printer friendly pageHISTORY 311A: Family, Gender, and Production in Ancient Rome
Seminar. The household as the basic unit of production in Rome in the context of family relations and ideologies of gender. Methodological challenges of doing social and economic history from literary, epigraphic, and literary texts. Demography of family and kinship in ancient Rome. Ideologies of gender and family roles and their influence on economic production. Economic theories of the family and human capital.
Last offered: Winter 2008
HISTORY 311G: Big Ancient History
How the shift away from thinking about European history in terms of a western civilization model toward embedding it in stories of how global history affects research and teaching on ancient Greece and Rome. Conventional, evolutionary, and global history narratives of the past 5,000 to 15,000 years and some new ideas about how Greco-Roman history might fit into different storylines.
Last offered: Spring 2009
HISTORY 312: Knights, Monks, and Nobles: Masculinity in the Middle Ages (FEMGEN 212X, FEMGEN 312, HISTORY 212, RELIGST 212X, RELIGST 312X)
This course considers masculinity as historically and culturally contingent, focusing on the experiences and representations of medieval men as heroes, eunuchs, fathers, priests, husbands, boys, and fighting men. Recognizing that the lives of men, like those of women, were governed by gendered rules and expectations, we will explore a wide range of medieval masculinities, paying close attention to the processes by which manhood could be achieved (e.g. martial, spiritual, sexual), and to competing versions of manliness, from the warrior hero of the early middle ages to the suffering Christ of late medieval religion.
Terms: Win
| Units: 4-5
Instructors:
Griffiths, F. (PI)
HISTORY 314D: Mediterranean Crossroads: Power, Culture, and Religion in Medieval Sicily (HISTORY 214D)
Sicily in the Middle Ages was a Mediterranean crossroads, a dynamic and diverse kingdom in which Muslim and Christian, Viking and African, European and Eastern Cultures all came together. Explores the life and times of Frederick II (1194-1250). He claimed universal authority as a Christian emperor, yet ruled multireligious Sicily as king. He promoted crusading, yet was accused of being a heretic and a crypto Muslim. He spoke six languages and actively patronized the arts and sciences. Topics include: structures and influences that made such a figure possible; how he managed the tensions of governing a diverse and disparate empire; how religion and cultural production created and maintained his authority; how contemporaries and later generations reacted to this enigmatic emperor; why has he continued to generate such polarizing reactions; and how did Frederick become a figure revered by Nazis and multiculturalists alike.
Last offered: Spring 2014
HISTORY 315: Advanced Paleography (CLASSICS 216, RELIGST 329X)
This course will train students in the transcription and editing of original Medieval and Early Modern textual materials from c. 1000 to 1600, written principally in Latin and English (but other European languages are possible, too). Students will hone their archival skills, learning how to describe, read and present a range of manuscripts and single-leaf documents, before turning their hand to critical interpretation and editing. Students, who must already have experience of working with early archival materials, will focus on the full publication of one individual fragment or document as formal assessment.
Last offered: Winter 2015
HISTORY 315A: Saints and Sinners: Women and Religion in the Medieval World (FEMGEN 215, HISTORY 215, RELIGST 215X)
Although the Apostle Paul taught that "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Gal. 3:28), men and women experienced medieval Christianity in ways that were often vastly different. In this course we examine the religious experiences of women from the origins of Christianity through to the end of the medieval period, with particular attention paid to female prophets and religious authority, saints and martyrs, sexuality and virginity, literacy and education within the cloister, mysticism, relations between religious women and men, and the relevance of gender in the religious life -- especially as gender intersected with fears of heresy, sin, and embodiment.
Terms: Aut
| Units: 5
Instructors:
Griffiths, F. (PI)
HISTORY 316: Women and the Book: Scribes, Artists, and Readers from Late Antiquity through the Fourteenth Century (ARTHIST 206H, FEMGEN 216, HISTORY 216)
This course examines the cultural worlds of medieval women through particular attention to the books that they owned, commissioned, and created. Beginning with the earliest Christian centuries, the course proceeds chronologically, charting women¿s book ownership, scribal and artistic activity, and patronage from Late Antiquity through the fourteenth century. In addition to examining specific manuscripts (in facsimile, or digitally), we will consider ancillary questions to do with women¿s authorship, education and literacy, reading patterns, devotional practices, and visual traditions and representation.
Last offered: Winter 2015
HISTORY 319B: Secularity
Classic theories of secularity. Is a secular world possible? How does, historically seen, the notion of the secular emerge, impose itself, and get challenged? Readings include Max Weber, E. Durkheim, R.A. Markus, Carl Schmitt, and Hans Blumenberg, and studies bearing on the Middle Ages, English monastic secularization, the French Revolution, and 20th-century political religions.
Last offered: Spring 2010
HISTORY 319C: Science, Technology, and Modernity in the Soviet Union (HISTORY 219C)
Science and technology were integral to the Soviet claim to offer a vision of modernity superior to that of Western capitalism. Science and technology would flourish; society would develop on a scientific basis. The results were more complex than the vision. Topics to be covered: science and Marxism-Leninism; the Lysenko affair; the R&D system; the role of the secret police; the atomic project; the space race; missile development; Andrei Sakharov; technology and innovation.
Last offered: Spring 2014
HISTORY 320G: Demons, Witches, Old Believers, Holy Fools, and Folk Belief: Popular Religion in Russia (HISTORY 220G, REES 220G, REES 320G)
19th and early 20th centuries. Peasants, parish priests, witches, possessed persons, cults and sects, old believers, saints, and women's religious communities. Nominally Christian, and members of the Orthodox Church, Russians embraced beliefs and customs that combined teaching from Church and folk traditions.
Last offered: Autumn 2015
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