HIST 001 Making of the Modern World
Taught as schedule allows (consult the Course Directory)
Cassanelli and Hahn
How did the world we now live in come to be? Is globalization a recent development or does it have a history of its own? At what point can we say that a world economy emerged and what sort of relations of production and distribution linked it together? When did people start thinking and acting as citizens of nations rather than as subjects of rulers or members of religious or ethnic communities, and what were the consequences? How should we conceptualize the great revolutions (French, American, Russian, Chinese) that would determine the landscapes of modern global politics? This course is designed to help us think about the "making of the modern," not by means of an exhaustive survey but by exploring a range of topics from unusual perspectives: piracy, patriotism, prophecy; global struggles for political and human rights, drivers of war and peace, capitalism, nationalism, socialism, fascism, fundamentalism; communication and culture.
