301 - 310 of 788 results for: HISTORY

The First World War provided a prototype and a reference for a new, horrific kind of war. It catalyzed the emergence of modern means of warfare and the social mechanisms necessary to sustain the industrialized war machine. Killing millions, it became the blueprint for the total war that succeeded it. It also brought about new social and political orders, transforming the societies which it mobilized at unprecedented levels. This course will examine the military, political, economic, social and cultural aspects of the conflict. We will discuss the origins and outbreak of the war, the land, sea and air campaigns, the war's economic and social consequences, the home fronts, the war's final stages in eastern and western Europe as well as non-European fronts, and finally, the war's impact on the international system and on its belligerents' and participants' perceptions of the new reality it had created.

This course introduces students to the history of fascist and authoritarian movements in modern Europe, from their origins through the post-WWII era. Germany and Italy will serve as central case studies, though the course will consider other examples as well. Through analytical consideration of secondary sources, primary texts, and art as political propaganda, we will interrogate the meanings and applications of these fraught and complex terms, the different forms taken by fascist and authoritarian movements, and their relationship to nationalism, race, religion, gender, and economic and political institutions. Why did millions of Europeans accept -- and even enthusiastically support -- fascist and authoritarian regimes? To what extent was a single, charismatic leader central to the success or failure of such governments? The course will conclude with an opportunity to reflect on the degree to which fascism and authoritarianism are concepts that remain relevant to political discourse in the twenty-first century.

This course examines the long pedigree of modern deportations and mass expulsions, from the forced resettlements of the ancient world to the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492, and from the outlawry of Saga-era Iceland to the culture of civic exile in Renaissance Italy. The course focuses on Europe and the Mediterranean from antiquity to the early modern period, but students are welcome to venture beyond these geographical and chronological boundaries for their final papers.

To explore the historical context of the earliest Christians, students will read most of the New Testament as well as many documents that didn't make the final cut. Non-Christian texts, Roman art, and surviving archeological remains will better situate Christianity within the ancient world. Students will read from the Dead Sea Scrolls, explore Gnostic gospels, hear of a five-year-old Jesus throwing divine temper tantrums while killing (and later resurrecting) his classmates, peruse an ancient marriage guide, and engage with recent scholarship in archeology, literary criticism, and history.

700 years ago this year Dante Alighieri died. The Italian poet, philosopher, politician, and humanist crafted one of the great epics of world literature, The Divine Comedy. For seven centuries, his journey through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven has been a source of inspiration and fascination for countless artists, critics, and students from all over the world. Yet, at heart, his tale is a commentary upon the complex, violent, wealthy, and deeply religious world to which Dante belonged. In this class, we will investigate Dante's world. Medieval Italy held a privileged place in Latin Christendom. Its location upon a peninsula, jutting out into the Mediterranean Sea, meant it was wedged between and deeply affected by the Islamic and Byzantine worlds. It was home to merchants, bankers, nobles, university students, friars, nuns, and heretics, popes, prostitutes, and the city-states in which they all lived together. Italy played a leading role throughout the Middle Ages in economy, art, culture, religion, and politics and gives us the opportunity to jump into a rich and fascinating world, much different from our own. Our guide and witness to this world will be Dante. Each week students will read selected portions of Dante's journey through the afterlife in order to make their own journey through the world of Italy in the Middle Ages.

(Undergraduates may sign up for German 213 or History 213F, graduate students should sign up for German 313 or History 313F. This course may be taken for variable units. Check the individual course numbers for unit spreads.) This course will provide a survey of the most important political, historical, and cultural events and trends that took place in the German-speaking lands between 900 and 1250. Important themes include the evolution of imperial ideology and relations with Rome, expansion along the eastern frontier, the crusades, the investiture controversy, the rise of powerful cities and civic identities, monastic reform and intellectual renewal, and the flowering of vernacular literature. This course must be taken for a minimum of 3 units and a letter grade to be eligible for Ways credit

In modern perception, the definition of Germany's various cultural landscapes often follows narratives of regional remoteness and aesthetic coherency. Today's Bundesland (federal state) of Hesse makes a case in point. Ever since the Brothers Grimm collected many of their fairy tales there, its image is defined by ideas of small picturesque towns with half-timbered houses and impressive castles on hilltops. However, a closer look clearly reveals that Hesse's countryside was and is rather heterogeneous and diverse in its architectural and artistic heritage, just like in many other "typical" German regions. In this class, we invite students to study the rich artistic heritage of medieval Hesse with us in order to re-define a scholarly concept of "cultural landscape" as a dynamic interaction of route, place, and object. Rather than being a remote region, Hesse was determined by important trans-European routes enabling the transfer of objects and ideas. Along these passages, a dynamic network of micro-landscapes around certain places like towns, abbeys, castles but also bridges with partly distinct political and religious connotations could both develop and transform over a long period. It is our aim to create a better understanding for a historically grounded diversity of German cultural landscapes.NO CLASS during the first week. Class will begin 10/5.

Grand rulers, decisive battles, one or more antichrists, and, inevitably, the end of the world - prophetic texts from the Middle Ages abound with significant allusions. These references are intricately interconnected and shrouded in enigmatic language. This course delves into the phenomenon of prophecy as depicted in medieval sources. Bridging eschatology and chronological perspectives, we will investigate the value of these texts and strive to gain a deeper understanding of the intellectual history of the Middle Ages. Moreover, we will meticulously examine the distribution of these numerous texts within manuscripts, scrutinizing the intended audience and specific effects of the texts. This subject area will serve as an exemplary object of study, enabling us to apply and refine the tools of historical scholarship.

How do historians, art historians, and literary historians of premodern Europe shape their research and their teaching around questions of race? How do current debates on race theory shape our perception of the past and deepen historical inquiry? This graduate colloquium focuses on the most recent publications on race in medieval and early modern studies to reflect on such questions while examining the challenges that race studies put on historical definitions, research methodologies, as well as teaching institutions.