This course surveys Nordic history from the time of the Viking expansion to the period of the Kalmar Union. Topics include Viking expansion and conquest, Nordic cultural and religious life, the coming of Christianity, the sagas and other literary sources, and later medieval developments.

The idea of courtly love typically evokes images of brave knights and fair ladies vowing eternal devotion in elegant language. How such a concept took hold in the early 12th century, and what the consequences have been for people of that time to the present, is the subject of our inquiry. This course explores the ideal of courtly love, its social function, its role in literature, the arts, and music, its ambiguous relationship to Christianity and to the feudal system, and finally, its critics, through interpretive reading of texts from the period supplemented by background lectures and readings from secondary sources.

This course explores the origins of the modern Russian empire. Using primary sources including chronicles, folktales, legal codes, letters, and religious icons, students consider Russia’s development from a loose collection of princedoms into a powerful, multi-ethnic empire spanning 11 time zones. Topics include the impact of geography and climate, the Orthodox religion, Mongol rule, gender roles, the rise of autocracy, and social rebellion.

This course examines the social, economic, and historical roles of women in colonial Africa based on selected case studies. Through discussions, films, and a varied list of intriguing primary sources and reading, the course introduces students to “doing history.” We reconstruct African women’s lives by exploring themes such as slavery, work, domesticity, marriage and kingship, social change, motherhood, and resistance and nationalism. The course pays particular attention to how women in colonial Africa coped with society and not how society coped with them. No prior study of African history required.

This course surveys Western history and culture from its origins in the Ancient Near East to the Italian Renaissance. Topics include the ancient world, the beginnings of Christianity, the emergence and disintegration of Rome as a unifying power, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance. Through original texts and historical studies, students explore relationships among religions, states, and societies and views of natural environments, family life, and gender roles.

Students use original texts, historical studies, and literature to examine, comparatively and chronologically, the evolution of selected cultures and societies before 1500. They explore topics such as political, cultural, and economic exchange, religious practices, human interaction with the environment, forms of political authority, family life, and gender roles.

This course examines the development of American culture and society from the Columbian encounter through the Civil War. Topics include the interaction of Europeans, Africans, and indigenous peoples in early America; the social development of the British colonies; the evolution of American slavery; the Revolution and the Constitution; industrialization, expansion and reform in the 19th century; and the Civil War.

Like all other human beings, Americans are consumers. But like all other cultures, Americans have crafted particular ways of consuming. This class explores the changes and continuities of American consumption from the 17th century to now, looking at how historians have interpreted our consumer history. At the same time, the course invites students to refine their own skills as historians, practicing American consumer history with both a research project and an extended reflective essay.

This seminar will explore some of the tools and methods historians use when writing and talking about American families. Among the variables we’ll consider are gender and family roles, race and ethnicity, and the role of experts in defining American ideals.

The Ancient Greeks played a large role in constructing our western culture and identity. Much of what we take for granted derives ultimately from them: democracy, theatre, philosophy, rhetoric, the writing of history, even architectural and artistic styles and conventions. This course surveys the history of Greece from the earliest days to its conquest by Rome. Our task is to understand how and why Greek culture developed as it did. Although we will examine a variety of subjects over a large period, the focus of our attention will be:

• power-holding, its mechanics and legitimization: Who held power in Ancient Greece? Why, How, and at Whose expense? How was the position of the power-holders justified and enforced?

• constructing histories: How do we understand the past? Specifically, how can the sources, especially the literary evidence, be used (or abused) to understand and reconstruct past society.

• our Greek heritage: Are the Greeks so different from us? In some areas, religion and gender relations, the Greeks seem strange, but in others such as politics and war, quite similar. Why is this the case and what can we learn from such comparisons?

The goal of this course is to help the student gain an understanding and appreciation not only for the scope and scale of Greek history, but for the workings of human society in general. Throughout the semester we shall use Ancient Greece as a laboratory in which to acquire the critical skills and experience necessary to evaluate contemporary events and institutions.

This course examines the history of Rome from the earliest days of the reign of the Severan Dynasty. Although we will examine a variety of subjects over a large period, the focus of our attention will be:

•power-holding, its mechanics and legitimization: who held power in the Roman World? Why and How? How was the position of the power-holders justified and enforced?

•the discipline of history itself: how do we understand the past? Specifically, how can the ancient sources be used (or abused) to understand and reconstruct ancient history?

The goal of this course is to help the student gain an understanding and appreciation not only for the scope and scale of Roman history, but for the workings of human society in general. Throughout the semester we shall use Ancient Rome as a laboratory in which to acquire the critical skills and experience necessary to evaluate contemporary events and institutions.

This course provides a survey of the history of Germany with emphasis on the period from 1700 to the present. Through primary sources, literature, and historical accounts, students examine Germany’s development from a collection of independent states to a great power, focusing on the social, cultural, and political impact of national unification, rapid industrialization, world wars, and European union.

History 226 surveys French history from the 1780s to the present and examines the forces of stability and instability that account for France's tumultuous past. Students begin with the French Revolution and its role in shaping both future consensus and division within the new nation. They consider the ways in which the establishment of a Republic in the 1870s brought an end to the cycle of revolution and reaction in the nineteenth century, and how republican regimes since then have met the challenges of industrialization, mass democracy, and world war--sometimes with great success, sometimes with great shame. Finally, in order to understand today’s France and current issues such as immigration and France’s role in world affairs, students examine politics and society since 1945.

Russia's modern history from Peter the Great to the revolution of 1917 centers on the tsarist autocracy and popular movements to limit its power. Students assess Russia’s economy, culture, and religion against the background of the country’s westernization. Foreign Language Across the Curriculum course available in Russian.

This class examines reform and revolution at the end of Qing dynasty; the creation and collapse of the first Republic; warlordism, the New Culture Movement, social and cultural change, and the rise of Chinese nationalism; Japanese invasion, civil war, and the Communist victory; the People’s Republic since 1949; economic and social change, conflict with the Soviet Union, the Cultural Revolution, Maoism and Mao’s legacy, and China’s recent economic and political transformation. Applied Foreign Language Component available in Chinese for students at the third-year level in the language.

This course is a comprehensive introduction to Native American history and culture that covers fifteen thousand years of human life in the Americas. Topics examined include Native religions; European invasions and colonization; Indian Removal; the Reservation system; the effects of U.S. “Indian Policy”; Red Power activism; the recent American Indian Renaissance; and the ongoing struggle for Native sovereignty in U.S. courts. Students also have the opportunity to conduct research individually and in groups to study in greater detail a tribe or issue of their choice.

In studying the impact of the Civil War era on American society and politics, students focus on slavery, emancipation, and race relations. They also address the impact of industrialization on northern society, encompassing immigration and nativism, the westward movement, and the dispossession of Native Americans. The course situates the dramatic political and military events of the era in the wider evolution of American life.

This course focuses on issues that have emerged in modern European history when ideas and assumptions about the body politic and the social body intersect with ideas about the physical bodies of individuals. Medical thought and practice have played a key role in defining and sustaining categories of "race" and "gender" since the Enlightenment. We'll see that the embedding of notions of race and gender in modern science at its origins was not accidental, but tied to emerging political ideas in Europe about rights, order, and liberty. We'll track the impact of medical notions of race and gender on nationalism and imperialism in the nineteenth century, explore medicine's contribution to antisemitic ideology, and examine the role of Nazi medicine in the Final Solution.

This seminar covers varying topics in East Asian history. Recent topics have included "World War II in East Asia and the Pacific" and "Nationalism and Communism in Southeast Asia." Offered periodically. May be repeated if topics are different.

In this two hundredth anniversary of Lincoln’s birth, having experienced the hoopla surrounding the inauguration of President Obama of Illinois, we’ll be looking at the life, politics and social world of this iconic figure in America history. Major topics include Lincoln’s biography, religious and social background, and his crucial views on race and slavery. The course will culminate in a major paper, utilizing the profusion of online and other primary sources on Lincoln and the Civil War era.

This seminar places the American experience in Vietnam in the Vietnamese historical context. By examining and interpreting primary sources, students examine the heritage of Vietnamese culture and society, French colonial rule, nationalism and the struggle for independence, Communism and the Cold War, the causes and consequences of the American role in Vietnam, and the effect of the war on Laos and Cambodia. Emphasis on interpreting primary sources.

On the basis of selected works of O.E. Rølvaag, including Giants in the Earth, this course considers the literature and history of Norwegian America in the later 19th and early 20th centuries. For the sake of comparison students also read selections from other Norwegian and Norwegian-American authors. Topics for consideration include ecology, family, gender, agriculture, economics, technology, urbanization, religion, immigration, ethnicity, and American pluralism.

This course introduces students to a selection of topics in women’s history during a transitional period in the West and helps them develop a sense of the methodologies of women’s history as a field. Topics include the status of women in Renaissance Italy, female rulers during the early modern period, women in the context of humanism, changing conditions for working women, women and the arts, witchcraft, and the impact of the Reformation.

This course examines the history of 20th-century Cuba, especially the 1959 revolution and its aftermath. Students study the transformation of Cuban political culture, the obstacles to economic and agrarian reform, education, the role of women, human rights, U.S. policies toward Cuba, and the future of Cuba after the breakup of the Soviet Union. The role of charismatic leadership in Latin America and the possibilities for revolutionary changes in the Americas are also examined.

This seminar examines one of history’s most dramatic episodes: the Spanish conquest and colonization of what is now Latin America. Through reading and discussion, we will examine such topics as European and indigenous perceptions of the Conquest, the role of missionaries the imperial enterprise, the response of native peoples to the imposition of Christianity, indigenous efforts to resist Spanish domination, the ecological/biological consequences of 1492, and subsequent debates over the morality of the conquest.

Students examine the overthrow of American segregation through several decades of agitation for civil rights. This seminar focuses primarily on the South, though students also discuss northern race relations. Primary accounts from the era constitute the assigned readings. Among the topics covered are the segregated South, Martin Luther King and his critics, the Black Power movement, and the rise of white backlash politics.

This Seminar examines American Society since 1945, with particular emphasis on the years between 1945 and 1975. The main focus is social history. Topics include the impact of the Cold War, migration to the suburbs, post-industrial society, the culture of the 1950’s, civil rights, the Vietnam War, the student movement, the sexual revolution, and Watergate. Sources include novels, essays, magazine stories, films, and documentaries.

How have people understood their identities racially, culturally, intellectually, and politically, throughout the periods of migration engendered by European colonialism? Students use travel literature, memoirs, colonial ephemera, and artwork to explore the experiences of both the European colonialists/settlers and the colonized migrants in an effort to place these often conflicting groups in historical conversation with each other.

This course surveys European history and culture since the Renaissance. Topics include the impact of Protestantism, the development of nation-states, the Enlightenment, revolutionary ideas and experiences, the Napoleonic era, imperialism, mass political movements, and global warfare. Through original texts, historical studies, and literature, students explore relations among religions, states, and societies, and understandings of liberty and reason, natural environments, family life, and gender roles.

This course takes a comparative and chronological approach to studying the diverse cultures of the modern world. Through original texts, historical studies, and literary sources, students examine such themes as the rise of American imperialism and its impact on the native peoples of the Americas, Asia, and Africa; the emergence of the nation state and new ideologies; the spread of American influence in the world; human interaction with the environment, challenges to religion and traditional life-styles; and innovation in family and gender structures.

As they study the development of U.S. society from the Civil War to the present, students examine changing race, gender and class relations as well as U.S. relations with the world. Students will pay special attention to different interpretations as history is approached by political, social, cultural and diplomatic historians; we will also study first-hand accounts and primary documents. Topics will include Reconstruction, the frontier, industrialization, immigration, U.S. imperialism, two world wars, domestic and global anti-communism, first and second wave feminism, the Vietnam War and U.S.-Middle East relations.

History 210 examines the experience of occupation, collaboration, and resistance in France during World War II, an individually and nationally painful episode for the French. During four years of hardship and uncertainty, both the Vichy regime and French Resistance groups attempted to remake France by developing competing visions of the nation. Upon the Liberation of Paris, a victorious Charles de Gaulle spoke of a nation of resisters “from the first hour.” The historical record and contested nature of French national memory, however, make clear that the truth is more complex. In this course we’ll use both primary and secondary sources to examine the perspectives of the historical actors and the interpretations of historical scholars. We’ll also consider the distinctive ways in which literature and film shape an understanding of French experience during the war years. Finally, since this course is a Majors Seminar (M-sem), we’ll pay particular attention to the way historians do their work.

Benjamin Franklin – satirist, printer, inventor, and statesman – has long been regarded the most endearing of our “Founding Fathers,” the “First American” at home and abroad. What many people often forget about Franklin, though, was that he was already seventy years old by the time America declared its independence. Franklin was born, came of age, prospered in business, and achieved fame in science as a subject of three different British kings (and one Queen). If we look carefully at the first seventy years of Franklin’s life, we see him not as an American, but as a colonial Briton. Franklin’s life, therefore, captures the essence of that world as much as it does revolutionary America.

Through the life of Benjamin Franklin, this course examines the varied, rapidly changing world of eighteenth century British North America. While we briefly touch on the revolutionary movements that led to American independence, it will focus more specifically on life as it was lived in the colonies prior to 1776. It will explore subjects such as the rise of civic life in America, provincial politics, intellectual and cultural life, religious awakenings, imperial wars, the frontier, and the African slave trade. It also offers students the opportunity to engage in research using original eighteenth century source material – the material of Ben Franklin’s America.

History 270, the M-Sem on the Civil War era, explores the social impact of war on regular people: soldiers, civilians, and slaves in particular. Major topics will include emancipation, the experience of war in a slave society, and what the war did to women's roles and the lives of children. The intention is to examine the experience of warfare emphasizing the perspective of the people who aren't part of the leadership elite.

This course examines European history during the period of about 300 to 1000. Topics include the culture of late antiquity, the foundation of Christian institutions, the age of migrations, the Byzantine Empire and its relationship with the West , the emergence of Islam, the Carolingian revival, the manorial system, and the development of feudalism, with attention given to women’s roles in medieval society throughout the course. History 190 recommended.

Students examine intellectual, political, social, and spiritual currents, 1300 to 1550, particularly in the city of Florence, but also in broader Italian and European Renaissance contexts. Topics include humanism, the political life of the northern Italian city states, changes in spirituality and in the life of the church, the status of women, and the development of political theory. Readings include Petrarch, Machiavelli, and Erasmus.

This course offers a survey of modern Scandinavian history from the period of the Protestant Reformation to the present with special attention to recent developments. Foreign Language Across the Curriculum course available in Norwegian.

This course begins with the Communist revolution of 1917 and traces the growth of the Soviet Union under Lenin, Stalin, and their successors. Students analyze the “crisis” of the Soviet system in order to explain why the last of the European empires collapsed in 1991. Foreign Language Across the Curriculum course available in Russian.

As the age of imperialism ended in the decades following World War II, major Western Empires (primarily England and France) faced the challenge of how to decolonize the lands and peoples they occupied. In this course students examine the processes and products of decolonization in order to explore key issues in post-1945 Europe, including: immigration, citizenship, race relations, religion, and national and cultural identity.

An overview of the evolution of Latin American societies since 1750, this course examines the consequences of independence, 19th-century economic imperialism, and the 20th-century transitions to more urbanized, industrialized ways of life. Students examine major Latin American nations and compare their revolutionary and counterrevolutionary trajectories toward the establishment of authoritarian states. Applied Foreign Language Component available in Spanish.

This course provides an overview of Chinese history and culture from the emergence of Chinese civilization to the late nineteenth century, providing an overview of traditional Chinese thought, institutions, society, and culture. History 250 examines social, economic, and political change, intellectual and religious history, and the development of Chinese arts and literature, as well as China's relations with its neighbors and, in late imperial China, with the West. The goal of this course is to give you a deeper understanding and appreciation of the historical heritage of modern China.

A study of Japan from the origins of the Yamato state culture to the emergence of modern Japan, this course provides an overview of traditional Japanese thought, values, and culture. The course examines social, economic and political change, intellectual and religious history, and the development of Japanese arts and literature, as well as Japan’s relations with China, Korea, and the West.

This course interrogates the nature and development of Muslim societies in sub-Saharan Africa from the earliest times to the present. With a varied list of reading, students explore questions of authenticity and “historical truth,” and examine current debates on themes such as patterns of Islamization, “African Islam” and Islam in Africa, the invention of Muslim identities, the expansion of Sufism, women in Islam, Islamic education, Islam and colonialism, and revivalism in Islam.

This course surveys women’s experience in American life from the colonial period to the present. Students examine the changing economic, social, and legal status of women, society’s attitudes towards women, and the growth of a women’s movement.

By examining the interaction of people and environment on the North American continent from the 15th century to the present, this course shows how history "takes place" in ecological contexts that change over time. Students compare Native American and Euro-American religious beliefs, social values, economic aspirations, and technological developments and examine their consequences for the flora, fauna, and peoples of the continent.

In this study of African Americans in U. S. society from African origins to the present, students explore the African heritage, the experience of slavery, segregation, and the rise of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. The course pays particular attention to the issue of black nationalism as a force in American life.

This course examines the colonial and early national periods of American history (ca. 1607 to 1828) through the experiences of women. Characterized by epochs of migration, settlement, religious awakenings, war, and revolution, students will explore the manner by which these and other events transformed the lives of American women. This course also takes an explicitly multicultural approach and investigates the lives of African, Native American, and non-English speaking European women. Subject matter will vary from week to week, but major topics include the construction of gender, women and the law, economic life, education, sexuality, widowhood, and women in the public sphere.

This course surveys the history of the medical profession in Europe and the US from 1700 to the present, with attention to legacies from earlier periods. “Vocation” provides the unifying theme, and is understood as a lived experience shaped by the values and expectations of practitioner, profession, and society, manifested in various settings. Students examine scientific, cultural, institutional, ethical, and personal factors influencing the development of physicians and their practice in specific historical contexts. Topics include: secular and religious definitions of medical vocation; changing attitudes toward/uses of the Hippocratic Oath; the rise of scientific medicine; the public health revolution; the historical experience of illness and “going to the doctor;” race, class, and gender as factors in medical careers and practice; perennial criticisms of doctors and medicine; medical narratives in context; and images of the doctor in popular culture.

This seminar covers various topics in the history of medieval Europe, depending upon the instructor. May be repeated if topics are different. Topic for Spring 2008: Medieval Italy, 1050-1350. This seminar will consider divergent developments in north, central, and southern Italy during a formative period in the history of the west. Topics include the medieval papacy and Rome; Sicilian history; Frederick II; the city-states of northern Italy; the crusades; Dante.

This seminar examines politics and religion in England from the era of Elizabeth I through the early Stuart period. Students examine the strengths and weaknesses of the royal state and of the Protestant state church. They analyze why both church and state collapsed in the 1640s in civil war, revolution, and demands for further reformation. Particular attention will be paid to Puritanism (including John Milton and John Bunyan), parliamentary politics, popular culture, radical political and religious groups (like the Levellers and the Quakers), women and patriarchy, the era of Oliver Cromwell, and the continuing impact of these historical experiences on Anglo-American culture.

This upper-level Russian history seminar focuses on the themes of national identity, ethnicity, and imperial rule in Russian history from the late medieval period through the twentieth century. The geographic designation “Russia” has always been populated by multi-ethnic peoples. How were non-Orthodox, non-Russian subjects incorporated into the Russian empire? What were the strategies and practices of imperial rule? How and why did policies of assimilation alternate with policies of tolerance, and why were these policies unevenly applied? We will consider these questions over a broad sweep of history with the goal of identifying analytical categories and models that are appropriate to the Russian context. The course will also introduce key theoretical texts on national identity and imperialism. We will interrogate these theories and test them against the Russian version of colonial rule – a colonialism that differed from European models yet, some would argue, has persisted to this day. Finally, we will consider the perspective of colonized peoples and what an alternative narrative history of Russian expansion might look like “from below.”

Many American historians would argue that the American Revolution was the defining event in United States history. Take away the colonists’ rebellion and hard-fought separation from Great Britain and what is left is a country devoid of much of its political and cultural character. The problem, as John Adams recognized, is that the Revolution, then as now, meant different things to different people, making it a difficult subject about which to write. As a result, generations of historians have interpreted the origins and consequences of the Revolution in a variety of creative and contradictory ways. The aim of this course is not only to examine the American Revolution's key events, but also to explore the various interpretations of its origins and consequences. Students will read from a diverse body of literature derived from several scholarly traditions, addressing questions such as: How radical was the revolution? Who made the Revolution happen? Who benefited most? Why did some refuse to support it? Why 1776? As we will see, the debates surrounding such questions remain heated and contested to this day, proof positive of the Revolution’s enduring legacy. What we may find is that the Revolution’s final chapter, in some sense, has yet to be written.

HISTORY RESEARCH WORKSHOP: This course integrates independent research and collective consideration of historical issues. Students discuss significant historical themes (e.g., power, reform, gender, narrative, public history), while working individually on research projects and collectively on critiques and revisions of their work. Designed for Majors who are juniors, the seminar is especially appropriate (but not required) for those considering Distinction, academic internships, or participation in the undergraduate research program. With the consent of both instructors, students may complete a research project satisfying requirements of the Research Workshop and another level-III seminar.

"Histories of Everyday Life"
This Semester, rather than focus on a particular place or period of time, we will look at how historians from many different fields began to explore and understand “everyday life.”  What do historians have to say about eating, sex, work, rumors, fear, night, noise, bingo, and more?  What sources do they use for this research?  What’s the significance of these histories of everyday life?  Much of this study comes under the umbrella of social and cultural history.  We will consider how these approaches developed within a number of different fields of history, paying especially close attention to “histories of everyday life” in works of local history and micro-history.
Students will produce a substantial research paper, based on primary sources and focused on a theme or problem related to histories of everyday life.  Over the course of the semester, a number of History Department faculty members will visit the class to help lead the discussion on a chapter or article from their field.  This would be a good opportunity to become acquainted with their fields and interests.  This seminar is appropriate (but not required) for junior history majors who are considering distinction, academic internships, or participation in the undergraduate research program.  Juniors especially are encouraged to consider this course, although seniors also are welcome to contact the instructor, Eric Fure-Slocum (furesloc@stolaf.edu).