History Courses

Course Catalog

I teach at least one of the survey courses (101 and 102) every semester. Upper division courses are taught on a two-year rotation.

American Studies 201: Introduction to American Studies

American Studies 201 is a sort of clinic on the theory and method of cultural studies. The emphasis is less on overarching themes than on cultural history as a discipline -- its practice and its practitioners.

History 101: American Civilizations, Contact to 1877

A survey of American history to 1877 with an emphasis on cultural history and biography. History is, most importantly, every story that was ever lived. This course attempts to recapture the storied nature of the past.

History 310: The Civil War and Reconstruction

The Civil War began as a limited conflict over sectional differences but became by its end a battle over the meaning of freedom in America. History 310 considers how and why Americans embraced violence as a solution to sectional problems, how the war evolved from 1861 to 1865, why Reconstruction ultimately failed, and how we should remember the war and its many dead.

History 314: The Gilded Age and Progressive Era

In the years following the Civil War, America industrialized and became a world power. To some, this seemed perfectly appropriate; the country was fulfilling the destiny for which it had been marked out in 1776. No longer a passive exemplar, a City Upon a Hill, America had become a global force prepared to remake the world in its own image. To others, the country's changes had gotten beyond the ability of a simple people to assimilate and make sense of them. Political corruption had replaced democracy; factories had replaced farms; contracts had replaced handshakes. America seemed not to be fulfilling a destiny but destroying one, transformed into the very thing the Revolution had been fought to avoid -- a nation of sweatshops and slums, paupers and prostitutes.

History 314 takes a loosely chronological, primarily thematic approach. Each week is devoted to a particular aspect of American life in the Progressive era. Through twists and turns students are encouraged to remember that at its core, progressivism was merely a mass of men and women struggling to come to terms with the forces unleashed by industrialization.

History 362: African American History, Emancipation to Present

"The destiny of the colored American," Frederick Douglass poigniantly remarked, "is the destiny of America." African Americans have, by their presence and persistence, consistently forced America to live up to its best self. History 362 examines race in American history generally and the experience of African Americans from emancipation to present specifically.

History 425: Edgar Allan Poe's America

History 425 is a special topics course; it is dedicated not to the world Poe created but to the world that created Poe.