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Spring 2010
His 301-1 Colonial America
Professor Kristalyn Shefveland
1:00 TTH
Bishop 103
Course description: Early American history was characterized above all by the interaction of various cultures from three different continents. These cultures were both dynamic and unstable. Therefore, this course will explore the messy, destructive, and often confusing set of circumstances that eventually resulted in the creation of the North American colonies. This course will focus first on pre-contact Native North America and the contact period through 1740. This class will trace the “forgotten centuries” of Native American history with a focus on cultural interaction and exchange and specific reference to trade systems and ideologies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. After leaving this course, the student will have a firm grasp on the history of Native peoples within North America as well as an understanding of the impact and cultural exchange of the colonial period. In addition, this class will also trace European expansion to the New World. After leaving this course, the student will have a firm grasp on the history of imperial ambitions as well as the impact of imperial power on societies in both the colonies and in Europe.
Course objectives:
To introduce the students to a variety of sources and topics concerning Native North America and Colonial North America:
To give students the opportunity to develop a research topic that introduces them to both primary and secondary sources.
To expose students to historical methods of argumentation and research
His 306-1 The United States Since 1945
Professor Michael Namorato
1:00 TTH
Bishop 101
Course description: This course will examine American development after 1945, focusing on the political, economic, diplomatic, and social aspects. Students will be expected to stay informed of what is going on in America and the world today since this is also within the purview of the class.
Each student will be expected to take a Mid-Term and Final exam. Each student will also be expected to complete a number of short research projects individually and/or within a small group.
Texts for the course include the following:
David McCullough, Truman
Charles Eagles, The Price of Defiance: James Meredith and the Integration of Ole Miss
E. Schrecter, McCarthyism
Bill Clinton, My Life
D. Rossinow, ed. The United States Since 1945: Historical Interpretations
J. Tygiel, Ronald Reagan
His 308-1/Aas 326 African American History Since 1865
Professor Marco Robinson
11:00 TTH
Turner 205
Course description: This course is a survey of African American history from 1865 to the present. The course focuses on the major social, economic, political and cultural themes relative to the black experience in America. To develop the student’s understanding of these themes black’s experiences during Reconstruction/late 1800s, the early twentieth century, the Great Migration, Harlem Renaissance, the Great Depression, World War II, the Civil Rights Movement, Post-Civil Rights Era, and contemporary times will be covered during the progression of the semester. Utilizing an interdisciplinary approach, students will also read and analyze literary texts and primary historical sources to gain a broadened perspective of the black experience in America.
Three exams, one of which is a comprehensive final, will be given during the semester. Students will be given several short writing assignments during the course of the semester.
Textbook :
John Hope Franklin, From Slavery To Freedom. 8th edition
His 308-2/Aas 326 African American History Since 1865
Professor Daphne Chamberlain
11:00 MWF
Barnard Observatory 105
Course description & objectives:
This course is a survey of African American history since 1865. It is designed to broaden students’ historical perspective by introducing them to major themes and watershed events in African American history from Reconstruction to the present. Over the course of the semester, students will explore trends in social, political, and cultural history through readings from a survey text. To develop a better understanding of the African American experience, students will also read and analyze literature written by African Americans who helped shape African American history, in particular, and United States history as a whole. As a part of the learning experience, it is my hope that students become more analytical thinkers, competent writers, and articulate speakers.
Required texts:
From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans – Volume II (8th ed.)
John Hope Franklin and Alfred A. Moss, Jr., eds.
The Miseducation of the Negro, Carter G. Woodson
Coming of Age in Mississippi, Anne Moody
Tentative assignments:
2 essay exams
1 comprehensive final exam
2 analytical papers
His 312-1/Gst 312 The History of American Women
Professor Elizabeth Payne
9:30 TTH
Bishop 112
Course description: This course introduces students to issues basic to understanding women’s experience in the United States, from European settlement to the present. Neither a survey of family history nor of feminism, the course, does, however, address both of these important themes. Topics also include the contours of women’s work, the changing definitions of motherhood, the idea of a woman’s sphere, gender re-definition over time and the contradictions of feminist theory.
Three exams, which are not cumulative, will count fifteen percent each. Students must be present on the days the books are discussed when short reading quizzes will be given. Each of these quizzes counts five percent. In addition, students will write a ten page typewritten paper based on research and interviews with a woman whose memory reaches back to the 1930s. The paper counts twenty percent.
Tentative reading list:
Buel and Buel, The Way of Duty
Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Anne Scott, The Southern Lady
Blanche Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt, V 1
Shawhan and Swain, Lucy Somerville Howorth
LuAnn Jones, Mama Learned Us to Work
Elizabeth Kytle, Willie Mae
His 315-1 The American Dream
Professor Sheila Skemp
11:00 MWF
Bishop 103
Course description: This course will examine the various understandings of the concept of the “American Dream.” Partly chronological, partly topical, it will utilize a variety of sources—essays, novels, autobiographies, short stories, poems, and plays—in an effort to trace and explain the changes in that dream over time. It will also examine the ways in which certain Americans at certain times were excluded from participation in “the dream.”
Course requirements:
Two, hour exams (100 points each)
A Final (comprehensive) exam (200 points)
Four short (4-5 pages) papers (50 points each)
One Research Paper (100 points)
Texts will include:
Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography
Horatio Alger, Ragged Dick and Mark the Match Boy
O.E. Rolvag, Giants in the Earth
Anzia Yezierska, The Bread Givers
Richard Wright, Black Boy
Sinclair Lewis, Babbitt
Arthur Miller, Death of a Salesman
Plus a Course Pack
His 324-1/Aas 324/ Race, Gender, and Courtship in African American History
Gst 321
Professor Hornsby-Gutting
11:00 MWF
Bishop 101
Course description: The course will examine concepts of courtship and romantic
love among African Americans to assess the central roles that race, gender, class and social forces played in the most private, and intimate, of matters. Though American
social historians have addressed concepts of romantic love, with articles and texts focusing on relationships of white Americans in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, scholarly illumination of intimacy among African Americans is rare. Through readings (primary and secondary), assignments, and discussions, students will assess the importance of “love” as a social construct among African Americans and how expressions of it complement or diverge from Euro-American conceptions. Class members will also study the diverse ways in which this history has thus far been approached and understood by historians. The remainder of the course will probe definitions of romantic love among black southerners. We will analyze love letters for clues as to how respectability and romantic love manifested themselves within southern locales during Jim Crow. By semester’s end, students should have become extensively familiar with this type of historical scholarship and have demonstrated improvement in their reading, writing, and analytical skills.
His 327-1/Aas 438 Historical Perspectives: Slavery America
Professor Cooper Owens
1:00 MWF
Bishop 103
Course Description: Throughout this semester we will explore the roots of slavery (broadly), why it arose on the American continent, how Africans and African-Americans survived and resisted the institution. Furthermore, we will examine why a powerful anti-slavery movement gradually started to develop around the time of the American Revolution and how it grew in the decades afterwards. Finally, we will explore the complex forces that led to slavery’s demise in the mid-nineteenth century. As an institution, slavery had an impact on ideologies surrounding race, gender, medicine, and political movements. One of the major objectives of this course is to gain a better understanding of the intellectual history of slavery, race, and racism. We will utilize not only some of the most interesting primary and secondary texts available on slavery, but also will consider film versions of the institution and the experience, as well as relevant methodological approaches. Major topics of discussion will be: trade; demography; culture; labor; gender; resistance; and freedom.
This course will deepen your awareness of the slavery's role in shaping American history and hopefully make you want to learn more about this topic in general. In specific terms, at the end of this course, you will:
1. understand the major historical figures, key events, and lasting consequences involving slavery in American history.
2. grasp the important role racism and race consciousness have played in American history.
3. comprehend the influence of America’s founding principles on the start of the anti-slavery abolition movement.
4. be able to place important historical figures and occurrences in time. This does not mean that you will simply memorize dates and events. Instead you will be able to place events and people in chronological order and within a larger and more meaningful context.
5. develop your critical reading and writing abilities as well as increase your oral communication skills.
His 329-1/Aas 443 The Civil Rights Era
Professor Daphne Chamberlain
9:00 MWF
Bishop 105
Course description: This course is designed to broaden students’ historical perspective by introducing them to major themes and watershed events of the civil rights era. Topics for discussion include the origins of the modern Civil Rights Movement, the rise of massive resistance, the development of an organizing tradition among local people, and the people/organizations that played an integral role in advocating civil rights for African Americans. To develop a better understanding of the struggle for civil rights, students will read, analyze, and discuss selected primary and secondary source materials. The course is also designed to challenge students to think critically and analytically about the origins of an overall black struggle for freedom and the role of the federal government in advancing the cause. As a part of the learning experience, it is my hope that students become more analytical thinkers, competent writers, and articulate speakers.
Required texts:
The Strange Career of Jim Crow, C. Vann Woodward
The Struggle for Black Equality, Harvard Sitkoff
On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail, Charles E. Cobb, Jr.
**Supplemental readings to be provided at a later date.**
Tentative semester assignments:
2 essay exams
2 writing assignments: 2-3 page book review; 8-10 page paper on an approved topic
1 presentation
His 329-2/Aas 443 The Civil Rights Era
Professor Daphne Chamberlain
2:00 MWF
Bishop 106
See course description above
His 330-1 The History of Mississippi
Professor Steve Palmer
4:00 TTH
Bishop 112
This course will examine the political, social, and economic events that shaped Mississippi history from the period before the arrival of Europeans in America to the present day. Through a variety of primary and secondary sources, students will complete a broad study of Mississippi history including Indian societies and their removal, the growth of the cotton kingdom, slavery, the Civil War, disfranchisement and Jim Crow, southern culture and regional cultural differences within the state, and the Civil Rights Movement. Students will complete several quizzes, three examinations, and a research paper on a topic appropriate to the course
His 330-2 The History of Mississippi
Professor Steve Palmer
11:00 TTH
Bishop 324
See course description above
His 331-1 The South To 1877
Professor Nancy Bercaw
11:00 TTH
Bishop 101
Course description: This course will trace the changing definitions of what it has meant to be a southerner from 1607 to 1877. All southerners share a strong sense of identity grounded in the unique history, habits, and customs of their region. Most agree that they are different than most Americans. They point to the importance of family, religion, and community in the South. Yet depending on their background--whether they are urban or rural, black or white, rich or poor--they assign dramatically different meanings to these simple unspoken values. Where do these traditions come from? Is there just one South or many Souths? And whose South is it?
Required texts:
Michael Gomez, Exchanging Our Country Marks: The Transformation of African Identities in the Colonial and Antebellum South
Tiya Miles, Ties that Bind: The Story of an Afro-Cherokee Family in Slavery and Freedom
Drew Faust, James Henry Hammond: A Design for Mastery
Gary W. Gallagher, The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat
Recommended text:
Keith, Janet, The South: A Concise History
His 332-1 The South in the Twentieth Century
Professor Will Hustwit
9:30 TTH
Bishop 105
Course description: This course should give students a solid understanding of the major social, economic, political, and cultural developments in the American South since 1900. Students should gain experience writing and understanding historical scholarship and should learn to deal with both primary and secondary sources.
Possible course readings:
Escott, Major Problems in the History of the American South (course reader)
Fields, Lemon Swamp
Faulkner, The Reivers
Larson, Summer for the Gods
Greene, Praying for Sheetrock
Covington, Salvation on Sand Mountain
His 332-2 The South in the Twentieth Century
Professor Will Hustwit
2:30 TTH
Bishop 324
See course description above
His 334-1 The Blue and the Gray
Professor John Neff
9:00 MWF
Bishop 209
This course offers an exploration of the American Civil War, from the secession winter of 1860-61 to the war=s last days in June 1865. Our primary focus will be combat; we will investigate the experience of individual soldiers, the campaigns of armies, and the societies which ordered and supported that military expression of the political will, but always with the goal of understanding how the individual and national experience of war proved to be a powerful force of change. Additionally, in order to better understand the persistence of the war in American society and culture, we will conclude the semester with an examination of how commemoration has shaped our public and private memories of the war and its soldier dead.
His 353-1/Clc 314 Roman Empire
Professor John Lobur
11:00 TTH
Bryant 200
This course is a survey course in the history of the Roman Empire from the reign of Augustus beginning in 31 B.C. through the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 A.D.
His 356-1 Reformation Europe, 1517-1648
Professor Jeffrey Watt
2:30 TTH
Bishop 112
Course description: This course will examine the religious, cultural, political, and social developments in Europe for the period 1517-1648. We will examine the impact of the so-called magisterial Protestant reformers, such as Martin Luther and John Calvin, as well as the importance of the Radical, Anglican, and Catholic Reformations. This course will also touch on themes such as witchcraft, the growth in monarchical power, and women and the family in early modern Europe.
Tentative reading assignments include:
Roland Bainton, Here I Stand! A Life of Martin Luther
Henry Kamen, The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision
Mary Laven, Virgins of Venice: Broken Vows and Cloistered Lives in the Renaissance Convent
Brian Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe
Steven Ozment, Ancestors: The Loving Family in Old Europe
Watt, Reformation Reader (a Penguin Customs Editions paperback created specifically for this course)
Recommended textbook: De Lamar Jensen, Reformation Europe: Age of Reform and Revolution, 2nd ed.
Paper assignments and exams:
One mid-term and a final exam. Students will be required to write either two shorter papers (5-7 pages) based on the required readings or one longer paper (10-15 pages) on a topic chosen in consultation with the instructor.
His 362-1 World War II
Professor Susan Grayzel
9:30 TTH
Bishop 209
His 362-2
Professor Noell Wilson
9:30 TTH
Bishop 209
Course description: The Second World War was a cataclysm. It was a truly global and modern conflict that unleashed weapons never before seen and led to unprecedented devastation and loss of life. This course will provide students with an opportunity to examine this conflict in detail. It will pay equal attention to the combatant and civilian experiences of this war, and to the war in all its theatres: Asia and the Pacific, Europe--both East and West--and the North Atlantic, North Africa and the Middle East. Along with studying the origins and legacy of this war, students will be able to gain a critical understanding of just what it meant to wage total war on this scale. This is not strictly a course in military history; we will closely examine the impact of this war on participant nations politics, economies, societies and cultures.
Readings will include some secondary texts, and a general history, but will focus on primary documents so as to enable students to develop their own analysis of first-hand accounts.
His 385-1 The History of Islam in Africa
Professor Bashir Salau
9:30 TTH
Bishop 103
Course description: This course will explore the history of Islam in Africa from the seventh century to the twentieth century. Attention will be given to examining, first, the diverse local forms of Islam and how historical, cultural, and environmental factors influenced their growth; second, the social, economic and political contexts that facilitated the growth of Islam from relative insignificance to one of the two leading religions in Africa; and, finally, the impact of Islam on Africa. The primary focus will be on West and East Africa. Topics will include Muslim minorities in non-Muslim societies, Islam and slavery, women in Muslim societies, Jihad movements in Africa, Muslim responses to nineteenth century European expansion, Islam and colonialism, and Islam and post-colonial developments. By the end of the course students must have embraced critical reading and writing skills. They will also appreciate the diversity of Islam and its importance in social, economic and political developments in Africa during the pre-colonial, colonial and the post colonial eras.
His 386-1 History of the Muslim World: From the Middle Ages to World War I
Professor Nicolas Trépanier
10:00 MWF
Bishop 105
Course description: This course offers a survey of the history of the Muslim world, from the thirteenth century to World War I. We will pay particular attention to the transformative effects of the Mongol invasions, the rise and expansion of the “gunpowder empires” (Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal), the appearance of modernity and of the decline discourse, the Wahhabi movement, the development of nationalism in Muslim-ruled areas and the transformation of the Muslim World that came about as a result olf World War I.
The course will follow a chronological approach to the main events in the history of the Muslim peoples while, in parallel, exploring a number of key themes in the social, intellectual and artistic history of the region. Themes discussed will include gender, religious minorities under Muslim rule, Islamic architecture, the place of the Muslim world in international trade networks and in the Age of Exploration, and early fundamentalist movements. This course is a continuation of His 383.
Textbook: Fischer and Ochsenwald, The Middle East: A History
Evaluation:
Mid-term exam (20%)
Paper topic (5%)
Paper research report (10%)
Term paper (30%)
Final exam (25%)
Class attendance and participation (10%)
His 386-2 Middle East and North Africa
Professor Nicolas Trépanier
1:00 MWF
Bishop 107
See course description above
His 396-1 Modern Japanese History
Professor Noell Wilson
1:00 TTH
Bishop 112
This course examines the emergence of modern Japan from the late 1500s to the present. Class lecture and discussion will analyze the historical background from which modern Japan emerged, identify the principal political and cultural developments in her transition to a modern industrial society, explore the rise and fall of Japan's colonial empire and examine her emergence as a major world power today. Intertwined with analysis of events, people and ideas, we will consider key theoretical debates on the meaning of "modernity" and how these analytical frameworks influence our understanding of Japan's past and present.
His 399-1 Problems in History
Native American History in Latin America and the United States
Professor Jeremy Mumford
9:00 MWF
Bishop 107
Course description: This course compares American Indians’ experience throughout the Americas, from pre-colonial times up to today. In countries such as Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Argentina, Canada, and the United States, Native people have many cultures and histories. Catholic Spain and Portugal established different kinds of colonial societies than Protestant England did, and the people called “indígenas” in Latin America today carry a different historical legacy than Native Americans in the United States. But the shared experiences of conquest and colonization, resistance and adaptation, tell a shared, overarching story. First, in colonial times, Native Americans and Europeansstruggled over the American landscape but each knew the other was not going to go away. It was only after Independence that the new American republics (both North and South) tried to destroy American Indians completely, through war and assimilation. But in the last century Native peoples (both Northand South) have reasserted their identity as separate peoples within the modern state: the “vanishing Indian” refused to vanish.
Class requirements:
Mid-term and final exam, two short writing assignments, and class participation.
His 399-2/Pol 398 Quarrels That Have Shaped Our Understanding
Of the Constitution
Professors Robert Haws and John Winkle
2:30 TTH
MBHC 311
In commenting on American democracy in the 1830s, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote that “There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.” Tocqueville’s observation remains an accurate one in the early 21st century.
This course will have two principal purposes. First, course materials will examine the central role of the U. S. Supreme Court in the major political controversies in American history which have shaped our understanding of our Constitution. Topics to be examined will include the writing and ratification of the Constitution, the struggle to establish a national market, the problem of slavery, the boundaries of free speech, issues of race, the problem of privacy and role of government in American life. Readings will be drawn from relevant secondary works and Supreme Court opinions.
Second, during two weeks of the spring term, we will be joined by Judge Rhesa Barksdale, who is a judge on the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Judge Barksdale joined the Fifth Circuit in March 1990 and assumed senior status in August 2009. He is a graduate of West Point and the University of Mississippi School of Law. Judge Barksdale’s participation in this course will inaugurate the Lott Leadership Institute’s Leader-in-Residence program.
His 400-3 Undergraduate Research Seminar in U.S. History
The Fifties in America
Professor Michael Namorato
4:00 Thursday
Bishop 326
Course description: This course will examine the United States in the 1950s, actually beginning with the post-World War II period and ending in 1960 with the election of John F. Kennedy. The course will cover in detail every aspect of the 1950s from a political, economic, diplomatic, and social perspective. Specifically, the course will study Eisenhower as president, the McCarthy movement, the Cold War, America’s first efforts in space, the social evolution of American society as witnessed by the young generation and its commitment to rock ‘n roll, and the growing inner economic workings of the military-industrial complex. Students will read about these events, watch videos, listen to musical recordings, and attend to the lectures that the professor will give.
Students will take a Mid-Term and Final exam. They also will do 2-3 short group projects. The main assignment will be a 20-page paper on a topic approved by the instructor on America in the 1950s.
The following books will be used:
D. Halberstam, The Fifties
R. Fried, Nightmare in Red
P. Boyle, Eisenhower
S. Whitfield, A Death in the Delta
J. Jackson, American Bandstand
His 445-1 Undergraduate Research: Europe to 1648
Witchcraft, Magic, and Diabolism
Professor Jeffrey Watt
4:00 Thursday
Bishop 333
Course description: The goal of this seminar is to engage students actively in research and writing techniques that are central to the historian’s craft. This seminar will examine the history of magic, witchcraft, and the occult. Special attention will be paid to early modern Europe, but we will also consider witchcraft and magic in medieval Europe, early America, and non-Western societies. Topics discussed will include the witch-hunts of the Reformation era, the relationship between magic and religion, misogyny and witchcraft, and changing beliefs in diabolical power. Students will write a shorter paper (3-5 pages) and a research or term paper (15-20 pages) on a topic chosen in consultation with the professor. PERFECT ATTENDANCE IS REQUIRED. We will begin the semester with a set of common readings tentatively taken from the following works:
Jonathan Barry, Marianne Hester, and Gareth Roberts, eds., Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe
E.E. Evans-Pritchard, Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic among the Azande
Guido Ruggiero, Binding Passions: Tales of Magic, Marriage, and Power at the End of the Renaissance
Jeffrey Burton Russell, Mephistopheles: The Devil in the Modern World
Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic: Studies in Popular Beliefs in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century England
Merry E. Wiesner, ed., Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe
His 450-1 Undergraduate Research Seminar in European History
The Cold War in Europe
Professor Chiarella Esposito
1:00 Thursday
Bishop 333
Course description: This is one of the history senior capstone seminars whose primary objective is to instruct students about how to write a 25-page research paper. Paper topics will have to deal with the history of the Cold War in Europe, including but not limited to: the postwar settlement; the origins of the Cold War; the reconstruction of Europe and the economic "miracles" of the 1950s; the Welfare State; decolonization and loss of empire; European economic integration; détente; the protest movements of the 1960s and 1970s; terrorism; the changing faces of liberalism and socialism; the crisis of Communism; the 1989 revolutions in Eastern Europe and their consequences; the new, post-Cold War Europe. The paper should be based both on primary and secondary sources.
During the first five weeks of classes students will learn how to choose an adequate research topic, and to write footnotes and a bibliography correctly. We will also read a number of articles, with each student reading two articles per week (40-60 pages approximately). Students will have to present the articles in class and in the process will learn how to summarize an article’s argument effectively and thoroughly. Students should speak clearly and loudly enough to be heard and understood by their classmates.
A prospectus about the chosen research topic, as well as a complete bibliography, will be due by Mid-February. A 15-page draft of the paper will be due by Mid-March.
(updated 10/16/09)
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