modern world syllabus

MODERN WORLD HISTORY (42.113) SECTIONS 3, 4

M. Hickey Old Science Hall Office 130 389-4161 hickey@planetx.bloomu.edu

Office Hours: M, W 3:00-4:00; T, Th 2-3:30

Navigation links for this syllabus

Introduction Grading Criteria Required Texts

Lecture and Reading Schedule and Links to Web Assignments and Study Questions

Instructions For Using "Blackboard" On-Line Discussion Board

Direct Link to the On-Line Discussion Board Link to FINAL EXAM INSTRUCTIONS!!!!

Quoting, Paraphrasing, Summarizing, Plagiarism/ Footnotes, Endnotes, Parenthetical Citations

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Introduction

Our era is often referred to as an Age of Globalization, in which the fate of nation-states is increasingly bound to world-wide developments in the economy, politics, environment, and culture. And yet amidst the universalizing tendencies of globalization, we are also experiencing trends such as increasing nationalism and even tribalism. Without a solid background in history, the world that is unfolding in our new millennium can seem random and inexplicable. Giving time and serious thought to the study of modern world history, however, might help us make sense of our present and future.

This course is built around several major themes of Modern World History, including:

the organizational basis of industrial capitalism and its human impact;

the spread of liberty and rights and conflicts over their definitions and limits;

the development of mass politics and in particular the politics of nationalism;

non-European responses to the rising power of Europe and North America;

the causes and impacts of the First World War;

the rise of “totalitarian” alternatives to liberal capitalism;

the causes and impacts of the Second World War;

revolutions and de-colonization;

the Cold War and issues that it overshadowed;

globalization and its discontents.

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Grading Criteria

A final grade of "A" in this course means that your cumulative score on all assignments adds up to 93 percent or more of possible points. A-=90-92; B+=88-89; B=83-87; B-80-82; C+=78-79; C=73-77; C-=70-72; D+= 68-69; D=60-67.

Attendance is required. In addition, please make use of the On-Line Discussion Board. (To see directions for using the Discussion Board, click here.)

Your grade will be based upon four in-class examinations. Exam questions shall be drawn from the study questions linked to this on-line syllabus.

Exam One is 10 percent of your course grade. Half of the exam will be on reading assignments from the course textbook (Bulliet) and half on the course lectures.

Exam Two is 20 percent of your course grade. The exam will be on The Autobiography of Yukichi Fukazawa.

Exam Three is 30 percent of your course grade and covers material since the first exam. One quarter of the exam will be on textbook assignments, one quarter on lectures, and one-half on Klemperer, I Will Bear Witness (1/2 of exam).

The Final Exam is 40 percent of your course grade and covers material since the third exam. One quarter of the essay is on textbook assignments, one quarter on lectures, and one-half on Zhu, Thirty Years in a Red House.

The main criteria used in grading all exam questions shall be: 1) Have you answered the entire question as it was asked; 2) Is your answer factually correct; 3) Is your answer based upon clear and sound logic; 4) Does your answer provide appropriate evidence; and 5) Is your answer presented in clear, grammatical English?

I will enforce university policy on cheating and plagiarism, as it is defined at the web site http://www.bloomu.edu/academic/acadpol.shtml.

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Required Texts

Richard W. Bulliet, et. al., The Earth and Its Peoples: A Global History, Vol. II, Since1500, Brief Edition (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000). Link to Bulliet study questions

The Autobiography of Yukichi Fukuzawa, revised translation by Eiichi Kiyooka (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966). Link to Fukazawa Study Questions

Victor Klemperer, I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1933-1941, translated by Martin Chalmers (New York: The Modern Library, 1999). Link to Klemperer Study Questions.

Zhu Xiao Di, Thirty Years in a Red House: A Memoir of Childhood and Youth in Communist China (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1998). Link to Zhu Study Questions.

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GENERAL SCHEDULE OF LECTURES AND ASSIGNMENTS--WITH HOTLINKS TO STUDY QUESTIONS AND WEB-BASED READINGS

Week I (28, 30 August): The organizational basis of industrial capitalism and its human costs

Read Bulliet, ch. 19. Link to Bulliet study questions

Link to documents on the Sadler Commission's 1832 report on textile workers in Britain. From the web site http://applebutter.freeservers.com/worker/#sadler

Link to Lecture Study Questions

Week II (4, 6 September): Revolutions in France and elsewhere—rights, liberty, and conflicts over their definition and limits

Read Bulliet, ch. 20. Link to Bulliet study questions.

Link to documents on the French revolutions of 1789-1799 and 1848.

This includes links to "The Declaration of Rights of Man (1789)" (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/rightsof.htm); "The Constitution of the Year II (1795)" (http://www.napoleonseries.org/reference/political/legislation/constitution3.cfm ); "The Constitution of the Year XII (1804)" (http://www.napoleonseries.org/reference/political/legislation/constitution12.cfm) and excerpts from 1848 in France, ed. by Roger Price (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1970).