History

In this course we examine “education” by looking beyond the typical setting of the school. Instead, we will consider education in the context of learning and culture. As scholars in history and anthropology have shown during recent decades, learning can be found in classrooms, families, churches, and public places. Learning can be thought of broadly as the process by which people acquire knowledge, attitudes, values, and skills. We will study the past as a deeply constitutive force in the present. Historians call this approach cultural history, anthropologists call it historical ethnography. Specific topics will include prominent and influential theories of pedagogy and learning, as well as the historical and cultural dynamics of race and ethnicity in learning. Throughout the course, we will keep the long history of education reform in mind – including contemporary initiatives. The course is modeled as an intensive reading and writing seminar in which students will be expected to complete an original research paper testing or applying principles discussed in class.

The Americas were populated for millennia before European colonization transformed the hemisphere and the lives of its first inhabitants. Descendants of these first inhabitants live in many parts of North America – including Orange County, California. This seminar explores the histories and cultures of select Native American peoples from Canada, Mexico, and the United States during selected eras, from before colonization and into the contemporary period. Through reading current and classic scholarship on Native Americans, along with writing a research essay on a topic of the students’ choosing, students will acquire an understanding of the historical and cultural processes that have defined Native American lives. 

This introductory course asks students to evaluate the centrality of slavery to the history of the United States. We examine how the enslavement of Africans and the conquest of the continent affected the development of capitalism, governments, and cultures in the US. Developing these themes entails comparisons across places and time periods. The course identifies a nascent global system, comparing the US with selected locations in South America, West Africa, and the Caribbean. Students make comparisons of the past and the present, seeking to understand how the era of slavery constructed race formations and other legacies for the contemporary world. Throughout, students gain an introductory narrative of American economic and political history and acquire an introduction to empirical methods, critical theory, and current scholarship.

This course examines the role of cultural institutions and ideas in the forming of the American mind from 1865 to the end of the twentieth century. It explores the influence of native progressive traditions as well as European social thought on modern American thinkers from across the political spectrum. Readings from W.E.B. DuBois, Jane Addams, Henry George, John Dewey, Randolph Bourne, Lewis Mumford, Lionel Trilling, Ayn Rand, Richard M. Weaver, Richard Rorty, William F. Buckley, and others.

In this course we examine “education” by looking beyond the typical setting of the school. Instead, we will consider education in the context of learning and culture. As scholars in history and anthropology have shown in recent decades, learning can be found in classrooms, families, churches, and public places. It can be thought of broadly as the process by which people acquire knowledge, attitudes, values, and skills. We will study the past as a deeply constitutive force in the present. Historians call this approach cultural history, anthropologists call it historical ethnography. Specific topics will include prominent and influential theories of pedagogy and learning as well as the historical and cultural dynamics of race and ethnicity in learning. Throughout we will keep the long history of education reform in – including contemporary initiatives. The course is a reading and writing intensive seminar, with students expected to complete an original research paper testing or applying principles discussed in class. 

The Americas were populated for millennia before European colonization transformed the hemisphere and the lives of its indigenous inhabitants. The descendants of these people live in many parts of North America – including Orange County, California. This seminar explores the histories and cultures of selected Native American peoples from Canada, Mexico, and the United States during selected eras from before colonization to the contemporary period. Reading current and classic scholarship on Native Americans and writing a research essay on a topic of the students’ choosing, students will acquire an understanding of the historical and cultural processes that have defined Native American lives.

This course is a survey of East Asian history from the earliest time to the present. The course is restricted to those aspects of East Asian history that enable us to understand the complexities and diversities in the historical experience of three East Asian countries: China, Japan, and Korea. This course concentrates on how three East Asian societies have achieved their own economic, political, social, and cultural developments, sometimes by way of mutual inspiration, influence or actual interaction with each other, and, later, with a broader world.

This course is a survey of Modern China from around 1600 to the present. The course helps students to understand the origins, processes, and outcomes of the revolution in 20th century China. The course analyzes the complex and contradictory process of revolution, including the Communist Revolution and the many other revolutions that have transformed Chinese society and politics.

This course examines the emergence of the Third World in modern history, the response to and reformulation of the question of modernity among Third World peoples and intellectuals, and the formation of modern global relation, beginning around 1450 to the present, in which Euro-Americans played a central part. This course also explores recent changes in the status and the meaning of the Third World and lays out numerous historical problems that still remain in this increasingly globalizing and interactive world.

Many scholars have argued that the whole idea of Asia is an invention, since geographically speaking the separation of Asia from “Europe” (or West, in a strict sense) makes little sense. This is the point of departure for this course, which will examine constructions and representations of East (Asia) and West, as ideas, in significant scholarly and literary works, and films, both Euro-American and Asian. The course examines each work in its relationship to its historical circumstances in order to convey a sense of changes historically in such constructions and representations.

This course introduces historical complexities and issues, and various constraints that have shaped the lives and struggles of East Asian women from the “pre-modern period” to the present, in their dealings with the questions of their own culture and, later, modernity. Literary works and films will be widely used. 

This course examines historical issues and problems of family, women and revolution in modern Chinese history through their representations in literature and films, both Chinese and foreign, with the emphasis on the analysis of the Chinese revolution through family and women narratives. The course considers literature and film in their relation to historical circumstances. Film and literature have been selected to cover a multiplicity and complexity of class, ethnic, gender, generational, and regional perspectives.

This course is intended as an advanced survey of the People’s Republic of China from its beginnings in 1949 to the present. The survey will cover internal developments in Chinese socialism and its global context as well as developments in Chinese society and culture since 1949.

This course is a survey of modern Japan from the mid-19th century to the present, with emphasis on historical issues that have led to diverse understandings and interpretations. The course focuses on the development of modern ideology, social relationships, and economic and political institutions in a global context. The course takes the development of Japanese capitalism in the global economic system as the central event of modern Japanese history and of Japan’s changing place in the world during the 20th century.

This course satisfies the advanced writing skills course requirement.

The United States of America originated as colonies within the British Empire, and the early founders of the republic openly celebrated the expected emergence of an American empire after the American Revolution. In what ways can the history of the United States be understood through this lens of emerging empire? Might that lens obscure as much as it reveals? What is imperialism, how is it different from colonialism, and what relationship to American cultural development has it had? To explore answers to these and other questions, students will focus on the US experience of empire and compare it to the history of imperialism and colonialism in India, Africa, and elsewhere. Students will read classic and contemporary works in Colonial Studies, Postcolonial Studies, and American Cultural History in preparation for group discussions, seminar papers, and independent research.