GLOBAL HISTORY

English; ability to read widely; understand global historical processes.

Upon the completion of this class students will be able to: develop key definitions; gain familiarity with the conversation that have emerged from the field of global history and develop the capacity to link historical knowledge to ongoing contemporary debates; develop sequentially key skills for graduate education and beyond: examination of sources and documents, critical thinking and reading, writing and communicating effectively for a wide range of audience.

Global History – the search to understand how human societies have developed as an interactive community across the world – has come into its own as a scholarly enterprise between the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first century. Spurred by ongoing processes of globalization, it flourishes as one of the most important developments in the discipline of history today. Examining processes, networks, and identities that cross the boundaries of modern nation states, this venture to push the study of the past, remote and recent, beyond the compartmentalized approach most older historians grew up with has mobilized scholars in faculties, departments, and research centers across the world.  This class is designed to introduce students to methods, theories, and critiques of global history. We will survey how scholars of diverse disciplinary backgrounds have attempted to analyze global change and cull meaning from global integration. We will begin by considering the concepts through which scholars have explained and typified global interactions. Starting from the most traditional economic history questions of capitalist development, we will then discuss how other approaches have been used to narrate human history as well as the problems posed by thinking across boundaries. These include environment, health, gender, migrations, and urban development. We will evaluate emerging paradigms for interpreting trans-local relations and the historicity of contemporary global studies. Through the readings and the discussions, students will assess the methodological and theoretical contributions of each scholar and, by critically reflecting on these, gain a toolkit for understanding the turn away from nation-centered ways of seeing history that has occurred in the last decades.

Sebastian Conrad, What Is Global History? (Princeton, NJ, 2016). Maxine Berg (ed.), Writing the History of the Global: Challenges for the Twenty-First Century (London, 2013). A full and more detailed list of readings will be distributed on the first day of class All readings will be accessible on Moodle.

Lectures, workshops and class discussions and presentations.

Participation (attendance, weekly discussions, reading responses) (35%) Final project proposal (5%) Book review (20%) Teamwork: poster (15%) Final research paper/creative work (25%) Non-attending students will have to sit a 1-hour written exam (100%), answering to 8-10 open-ended questions. Please contact class teacher and TAs for further details.

Student projects approved by class teacher.