DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY COURSE OFFERINGS
Spring 2023
HSTY 102 Introduction to Byzantine History. 3 Units. T/R 10-11:15am
Development of the Byzantine empire from the emperor Constantine’s conversion to Christianity and founding of the eastern capital at Constantinople to the fall of Constantinople to Turkish forces in 1453. Offered as CLSC 102 and HSTY 102. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 109 Modern American History. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
This course provides an introductory survey of American history from the end of Reconstruction through the early 21st century, focusing on politics, foreign relations, the economy, and culture and social life. It is designed not to replicate high school American history courses, but introduce undergraduates to major themes in how academic historians approach the past, as well as instructing students on how to read, discuss, and write about primary sources. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement
HSTY 113 Introduction to Modern World History. 3 Units. M/W/F 10:35-11:25am
The history of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in global context. Emphasis on the forces that have created or shaped the modern world: industrialization and technological change; political ideas and movements such as nationalism; European imperialism and decolonization; and the interplay of cultural values. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 157. Women’s Histories in South Asia. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
This course traces the history of women in South Asia from pre-colonial times to the present. Themes explored in the course will include (but not be limited to): the historical transformations of institutions shaping women’s lives such as state, family, religious and legal traditions; the impact of colonialism, nationalism, and decolonization on women, as well as the history of women’s movements in various parts of South Asia. Offered as HSTY 157 and WGST 257. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 202 Science in Western Thought II. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
The development of Western thinking about the natural world and our relation to it, as part of culture, from Newton to the modern age. HSTY 201 is not a prerequisite.
HSTY 208 Social History of Crime. 3 Units. T/R 11:30-12:45pm
This course explores the relationship between law and history in American society. It uses social history methodology to suggest new ways of understanding how the law works as a system of power to advance certain interests at the expense of less powerful groups. Emphasis is on issues of pressing concern to America’s poor and working class, including the death penalty, abortion, rape, the war on drugs, and the prison industry.
HSTY 219 Berlin in the Tumultuous 20th Century. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
The tumultuous but short twentieth century began and ended with a united Germany, with Berlin as its capital. But in between, Berlin, and Berliners, experienced the extremes of the economic, technological, and cultural progress that the century brought, and the devastation, violence, division, and uncertainty that it also brought. This course introduces students to the German tumult of the twentieth century. We will read about historical events and developments. We will address persistent questions, such as why and how did Hitler come to power; what was life like behind the Berlin Wall; how does one come to grips with a history like Germany’s in the twentieth century; and what has life been like for ordinary Berliner/innen. Counts as SAGES Departmental Seminar. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement..
HSTY 230 Colonial Latin America 3 Units. T/R 11:30-12:45pm
Colonial Latin American history is a period fraught with bloodshed, deadly disease, and the brutal enslavement of Africans and Indigenous peoples, yet was also a time of resistance, mobilization, and the flourishing of arts, culture, and unique hybrid religious practices. This course is an invitation to focus on primary sources and wrestle with thewriting of colonial history throughout the last 500 years, with all its discrepancies, biases, and unanswered questions. We look especially at the role that women, Indigenous peoples, and Africans played in society–voices that have traditionally been silenced. How can we resurrect those voices? We ponder the construction of colonial society and conclude with how the wars of Independence fundamentally altered society. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY234 France and Islam. 3 Units. R 2:30-5:00pm
This seminar examines French encounters with the Muslim world from the Middle Ages to the present. Over the last millennium, France has viewed Saracens, Moriscos, Turks, Berbers, and Arabs with admiration and fear, disdain and incomprehension. Between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, French soldiers battled in the Holy Land; for several hundred years after that, France and the Ottoman Empire exchanged diplomats, traders and slaves. The colonial occupation of Algeria that began in 1830 ended violently in 1962. By then, the empire that struck back had also come home through large waves of immigration. Today, the social and economic status, religious affiliation, political significance and cultural impact of French citizens of North African descent are the subject of burning national debate. Taking a long view on Franco-Muslim relations, the course will explore such topics as the Crusades, Mediterranean piracy and captivity, Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign, the Algerian War of Independence, the “veil affair,” riots in the suburbs of Paris and World Cup soccer.
HSTY 245 History of Capitalism. 3 Units. T 4:00-6:30pm
This course will explore the history of capitalism, from its origins to its recent past, from different angles. Themes under discussion will include, but not be limited to, industrialization, slavery, corporate capitalism, and neoliberalism. We will also study capitalism’s impact on gender, race, environment, education, and time. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 246 Early Native American History. 3 Units.
This survey will explore the rich and diverse history of Native America before contact with Europeans and continue through the nineteenth century. This course will examine interactions between Native nations, European empires, and the United States from Indigenous perspectives. Major themes include tribal sovereignty, settler colonialism, treaty rights, and survivance.
HSTY 248. Digital History Internship with the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History. 3 Units.
This directed digital history internship focuses on familiarizing students with the evolving nature of on-line, vetted historical resources, most particularly encyclopedias and other multi-authored datasets, and providing experience in expanding and maintaining a major web-based historical resource. Students will work with the editor (the instructor for the course) and the graduate student associate editors of the on-line edition of the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History (https://case.edu/ech/) in creating new content for the on-line edition of the Encyclopedia and in modifying and enhancing its website, as well as assisting with the management of its social media components.
HSTY 252A Introduction to African-American Studies. 3 Units. T/R 4:00-5:15pm
This course is designed to introduce students to the study of Black History, cultures, economics, and politics. Students will learn about the development of the field by exploring theoretical questions, methodological approaches, and major themes that have shaped the study of black people, primarily in the U.S. context. This is a seminar-style, discussion-based course that emphasizes critical analysis and expository writing. Offered as ETHS 252A and HSTY 252A. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 254 The Holocaust. 3 Units. T/R 10:00-11:15am
This class seeks to answer fundamental questions about the Holocaust: the German-led organized mass murder of nearly six million Jews and millions of other ethnic and religious minorities. It will investigate the origins and development of racism in modern European society, the manifestations of that racism, and responses to persecution. An additional focus of the course will be comparisons between different groups, different countries, and different phases during the Nazi era. Offered as HSTY 254, RLGN 254, ETHS 254, and JDST 254. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 261 African American History 1865-1945. 3 Units. T/R 1:00-2:15pm
Explores the fashioning of a modern African-American culture between emancipation and the end of World War II. Emergence of a northern-based leadership, the challenge of segregation, emergence of bourgeois culture, the fashioning of racial consciousness and black nationalism, the shift from a primarily southern and rural population to one increasingly northern and urban, the creation and contours of a modern African-American culture, the construction of racial/gender and racial/class consciousness. Offered as AFST 261, ETHS 261 and HSTY 261. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 264 Black Activism. 3 Units. T/R 2:30-3:45pm
The global circulation of transnational politics of Blackness and Black politics is fundamental to understanding anti-racist struggles and the meaning of Blackness in different places and moments in History. This course examines Blackness and Black people’s practice of agency in Africa and its diasporas in the twentieth and twenty-first century. Through various and different Black intellectuals’ and Black artists’ voices of protest we will explore local and transnational activism of Black people worldwide. In doing so, we will attend to the socio-political similarities and differences that shape the meaning of Blackness in Africa and its diaspora. The course will explore Black activism internally and transnationally in various Afro-diasporic spaces based on different stages ranging from early twentieth century towards mid-twentieth century, mid-twentieth century to 1980s, and 1980s to present. From a global perspective we will try to understand what it means to identify as Black amid national, cultural, political, and socio-economic particularities. We will explore the challenges in maintaining a homogenous global black collective over time. Overall, the course studies Black activism against the threats of eurocentrism and everything it symbolizes in terms of politics, culture, race, gender, and class.
HSTY 288 Imperial China: The Great Qing. 3 Units. T/R 11:30-12:45pm
This course is an introduction to the history of Imperial China, from the fall of the Ming Dynasty in 1644 to the creation of the Chinese republic in 1912. We will explore the major historical transformations (political, economic, social, and cultural) of the last imperial dynasty, the Qing (1644-1911), and develop an understanding of the major social, political, economic, and intellectual cultural forces shaping the formation of modern China. Contrary to commonly-held ideas in both West and in China that traditional Chinese society was timeless or stagnant, historians now see dramatic and significant changes during this period–to the economy, to gender relations, to religion, and to many other aspects of life. This course surveys the social, political, economic, and cultural history of this era, with emphasis on recent research. The main goals of the course will be to acquaint students with the key changes and to show the interplay between economic, social, and cultural changes on the one hand and political developments on the other. By the end of the semester you should have a good sense of how Chinese society was transformed over the course of the 17th through early 20th centuries. The topics we will discuss include urbanization and commerce; gender, family and kinship; education and the examination system; opium and free trade; and ethnicity and nationalism. Offered as ASIA 288 and HSTY 288. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 305 Women in American History III. 3 Units. T/R 1:00-2:15pm
This seminar/lecture, writing and reading intensive course interrogates American women’s history from 1945-the present with particular attention to intersections of gender, race, class, region, religion, and age. It is an interdisciplinary course that takes in to account cultural expression (art, film, music, folklore, etc), social science (psychology, etc), science (medicine), economics, politics, non-textual sources (oral histories, produced items) and the law. On this journey, students will engage critical thinking skills to consider issues that address human diversity and commonality, and morals and ethics.
HSTY 312 Curating Public History: The ERA and Women’s Rights in America. 3 Units. T 2:30-5pm
2023 will mark a hundred years since the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was first introduced to Congress. Seeking to create equality between the sexes, the continuous fight to ratify the amendment has been at the heart of feminist politics over the last century, and continues today as debates over reproductive rights and LGBTQ equality once again take center stage. This course will explore the history and legacies of this struggle from gaining the right to vote to the present, examining the multifaceted issues that define “Women’s Rights” in the United States. The course will explore the history of the Amendment and how the fight over the ERA has shaped feminism throughout the 20th century, serving both as a history and a public history experiential course. In addition to engaging in research and understanding of the history of struggle to ratify the ERA, students will create an exhibition that will be complemented with a digital website and an educational database, and will have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience with digital scholarship and tools, as well as with museum studies, learning a set of curatorial and digital skills, and to engage in public humanities.
HSTY 313 Comparative White Supremacy. 3 Units. T 7:00-9:30pm
White supremacy is a set of assumptions, ideas, and practices that pervade the globe. Far from an outgrowth of something inscrutable like “hate” or “human nature,” white supremacy emerged in history amid specific circumstances. Topics will include colonialism, slave trades, the history of the nation state, scientific racism, Social Darwinism, and institutionalized racism in liberal democracies. It will be globally-comparative, focusing on former “white settler colonies.” Having taken the class, seminar participants will understand whence today’s manifestations of white supremacy came. Put another way, hope for dismantling white supremacy depends on understanding its historical footings. Offered as HSTY 313 and HSTY 413. Counts as SAGES Departmental Seminar. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 319 The Crusades. 3 Units. T/R 1:00-2:15pm
This course is a survey of the history of the idea of “crusade,” the expeditions of Western Europeans to the East known as crusades, the Muslim and Eastern Christian cultures against which these movements were directed, as well as the culture of the Latin East and other consequences of these crusades. Offered as HSTY 319 and RLGN 319. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 332 European International Relations 1789-1945. 3 Units. M/W/F 9:30-10:20am
Presents a broad interpretation of the development of the international system in Europe between the French Revolution of 1789 and the end of the European era in 1945. It explains why and how the closed European state system at the beginning of the nineteenth century evolved into an international transcontinental system by the early twentieth century. Counts as SAGES Departmental Seminar. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 343 Racial Capitalism. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
This course examines the utility of the concept of racial capitalism. What is racial capitalism and does the term help us conceptualize how capitalism actually works or does it conflate and confuse distinct forms of oppression? Through readings that explore the relationship between capitalism and race, we will seek to better understand the origins of capitalism, the history of commodifying enslaved laborers, the making of legally free workforces, and the ideologies that rationalize the super exploitation of racialized citizens and noncitizens. Offered as HSTY 343 and HSTY 443. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 345 The Modern European City. 3 Units. T/R 11:30-12:45pm
An examination of social, cultural, political, economic, and architectural and urban planning aspects of life in European cities in nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The principal focus will be the transition of medieval and early modern cities to modern metropolises, both spatially and socially. Case studies may include London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Moscow, and cities in East-Central Europe, among others. Offered as HSTY 345 and HSTY 445. Counts as SAGES Departmental Seminar. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 350 Indigeneous Ohio. 3 Units.
This course will introduce students to the history of Native peoples within what-is-today the state of Ohio. We will look at Indigenous and settler-colonial perspectives of pre-contact Ohio history, early Native and European interactions, the removal of Native communities from Ohio by the United States, and the impact on Native peoples and the state of Ohio. Indigenous Ohio will encourage the students to think about Native resistance, persistence, and survivance over the last several centuries.
HSTY 355 Age of the American Civil War 1815-1880. 3 Units. T/R 10:00-11:15am
This course examines the causes and consequences of the Civil War, focusing on the rise of sectionalism, the dynamics of conflict, and reconstruction. Heavy emphasis is placed on archival research in relevant first person accounts from the period.
HSTY 373 Women and Medicine in the United States. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
Students in this seminar will investigate the experiences of American women as practitioners and as patients. We will meet weekly in the Dittrick Medical Museum for discussion of texts and use artifacts from the museum’s collection. After a unit exploring how the female body was viewed by medical theorists from the Galenic period to the nineteenth-century, we will look at midwives, college-trained female doctors and nurses, and health advocacy among poor populations. We will then look at women’s experiences in terms of menstruation, childbearing, and menopause, before exploring the cultural relationship between women and psychological disorders. Offered as HSTY 373, HSTY 473, and WGST 373. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 380 The Sixties in America. 3 Units. T/R 1:00-2:15pm
This course examines social, cultural, and political changes in the United States during the 1960s. We begin by examining the economic prosperity and “fragile” political consensus of the post-WWII period, as well as the undercurrent of poverty, dissent, and Cold War fears. We then cover the civil rights movement, student activism, the women’s movement, the growth of Liberal America and the welfare state, the Vietnam War, the counterculture and conservative youth movements, the growth of a national consumer-driven, mass-mediated market, and the music, art, and pop culture–as well as their growing reliance on technological intervention–during this period of creative efflorescence. We will do this through reading books, but also through “reading” contemporary evidence of life in America, including listening to music, viewing films, analyzing pictures and artifacts.
HSTY 402 Science in Western Thought II. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
The development of Western thinking about the natural world and our relation to it, as part of culture, from Newton to the modern age. HSTY 201 is not a prerequisite.
HSTY 405 Women in American History III. 3 Units. T/R 1:00-2:15pm
This seminar/lecture, writing and reading intensive course interrogates American women’s history from 1945-the present with particular attention to intersections of gender, race, class, region, religion, and age. It is an interdisciplinary course that takes in to account cultural expression (art, film, music, folklore, etc), social science (psychology, etc), science (medicine), economics, politics, non-textual sources (oral histories, produced items) and the law. On this journey, students will engage critical thinking skills to consider issues that address human diversity and commonality, and morals and ethics.
HSTY 412 Curating Public History: The ERA and Women’s Rights in America. 3 Units. T 2:30-5pm
2023 will mark a hundred years since the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was first introduced to Congress. Seeking to create equality between the sexes, the continuous fight to ratify the amendment has been at the heart of feminist politics over the last century, and continues today as debates over reproductive rights and LGBTQ equality once again take center stage. This course will explore the history and legacies of this struggle from gaining the right to vote to the present, examining the multifaceted issues that define “Women’s Rights” in the United States. The course will explore the history of the Amendment and how the fight over the ERA has shaped feminism throughout the 20th century, serving both as a history and a public history experiential course. In addition to engaging in research and understanding of the history of struggle to ratify the ERA, students will create an exhibition that will be complemented with a digital website and an educational database, and will have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience with digital scholarship and tools, as well as with museum studies, learning a set of curatorial and digital skills, and to engage in public humanities.
HSTY 413 Comparative White Supremacy. 3 Units. T 7:00-9:30pm
White supremacy is a set of assumptions, ideas, and practices that pervade the globe. Far from an outgrowth of something inscrutable like “hate” or “human nature,” white supremacy emerged in history amid specificcircumstances. Topics will include colonialism, slave trades, the history of the nation state, scientific racism, Social Darwinism, and institutionalized racism in liberal democracies. It will be globally-comparative, focusing on former “white settler colonies.” Having taken the class, seminar participants will understand whence today’s manifestations of white supremacy came. Put another way, hope for dismantling white supremacy depends on understanding its historical footings. Offered as HSTY 313 and HSTY 413. Counts as SAGES Departmental Seminar. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement.
HSTY 443 Racial Capitalism. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
This course examines the utility of the concept of racial capitalism. What is racial capitalism and does the term help us conceptualize how capitalism actually works or does it conflate and confuse distinct forms of oppression? Through readings that explore the relationship between capitalism and race, we will seek to better understand the origins of capitalism, the history of commodifying enslaved laborers, the making of legally free workforces, and the ideologies that rationalize the super exploitation of racialized citizens and noncitizens. Offered as HSTY 343 and HSTY 443. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement
HSTY 473 Women and Medicine in the United States. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
Students in this seminar will investigate the experiences of American women as practitioners and as patients. We will meet weekly in the Dittrick Medical Museum for discussion of texts and use artifacts from the museum’s collection. After a unit exploring how the female body was viewed by medical theorists from the Galenic period to the nineteenth-century, we will look at midwives, college-trained female doctors and nurses, and health advocacy among poor populations. We will then look at women’s experiences in terms of menstruation, childbearing, and menopause, before exploring the cultural relationship between women and psychological disorders. Offered as HSTY 373, HSTY 473, and WGST 373. Counts for CAS Global & Cultural Diversity Requirement. Prereq: Graduate standing or instructor permission
HSTY 478 Introduction to Social Justice History. 3 Units. M/W 12:45-2pm
This topical seminar serves as the introductory course for the graduate track in Social Justice History. The focus will vary from year to year as determined by the instructor. Course content will explore the histories of oppression and of the struggles of peoples who have sought to create a more just world..
HSTY 479. Historical Research and Writing. 3 Units. T 2:00-4:30pm
Research seminar for graduate students. Intensive focus on processes of historical research and writing. Students produce a conference paper and a research paper based on primary sources on a topic of their own choosing. Prereq: Graduate standing or instructor permission.
HSTY 498 Social Justice History Practicum: Mapping Police Violence in Cleveland. M/W 3:20-5:50pm
This practicum invites students to apply the concepts and methods of social justice history to a contemporary real-world problem. To provide a meaningful experience of activism, it requires a semester-long engagement with an organization working against some form of oppression, chosen in consultation with a faculty mentor. A final project will analyze the origins of the particular organization or the larger movement of which it is a part.
USSO 294G-100. Women in America, 1945-2000 T TH 10-11:15
Putting female experiences at the center of history changes how students understand the American past and leads to questions such as: do we use the same historical methods? Do we use the same markers of time? How does the private world intersect with the public one? This seminar/lecture, writing and reading intensive course interrogates American women’s history from 1945-the present with particular attention to intersections of gender, race, sexuality, class, region, religion, and age. It is an interdisciplinary course that takes into account cultural expression (art, film, music, folklore, etc), social science (psychology, etc), medicine, economics, politics, non-textual sources (oral histories, produced items) and the law.