A few of the courses I’m teaching these days…
First Year Seminar—History at the Movies
Far more people get their history from the movies than from college lectures and historical monographs. But a lot can go wrong in this transmission. Movies can entertain, uplift, and inspire. They can also mythologize, distort, and obscure. We’ll study films from several perspectives: as historical sources for their day, as dramatic (and influential) retellings of the past, and as powerful sources of insight and empathy. The course will require watching old films in black and white, foreign films with English subtitles, and long, challenging documentaries. Please note that there will be extensive reading on film and history. The course will culminate in a hands-on project to create our own (short) historical films.
History 201 (The Craft of History)—The History of News
We live in a media-saturated world, at a moment of profound change: online sources have undermined traditional news sources, the economic model of newspapers is in crisis, cable news has degenerated into sensationalism and opinion theater, new outlets for gossip and entertainment multiply. We’re wrapped up in debates over bias in the news, confused by allegations of “fake news” directed at vaunted outlets of press and broadcast. We’ve come a long way from the hallowed promise of the press as the fourth estate, the check and balance to kings and governments. How shall we understand our news world? A little bit of history may help us to make sense of it.
This course serves two functions. It is, first of all, an introduction to the history of the news in Western societies—from the newsbooks and ballads of the sixteenth century to the newspaper, broadcast news, the internet, and beyond. At the same time, this course is a practical introduction to the critical skills of the historian—including the analysis of primary sources, historiography, historical research and writing, and historical argumentation.
A series of questions will guide our studies: What, in different societies, has counted for news? How have news media changed? What connections are there between the form and the content of news? What has been the social impact of news? Who controls the news? We will explore these questions through classic works on the printing revolution, the history of the press, the sociology of culture, and media criticism, together with newspapers, films, newsreels, and fiction.
History 202—Documentary Filmmaking
An introduction to the theory and practice of documentary filmmaking. We will explore theory: How do documentaries work? How do they represent the world? What makes for good documentary? What are the ethics of documentary filmmaking? And practice: How do we make our own documentaries? How can we capture engaging video? Good sound? How can we tell compelling (real) stories in film?
This course is listed in the History department and we will take up important questions of historical representation. It is also cross-listed in Global, Media and Digital Studies and the Digital & Visual Storytelling Pathway. It is open to students with no prior training in filmmaking. As part of the course students will conceive and produce their own documentaries. If you have a video project in progress, you are invited to integrate it into the work of the course.
History 208—Europe in the Age of Total War, 1890-1945
This course explores the history of Europe from about 1890 to 1945. These years were marked by pitched social conflicts, economic crises, ideological struggles between liberal democracy, fascism, and communism, two devastating world wars, genocide. But it’s not all so bleak. This was also an age of exciting cultural and intellectual innovations and profound social transformations. The age of Hitler and Stalin was also the age of Einstein and Freud, Picasso and Eisenstein, the “new woman” and a newly empowered working-class.
There is too much history here to be comprehensive. We’ll approach this history in three ways, first through a survey of the forces that brought Europe to war against itself twice in this era, then through the close reading of important secondary sources and primary sources, and finally, through student research in an area of interest.
Class format will combine lecture, discussion, and student presentations.
History 209—Europe Since 1945: History & Film
This course examines history and film in Europe from the immediate aftermath of the Second World War to the recent past. Topics include: the memory of the Second World War and the reconstruction of Europe, the Cold War, the dilemmas of Americanization, the expansion of the social welfare state, decolonization and immigration, student protest, the radical right, (the challenges of) European integration, and more.
We will examine how the major political, social and cultural struggles of Europe have been reflected and interpreted in the art of cinema. We’ll pursue a set of guiding questions: How has Europe (and how have Europeans) recovered from the disaster that was the first half of the twentieth century? How have filmmakers reflected upon this history? How can film help to illuminate our understanding of history? How can history help to illuminate our understanding of film?
The course will be taught with a mix of lecture and discussion, with weekly film screenings.
History 223—France in Revolution, War and Empire
France has fascinated and puzzled visitors for more than two hundred years now. For good reasons. It has been the “first daughter of the Catholic Church” and a hotbed of secularism, a country with a deep-rooted revolutionary tradition and a tradition of authoritarianism, the proud home of a human rights tradition and the breeding ground of virulent racism, a hothouse of modern art and a protector of tradition. In this course we will set out to understand France in historical perspective.
We will examine the history of France through the tumultuous experience of revolution, war, and empire. We will study several episodes of crisis in close detail—from the French Revolution to contemporary struggles over identity and integration. We will analyze long-running developments in French society and culture—the emergence of class society, industrialization, the survival of the peasantry, movements in high culture, changing roles for women, colonialism and decolonization, immigration. We will ask how French men and women of various social positions experienced this history. And we will look to the ways in which this history has been reflected in art, literature, film, and music.
Readings include a textbook of French history and a lively mix of important primary & secondary sources. We’ll watch a series of films that dramatize this history. The course will include lectures, frequent discussions, and class activities. There are no prerequisites. No familiarity with French or French history is assumed.
“The world has changed more in the last thirty years than it has since Jesus”—Charles Péguy, 1913
This course is an upper-level seminar on the history of the world at the turn of the twentieth century, the period Jan Romein described as “the watershed of two eras.” It was a period of profound transformations in politics, society, culture and ideas across the world; what is more, it was an era of seismic shifts in international relations. In many respects, the world in 1900 has more in common with our own world than the intervening era of world wars and cold war. After a survey of the world in 1900, we will take up an important question each week, examining international relations, changes in everyday life, mass politics, consumer society, scientific innovations, new cultural movements, imperialism, and more. We will look to examples from around the world. The class will be run on the model of a graduate seminar with a heavy reading load and weekly meetings. Readings will include important new scholarship, classic historical accounts, and powerful primary sources. Requirements include three short papers, class presentations, and a take home final exam.
Other Courses Include:
First Year Seminar: The Eyewitness in History
First Year Seminar: The Memory of War
History 101: France in the Age of the Eiffel Tower
History 109: The Making of the Contemporary World
History 201: Crime & Punishment in History
History 301: The Nineteenth-Century European City
History 301: War and Memory in 20th c. Europe