwame Nkmmah. Ismail Rashid.
Prerequisite(s): Permission of the instrcutor.
Not offered in 2022/23.
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HIST 375 - Nineteeth-Century America at War Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)
This course explores three military initiatives in the nineteenth-century United States and interconnections among them: violent dispossession of Native peoples between the 1830s and the 1890s; the U.S.-Mexico War; and Confederate secession and the Civil War. We consider questions such as: What factors drove each conflict? Who opposed these military operations and why? What results did the victors anticipate, and what outcomes actually unfolded? Who did the U.S. government seek to “Reconstruct” in peacetime? What were the long-term political, social, and cultural legacies, and how was each conflict remembered and mythologized? We also consider the grim toll of grief and suffering wrought by violence, as well as participants’ and observers’ responses. Readings include eyewitness accounts, works of fiction, films, and historical scholarship. Rebecca Edwards.
One 2-hour period and individual conferences with the instructor.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 382 - Marie-Antoinette
1 unit(s)
(Same as WFQS 382 ) More than 200 years after her death, Marie-Antoinette continues to be an object of fascination because of her supposed excesses and her death at the guillotine. For her contemporaries, Marie-Antoinette often symbolized all that was wrong in French body politic. Through the life of Marie-Antoinette, we investigate the changing political and cultural landscape of eighteenth-century France including the French Revolution. Topics include women and power, political scandal and public opinion, fashion and self-representation, motherhood and domesticity, and revolution and gender iconography. Throughout the course, we explore the changing nature of the biographical narrative. The course also considers the legacy of Marie Antoinette as martyr and fetish object in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and her continuing relevance today. Sumita Choudhury.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 385 - Colonialism, Nationalism, and Social Identities in the Modern Middle East
1 unit(s)
This course explores how social sciences, colonialism, and nationalism have shaped identities in the modern Middle East. The course begins with a brief survey of older, foundational scholarship on “The Orient” in order to map out how scholars understood the non-European world, including regions later labeled “The Middle East.” We then discuss how these European mythologies, as well as imperial interventions, international institutions, and post-colonial nationalisms nurtured new differences, leading to violence along sectarian, racial, ethnic, or national lines. We focus particularly on the question of how Middle Eastern and North African societies have come to be seen as divided between religious “minorities” and “majorities.” Joshua Schreier.
Recommended: HIST 174 or HIST 214 or HIST 255 .
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 386 - Central Asia and the Caucasus: Nation Building and Human Rights Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)
(Same as INTL 386 ) The Muslim regions between Russia and China are becoming more populated, prosperous, and connected. The Caspian Sea region is booming with new oil and gas wealth. A wave of democracy movements swept newly independent states but oligarchs and long-term autocratic presidents dominate politics and business. An Islamic revival after the fall of communism has brought a crisis of political Islam, including problems like terrorism, re-veiling campaigns, and bride-kidnappings. Chechnya and the North Caucasus became magnets for violence, while Tatarstan has seen a quiet renaissance of liberal Russian Islam. This cross-listed seminar explores nation building, human rights, and spiritual life in Central Asia and the Caucasus from a historical perspective. Topics include the legacies of Mongol and Tatar power verticals, the impact of communism on Central Asia, the war in Chechnya and its effect on human rights in the region, the history of Kazakhstan’s new capital, Astana, and daily life and politics since independence in 1991. Michaela Pohl.
One 2-hour period.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 387 - Modern China: Wealth, Power and Revolution
1 unit(s)
(Same as ASIA 387 ) The search for wealth and power in China has been profoundly shaped by the country’s twentieth-century revolutionary experiences. In contextualizing China’s ambitions from its history from the eighteenth century to the present, this seminar critically explores the rise and fall of an expansive Qing Empire, debates the vibrancy of Republican-era Chinese society, and investigates the contingencies and legacies of the communist revolution. In addition, we explore the multifaceted experiences of intellectuals, cadres, diplomats,politicians, businessmen, scientists, artists, students, workers, and peasants living in the People’s Republic of China and the Republic of China on Taiwan through the lens of gender, ethnicity, work, diaspora, and ideology. Students understand the rise of China today within the context of its dynamic recent past. Wayne Soon.
One 2-hour period.
Not offered in 2022/23.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 391 - Independent Study - Thesis Preparation and Methodology Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
1 unit(s)
As a yearlong independent research project, a senior history thesis can be an exhilarating but also challenging experience. Many questions must be considered: How do I clearly define my research question? How do I locate my work within the existing scholarship in my field? Where are the most relevant sources? How do I organize and interpret the information that I have uncovered? This seminar provides the opportunity for students to grapple with these questions and to prepare for writing their senior history thesis. Students develop clear research ideas and questions, locate necessary sources, become acquainted with different historical methods, and discuss strategies for different stages of the process. Robert Brigham.
One 2-hour period and individual conferences with the instructor.
Course Format: CLS -
HIST 392 - Independent Study - Senior Thesis Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
1 unit(s)
This 1-unit course, which builds on the work done in HIST 391 , culminates in the completion and submission of a thesis that is approximately 10,000 words long. Maria Höhn.
One 2-hour period and individual conferences with the instructor.
Course Format: OTH -
HIST 399 - Senior Independent Work Semester Offered: Fall or Spring
0.5 to 1 unit(s)
Maria Höhn.
Permission required.
Course Format: OTH
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