H109:  Perspectives on the World since 1800

Spring 2004

T-TR 4:00-5:15, CA219

 

Instructor:  Nathan Wood

Email: ndwood@indiana.edu

Office hours:  Tuesday-Thursday 2:30-3:20

 

Course Description:

This introductory course on modern, world history explores the major political, technological, economic, and cultural developments that have shaped our world for the past two centuries, illustrating the peak and relative decline of Western influence during this period.  It begins with an examination of revolutionary developments in Europe, including the French Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, and their accompanying ideologies—liberalism, socialism, and nationalism—that greatly affected global history thereafter.  In the first third of the course, online primary source documents will supplement lectures and textbook readings as students become familiar with the major developments of nineteenth-century Europe.  The second third of the course will examine these themes in other regions of the world, including East Asia, South Asia, Africa, Latin America, North America, and Australia during the period of “New Imperialism” and global war from 1880 to 1945.  A novel by South African writer Peter Abrahams, Mine Boy, will provide a new context for exploring issues of industrialization, urbanization, imperialism, and racism.  The last third of the course investigates the world of nation-states after the collapse of empires since 1945, with continued attention to regions of the world and their interrelated development.  The Romantics, a coming of age novel by the Indian novelist Pankaj Mishra, will help us further investigate questions of globalization, urbanization, and the complex relationship between the West and former colonial peoples.   

 

Course Objectives:

Perspectives on the World is designed to help students develop many of the skills listed in the “Principles of Undergraduate Learning” http://www.jaguars.iupui.edu/gened/gnedprin.htm --

including, foremost, core communication skills, critical thinking, application of knowledge, and understanding of society and culture.  Readings, lectures, and exams will help students synthesize and analyze information, while introducing them to the common features and key differences of global regions and societies.  Through the use of primary source documents and novels, the course will encourage students to think historically to arrive at interpretations of the sources.  Papers and discussion sessions provide written and oral opportunities “to comprehend, interpret, and analyze texts.”  

 

Required Texts:

 

  1. John P. McKay, Bennett D. Hill, John Buckler, Patricia Buckley Ebrey, A History of World Societies, Volume C: From 1775 to the Present, sixth edition (Houghton Mifflin, 2004).  [Textbook]
  2. Peter Abrahams, Mine Boy (Hinemann, 1989 [1946])
  3. Pankaj Mishra, The Romantics, (Anchor Books, 2000).

Fifteen online primary source documents, including documents from the French Revolution, excerpts from The Communist Manifesto, and documents concerning New Imperialism, the Russian Revolution, Fascism and Nazism, Human Rights, Nonalignment, and African independence are also mandatory texts.  The documents can be accessed via links on ONCOURSE, or by typing in the URL from this copy of the syllabus.  I recommend that you print them all at once and save them for class.  You must bring a copy of the texts with you on the days for which they are listed.  Documents will be an important part of both in-class discussions and the examinations.

 

Course Requirements and Grading:

 

First Exam:                               20%

First Paper:                               15%

Second Exam:                           20%

Second Paper:                           20%

Final Exam:                               25%

 

Consistent attendance and participation are important to your success in the course.  I will take attendance by means of a daily sign-up sheet.  On the four days we have discussion sessions I will grade your participation.  Excellent attendance and participation can improve your final grade by 1/3 (thus a B+ would become an A-, for example), average or mediocre attendance and participation will not affect your grade, and poor attendance and participation will lower your final grade by 1/3.  I will let you know on ONCOURSE how you are doing as of midterm, so you will have time to make adjustments.

 

Final grades will be calculated with the grading system used by the Registrar, e.g., A (4), a- (3.7), B+ (3.5), etc.   Grades on each assignment will be graded on a traditional 100-point scale.

 

Course Policies:

 

I will use ONCOURSE to post your grades, announcements, and assignments, so please check it regularly.

 

I expect you to read, think critically about, and come prepared to discuss assigned readings.  Critical reading requires that you question the text, take notes, and come prepared with ideas and questions to discuss.  Learning how to read texts and primary sources is one of the most important skills you should acquire in this course. 

 

Late papers will be penalized by 1/3 a letter grade (B to B-) for tardiness (any time from the end of the class for which they are due until the next class), one full letter grade after a week (B to C), and two letter grades after the third class period (B to D).

 

Be sure to save all papers to your hard drive and a diskette, and retain all graded assignments until final grades are posted.

 

Please be courteous of your classmates and instructor by arriving on time and turning off your cellular telephones while in class. 

 

Plagiarism, which is the use of the work of others without proper acknowledgement, quotation, or citation, is unethical and will not be tolerated.  Please see the IUPUI Campus Bulletin, 2000-2002 (p. 36) for university policies regarding plagiarism.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Course Schedule:

(Subject to change)

WEEK 1:  Jan. 13/ 15                Introduction to World History since 1800

 

  1. Introduction:  What is World History?  What are our tasks in this class and how can you succeed?  (Discussion of the syllabus)
  2. Lecture 1:  The World in 1800

 

UNIT ONE:  European Precedents: 

Industrial Capitalism, New Ideologies, and the Nation-State

 

WEEK 2:  Jan. 20/ 22                Liberty, Equality, and Brotherhood

 

  1. Lecture 2:  The Age of Revolutions I: The American and French Revolutions

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 22

  1. Discussion 1:  The French Revolution: New Ideals

Readings:  Abbé Sieyes, “What is the Third Estate?”

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/sieyes.html 

Declaration of the Rights of Man http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/rightsof.htm

Olympia de Gouges, Declaration of the Rights of Woman,

McKay, pp. 726-727.  Be sure to bring these documents to class. 

 

WEEK 3:  Jan. 27/ 29                Industrial Capitalism

 

  1. Lecture 4:  The Age of Revolutions II:  The Industrial Revolution

Readings:  McKay, pp. 731-747; Tables Illustrating the Spread of Industrialization http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/indrevtabs1.html

  1. Lecture 5:  Capital and Labor

Readings:  McKay, pp. 747-759

 

WEEK 4:  Feb. 3/ 5                   The Isms:  Modern Ideologies

 

  1. Lecture 6:  Liberalism, Socialism, and Communism

Readings:  McKay, pp. 761-767; 769-771; 816-819, and The Communist Manifesto: www.anu.edu.au/polsci/Marx/classics/manifesto.html  (Read the introduction and chapters I and II, “Bourgeois and Proletarians” and “Proletarians and Communists”).  Be prepared to discuss this document during the last half of class.  Print and bring it to class.

  1. Lecture 7:  Nationalism and the Nation-State

Readings:  McKay, 767-769; 774-791; 809-816

 

 

WEEK 5:  Feb. 10/ 12               Modern, Urban Life

 

  1. Lecture 8:  Urbanization and Modern Life

Readings:  McKay, 792-808; 819-820

  1. Discussion 2:  Big-City Life

Readings:  Excerpts from Friedrich Engels, Industrial Manchester, 1844 at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1844engels.html and other documents to be distributed beforehand in class.  Be sure to bring the McKay textbook as well.

 

UNIT TWO:  “The Age of Empires”: Global Conflict, 1880s-1945

 

WEEK 6:  Feb. 17/ 19  

 

  1. FIRST IN-CLASS EXAM, FEB 17

 

  1. Lecture 9:  The Growth of the World Economy and Western Imperialism

Readings:  McKay, 825-843, and the following primary sources:

French Prime Minister Jules Ferry’s justification for imperialism:

McKay, 858-859

Indiana Senator Beveridge advocates a US policy of imperialism:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1898beveridge.html

Rudyard Kipling’s “White Man’s Burden”:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/Kipling.html

An Irishman, E.D. Morel, condemns imperialism:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1903blackburden.html

(Be sure to bring the textbook and the printed on-line documents to class.)

 BEGIN READING Mine Boy over the weekend

 

WEEK 7:  Feb. 24/ 26               Imperialism

 

  1. Lecture 10:  The Scramble for Africa

Readings:  McKay, 843-855

Paper 1 questions posted on ONCOURSE

  1.  Discussion Session 3:  Mine Boy

Readings:  McKay, 851-853, Abrahams, Mine Boy (complete)

 

WEEK 8:  March 2/ 4                Imperialism in Asia, Nation-Building    

 

  1. Lecture 11:  South and Southeast Asia

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 27

  1. Lecture 12:  Nation-building in the New World, I:  Latin America

Readings:  McKay, 889-905; 932-933 

First paper due, Thursday March 4

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

WEEK 9:  March 9/ 11              Nation-building, cont. and World War I

 

  1. Lecture 13:  Nation-building in the New World, II:  The United States, Canada, and

Australia

Readings:  McKay, 905-929

  1. Lecture 14:  World War I and the Russian Revolution:  Collapse of European Empires

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 29 and pp.1010-1014

Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited Peoples (1917)

http://www.dur.ac.uk/~dml0www/decright.html

 

SPRING BREAK:  MARCH 15-21

 

WEEK 10:  March 23/ 25          Nationalist, Authoritarian, Communist, and Fascist Regimes

 

  1. Lecture 15:  Nationalism in Asia

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 30

  1. Lecture 16:  Fascism and Dictatorship

Readings:  McKay, 1025-1039, Benito Mussolini, “What is Fascism?” (1932)

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/mussolini-fascism.html

                        Joseph Goebbels, “The Racial Question and World Propaganda” (1933)

                        http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/goeb41.htm

 

WEEK 11:  Mar. 30/ April 1      World War and Genocide

 

  1. Lecture 17:  Holocaust and World War II

Readings:  McKay, 140-1057

  1. SECOND IN-CLASS EXAM, APRIL 1

 

UNIT THREE:  Three Worlds/ “One Small Planet”: 1945 - present

 

WEEK 12:  April 6/ 8                The Cold War

 

  1. Lecture 18:  The Cold War and Its Aftermath in the West

Readings:  McKay, Chap. 33; Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1948HUMRIGHT.html

 

  1. Lecture 19:  Japan and China, 1945-Present

Readings:  McKay, 1101-1108

 

WEEK 13:  April 13/ 15             Nationalism in South Asia and the Middle East

 

  1. Lecture 20:  India and Southeast Asia, 1945-Present

Readings:  McKay, 1109-1115;

Jawaharlal Nehru: “Marxism, Capitalism and Non-Alignment”:

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1941nehru.html

Paper 2 questions posted on ONCOURSE; Begin reading The Romantics

  1. Lecture 21:  The Islamic Heartland

Readings: McKay, 1116-1122

 

WEEK 14:  April 20/ 22             Decolonization and the “Third World”

 

  1. Lecture 22:  Nationalism and the Decolonization of Africa

Readings:  McKay, 1122-1135; UN Declaration, 1960

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1960-un-colonialism.html

Kwame Nkrumah, “I Speak of Freedom”

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1961nkrumah.html

 

  1. Lecture 23:  The Third World and the Growth of Cities

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 35

 

WEEK 15:  April 26/ 29             A Global Society

 

  1. Discussion Session 4:  The Romantics

Readings:  Mishra, The Romantics, complete; and review McKay, 1108-1113

Second Paper due, April 26

  1. Review Session:  Looking back, Looking forward

Readings:  McKay, Chapter 36

 

FINAL EXAM:  Friday, May 7, 3:30-5:30pm