Spring 2025 History Courses
HIST 002: Western Civilization II
Dorabiala
This course explores the major changes that shaped the Western world from the 16th century to today. We will look at the impact of the Reformation, the rise of powerful nation-states, and the big ideas of the Enlightenment. We will also learn how industrialization changed lives, how empires redrew maps, how two world wars reshaped borders and ideas, and how the Cold War's global standoff created lasting tensions and alliances. Through discussions and primary source analysis, we will connect the past to today’s society and see how key moments still influence our lives.
History 010: World Civilizations to 1500
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This course will explore human origins, early civilizations and the social, economic, and political evolution of societies and cultures from the beginnings of human societies to the beginning of the modern age. One objective of the course is to develop analytical skills directed toward historical events. Students will be able to recognize, analyze, and evaluate historical issues with a greater degree of sophistication by the end of the semester than was possible at the start. The student will also be able to recognize historical events that have helped give shape to the modern world.
HIST 011: Modern World History
McNicholas
How on earth did the world get to be the way it is today? This course surveys the past 500 years of world history, an age of intense commercial, military, and cultural interactions between Europeans and the peoples of Asia, Africa and the Americas. After a brief look at the world in the 1400s, we will move on to see European exploration and exploitation of other parts of the globe, including colonization, industrialization, and global imperialism. We’ll also see the diverse responses these things provoked and inspired, from nationalism and revolution to cultural shifts amid world wars, independence struggles, and superpower rivalry. Along with basic textbook coverage, we will dig deeper through weekly engagement with primary sources from around the world. No prior knowledge of world history is required.
History 103: The History of Madness, Mental Illness, and Psychiatry
Page
This course will be an introduction to the history of "madness," examining and evaluating the ideas that have shaped perceptions of madness, insanity, and mental illness over the centuries. Students will become acquainted with the ways in which human biology, culture, society, and politics have reciprocally shaped one another in history.
HIST 110: Introduction to Global Environmental History
Black, Online via Zoom
Through an emphasis on energy systems, this course provides a broad introduction to the history of the human relationships with nature throughout the world. The world of plants, animals, and microbes, of air, water, and land proves to be a crucial historical subject with important implications for the present day. In History 110, students make the important connections between contemporary issues such as climate change and weather patterns and the human past.
HIST 157: Railroads and American Society
Weisel
Discover how, without railroads, the United States would not have become the United States! Course topics include the building of the first railroads, the Civil War, the transcontinental railroads, and the growth of communities like Altoona. Various labor and social groups are also considered, including Mormons, Chinese, African Americans, Mennonites, and Native Americans. The last sections of the course study the rise of competition from motor vehicles and airplanes, the rail crisis of the 1970s (Penn Central) and the recovery of the rail industry after 1980.
HIST 163: Asian History Through Film
McNicholas
This course uses movies as a window on East Asian history. We will watch Asian films from the 1920s to recent years as a visual introduction to Asian cultures and societies and for the light they can shed on problems of modern life and historical interpretation. How have modern Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans viewed and depicted their own histories? How have they dealt with war, revolution, and social and cultural change? Approaching film in its diverse uses as documentation, interpretation, commentary, propaganda, nostalgia, vision for the future, and reflection of social norms and problems, we will also consider films as products of specific historical environments: why did certain movies appear when they did? No prior knowledge of Asian history required. Just bring your eyes and curiosity.
HIST 480: Japan in the Age of Warriors
McNicholas
Once upon a time, Japan was sort of ruled by emperors—but they lost their grip and were pushed aside by warriors. This course explores the warrior age, or medieval Japan, from the rise of provincial samurai in the tenth century through the establishment of the last military dynasty (the Tokugawa shogunate) in the seventeenth. Along the way we will see not only armed struggles but also an array of political, social, economic, and cultural changes that accompanied warrior rule. We’ll survey this landscape together, and you’ll dive into a topic of your choice. No prior background in Japanese history required; just bring your curiosity.
