Department of History

Survey of the peoples, cultures, and social, economic, and political systems that have characterized the world’s major civilizations in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Oceania. 1000 CE to 1700 CE.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
Area E: Culture and Thought
European Traditions
Writing

This course surveys the early cultural, social, economic, and political development of Africa, the Americas, Asia, the Mediterranean, and Oceania, from prehistory to 1000 CE.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
Area E: Culture and Thought
European Traditions
Writing

Survey of the history of Europe in the Medieval and Early Modern periods, 800-1700. Discusses the major social, political, religious, and cultural characteristics and developments of the period, as well as key interactions between Europe and other parts of the world. Weekly discussion sections are an important feature of this course, enabling students to develop and expand upon material presented during the lecture hour.

Satisfies General Education Requirements: Area E: Culture and Thought, European Traditions, and Writing

Deals with major issues in Latin America’s historical formation: pre-Hispanic cultures, the Spanish conquest, the role of colonial institutions, the development of trade, eighteenth-century reform, independence, the formation of nations; and identify major issues in current Latin American affairs.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
Area E: Culture and Thought
Writing

Through studying a particular topic in history, students gain insight into historical methods and skills. Course designed for freshmen and sophomore history majors or prospective majors. Others may enroll by permission of instructor. Topics vary by quarter and instructor.

Winter 2019:  Do bodily practices and emotional expressions have a history? How is culture written on our bodies? How are cultural differences expressed and mediated through the human body? These are just a few of the questions that historians of the body and historians of the emotions have tackled in recent decades. This course uses specific primary and secondary readings to explore some of the ways that historians of sixteenth-, seventeenth- and eighteenth-century North America have begun to write the history of the human body, and, through it, the history of cultures in interaction. Readings will cover topics such as anger, torture, sexuality, pregnancy, visions, ghosts, dancing, manners, conjuring and clothing to uncover changing approaches to understanding and interpreting culture and emotions in the body.
Students will work in teams with specific “bodies” of primary evidence to unpack the cultural richness and insights of this field of historical investigation.

Through studying a particular topic in history, students gain insight into historical methods and skills. Course designed for freshmen and sophomore history majors or prospective majors. Others may enroll by permission of instructor. Topics vary by quarter and instructor.

Winter 2019:

Do the things we own have histories? If they do, how are they different from the histories of people who make or use those things? Using these two related questions, this course will introduce students to primary and secondary sources from South Asia that follow histories of three different commodities – an agricultural, industrial, and a digital one. We will use newspapers, poetry, photographs, and government reports to learn how we can use a commodity to talk about larger global histories beyond the thing itself. To that end, we will also learn two historical concepts, namely value and violence. Studying how a commodity is valued by different people will help students see the role commodities play in society, just as studying violence behind commodities will help students see what is hidden within commodities. The final project will ask students to research the history of a particular commodity, not necessarily just from South Asia, using the concepts learnt in the course.

A survey of the leading issues in American life from the sectional crisis to progressivism. The course focuses on politics, cultural development, social conflict, economic life, foreign policy, and influential ideas. Features discussion sections.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
Area D: Social Science
American History and Institutions
Writing

Explores how science, technology and/or medicine have helped shape modern societies (roughly 1850-present). Themes include formation of scientific and technical communities, the interactions of science with political and popular culture, and the social context of knowledge production.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:

Area E: Culture and Thought

Examines historiographically and sociologically the Japanese State’s various engagements in violent acts during war and peace times.

1800 – 1945. History 49-A-B-C is a general survey course designed to introduce students to major themes in African history. The course focuses on African civilizations and identities, European colonial conquests, governance and colonial economies, African resistance and engagement with global capitalism. Weekly discussion sections are an important feature of this course, enabling students to develop and expand upon material presented during lecture

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
Area E: Culture and Thought
World Cultures
Writing

Historical and interdisciplinary perspectives on poverty and inequality globally and in the U.S., tracing structural transformations, shifting modes of thought, policy, and action, dynamics of class, racial, gender, ethnic and geographic stratification, and major theoretical debates from antiquity through the present. Course features guest lectures to introduce students to varied conceptual and methodological approaches to studying poverty and inequality, and draws on readings, discussion, writing, and related assignments to explore issues within a social justice framework.

A basic introduction to the history of Japanese culture from its origins to the present day, with particular emphasis on the evidence of architecture and painting (presented through audiovisual modules). Selected examples of fiction and poetry will also be used.

Intermediate-level honors seminar in which students read and critique major primary and secondary works from a variety of periods and regions.

Winter 2019:

In this seminar, we will explore aspects of historical writing through reading, discussion and written analysis of a series of terrific books and articles in history.  We will think about historical sources, methods, modes of analysis and especially writing: what makes these studies great?  The books will range across a variety of historical periods and genres.  A few examples: Nick Terpstra’s Lost Girls: Sex and Death in Renaissance Florence, a historical detective story in which the author puzzles out why one particular orphanage for girls had a shockingly high mortality rate; Jonathan Schlesinger, A World Trimmed with Fur: Wild Things, Pristine Places and the Natural Fringes of Qing Rule, a study of how pristine nature was invented in nineteenth century China; Lyndal Roper, Martin Luther: Renegade and Prophet, a vibrant new biography; Karl Jacoby, Shadows at Dawn: An Apache Massacre and the Violence of History, a reconstruction of a terrible and  perplexing massacre.

The history of science in the West from Copernicus to Lavoisier: the transition from medieval, theocentric views of human nature and its operation to secular and mechanistic views in the 17th and 18th centuries, and the transition from natural philosophy to science. The role of science in Western culture.

History of the Persian Empire from its formation under Cyrus II of Anshan (r. 559-530 BCE) to the conquests of Alexander III of Macedon (356-323 BCE).

Explores the overlapping worlds of Renaissance Italy, 1300-1500: the vibrant merchant culture; the elegant courts of princes; intellectual circles like the Platonic Academy; famed mercenary captains and their troops; the underworld of male same sex relations, of criminality and prostitution; the lives of women in marriages, in convents and in poorhouses; the workshops and homes of the laboring poor. One central theme is the culture of patronage and the production of extraordinary art.

Human-environmental interaction from the fall of Rome to environmental and epidemiological disasters of the fourteenth century. Topics include agricultural impact on the environment, introduction of new animal species to northern Europe, and selective breeding of livestock and plant life.

Examines important themes in early modern European history, 1450-1750. Topics will vary by offering and instructor.

Recommended Preparation: Hist 9 or Writ 109HU

Winter 2019:  The Colonial Empires of Spain, Portugal, Britain and France have long been in the focus of historical research and teaching in the US. In contrast, the empires within Europe have been largely ignored. This course will concentrate on the Holy Roman Empire, the Swedish Empire, the Polish-Lithuanian Empire, and the Russian empire, which collectively dominated European history both in the Early Modern Period and in modern times. We will focus specifically on the political cultures of these empires and their impact on European cultures.

A seminar in early modern European history, 1450-1700. Students develop research skills and use them to complete a research topic of their choice in early modern European history. Emphases will vary with instructor and offering.

Examination of German history from the beginning of the twentieth century to World War II. Topics include Germany’s role in the first world war, the German revolution of 1918-19, the Weimar Republic, and the national-socialist state and its aims in World War II and the Holocaust.

Explores the history of U.S.-Mexican relations from 1821 to the present. Topics include: U.S. intervention in Mexico, the Mexican Revolution, the Good Neighbor Program, immigration, NAFTA, the U.S.-Mexico border, and War on Drugs. Students will learn to read, interpret, and analyze foreign policy, primary, and secondary sources.

A history of England from the late middle ages to the eighteenth century.

The rise of Britain as an industrial, urban, and imperial nation. Topics include the nature of industrialization, urbanization, and class formation,the role of gender and race in cultural society, the arts, and the construction of Victorian identities.

Examines the social and cultural construction of the United States and Mexico border.

Through a critical engagement with colonialism, nationalism, and modernity this course explores the social, economic, political, and cultural histories of the Middle East from 1750 to the present.

Satisfies General Education Requirements:
World Cultures

Explores the experiences of Africans and their descendants in the Americas,mostly in Latin America and the Caribbean. Looks at ways in which men and women (enslaved and free) negotiated their imposed conditions from the colonial period to the present. Considers the methodological challenges of writing a history of people who did not produce primary sources. Underscores the contribution that people of African-descent have made and the debates that continue shaping the discipline.

Recommended Preparation: HIST 9 or WRIT 109HU

A research seminar in Latin American history. Students will conduct historical research in a seminar context, using both primary and secondary source materials, to produce an original and substantial research paper. Topics addressed: defining a research problem, identifying an original topic, conducting research, citing sources, and presenting results. Intensive writing required.

Recommended Preparation: History 9 or WRIT 109HU

Post independence Mexico.

Research seminar on the history of women in America. Topics addressed: defining a research problem, identifying an original topic, conducting research, citing sources, and presenting results. Intensive writing required. Students will conduct historical research in a seminar context, using both primary and secondary source materials, to produce an original and substantial research paper.

The history of American politics since Watergate

An undergraduate research seminar on US history designed to guide students in doing research. Each student will produce a substantial research paper on some aspect of American politics and/or culture since 1900.

Studies in selected aspects of Chicano history and the United States-Mexico borderlands with an emphasis on social and economic history.

The interaction of politics and public policy from the revolution to the present, focusing upon the key issues of each era in social, economic, cultural, racial, and other policy areas. A particular concern for the policy-making process, ideology, and the cultural origins of politics.

The American West as a frontier and as a region, in transit from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific, and from the seventeenth century to the present.

Same course as Anthropology 176B

Ancient China to 589CE

The Qing period saw the doubling of China’s territory, the enormous population growth, and the many encounters with the West. We will examine the politics, cultures, social norms, and different peoples, with a focus on the problem of modernization.

Cross-listed with CHIN 185A

Explores the cultural, economic, and geopolitical roles of food and drink in world history. Topics include: trade, production, and consumption; global food chains; morality and food reform; identities and body image; scarcity, food scares, and food security.

A two-quarter individual research project, under the direction of a history professor selected with the advice of the departmental adviser to public policy students.

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces the student to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor. AM. America.

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces students to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces students to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor. E. Europe.

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces the student to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor. (Usually offered quarterly.)

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces the student to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor.

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces the student to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor. E. Europe.

Winter 2019:

In an age of globalization and radical changes in the volumes and modes of communication, the exchange of both material goods, ideas and practices has gained increasing scholarly attention. Historians have sought to characterize what is involved in these exchanges, and a lively debate has ensued. This reading seminar will not only follow the theoretical debate, but also elucidate the major achievements of research focusing on such issues from the European Renaissance and the global encounters of the Dutch Golden Age to the “invention” of Romanticism. Methodologies, sources and research practices will also be discussed. The seminar is addressed to graduate students from all epochs of history and art history as well as advanced undergraduates.

A reading course in a field of the professor’s specialty. Introduces the student to the sources and literature of the field in question. Written work as prescribed by the instructor. E. Europe.

To acquaint students with relevant research methods (oral history, legal research, family history, government documents and sources, historical preservation, field research).

A two-quarter graduate seminar in medieval social history.

American cultural history.

This year long interdisciplinary colloquium brings together graduate students who study Japanese history and culture. It introduces current scholarship on Japan via readings, discussions and presentations by visiting scholars, UCSB scholars and graduate students. The colloquium meets bi- weekly. Students will prepare readings for discussion, write a seminar-length paper and present their paper to the colloquium once during the year.

A colloquium introducing the important issues, themes and literature in the history of the United States, from 1846 to 1917. Historiographical in nature the course assumes a basic familiarity with the period.

Hosts leading scholars of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century U.S. whose work touches upon the history and character of work, employment, labor, poverty, race, ethnicity, political economy, and public policy. The colloquium meets three to four times per quarter.

A year-long workshop on methods for graduate students, focused on Latin America but open to students of other fields. Involves readings, discussions, practical exercises, and occasional guest lectures. Includes training in core archival research skills, such as palaeography; the use of digital tools such as online databases, reference managers, and writing software; and digital humanities methodologies such as digital mapping, database creation, text encoding and analysis, web publishing, and the digitization of archival materials. Participants prepare readings for discussion, produce seminar-length papers or small digital humanities projects, and present their results to the group. Meets bi-weekly throughout the academic year.

Writing/reading workshop, professionalization seminar, and guest lecture series for graduate students working in area of history of science/technology. Meets monthly throughout the academic year.