Course Descriptions

TTh 12:30-1:45

Dr. David McDaniel

The History of Rock and Roll (History 3165) is a very groovy course that traces the development of the musical genre of rock and roll from its inception in post-WW II America to its fragmentation by the mid-1970s.

The music itself will, of course, play a significant part in our studies, from the classic doo-wop tunes of the 1950s, to the folk-rock tradition of the early 1960s (featuring groups such as Peter, Paul, and Mary and the inimitable Bob Dylan), through the British Invasion involving the Beatles, and so much more, to the relevance of the 1960s anti-war music, the serendipity of the Woodstock Nation, and the dramatic advent of Hard Rock and Heavy Metal as exemplified by groups such as Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. In a final chapter, involving what I consider to be the legacy of rock and roll, we will delve into such genres as Punk Rock, New Wave, Alternative Rock, Grunge, Indie Rock, and other trends that may speak more directly to contemporary students.

Beyond the music itself, History 3165 will consider the significant cultural, social, and even political impact of rock and roll on American society in terms of youth rebellion and empowerment and challenges to the status quo in terms of manners and morals and race relations. Ultimately, we will discover the power in the music that became the soundtrack for one of the most dramatic and transformative periods in the history of the United States.

MWF 1:00-1:50

Staff

 Description to be added.

M 2:00-4:30

Dr. Patrick Mullins

For communities as for individuals, we are what we remember. The identity of a people—from a small community to an ethnic group to a nation-state—hinges on how those people recollect shared historic events and apply those lessons to present and future problems. Historians have a responsibility to inform the public about the past—and to inform themselves by listening to the public. Public History is the subfield of History which studies the past for and with the public. Public historians study how the public understands history, how historians can address general audiences, and how historians and the public can work together.

In this course, we will explore the challenges and opportunities of Public History by focusing on three pivotal historic episodes: the American Revolution and national founding, slavery and the Civil War, and World War II and the Holocaust. We will approach each event as a case-study in public memory, examining how events are interpreted for the public by historians (or for historians by the public) through museum exhibitions of artworks, photographs, and other artifacts, creation and preservation of historic sites (such as buildings, landscapes, and memorials), and through storytelling, from folktales and oral histories to Hollywood and documentary movies.

Graduate students and undergraduates will explore together the practical advantages and theoretical challenges of working directly with unconventional sources and engaging constructively with communities about their shared memories. Together, we will gain appreciation for the power of artifacts, places, and stories to help public historians connect communities with their past and to help academic historians understand marginalized communities and hear silenced voices.

MWF 12:00-12:50

Dr. Michael Donoghue

This course will examine the people, ideas, and institutions that have shaped the U.S. rise to global power in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.   Although this is a history and not a current events course, we will establish a dialogue between events in the past and current U.S. foreign policy, specifically the U.S.-led “War on Terrorism” and recent standoffs with North Korea and Russia. We will look at the origins of current international problems and trace the broad themes, attitudes, and policies that have recurred in US foreign relations throughout the last century including how race, gender, and culture have influenced their development.  The course will also address the major events that shaped the extraordinary US rise to power including the two world wars, the Cold War in Europe and Latin America, the Korean and Vietnam conflicts and the more recent U.S. interventions in the Middle East.  All this will be tied to the larger trajectory of U.S. superpower status in the twentieth century that continues to this day.  The course will be reading-intensive with a midterm, a final exam, short in-class writing exercises, and 2 short papers. 

MW 3:30-4:45

Dr. Robert Smith

This course explores United States legal traditions, its key players, and development throughout the nation’s history. The class investigates the legal cultivation of race relying on the US Constitution, landmark Supreme Court opinions, Congressional legislation, and key state laws and statutes.

W 5:00-7:30

Dr. Bryan Rindfleisch

We will explore the history of violence in early America from the pre-Columbian era to the American Revolution. In particular, we will focus on the social, political, economic, religious, intellectual, and transatlantic dimensions of violence from the 15^th-18^th centuries, how such violence developed over time, and how violence profoundly shaped the early “American” past. Even more specifically, we will examine the themes of colonialism and decolonization, archival creation and erasure, empire-formation and revolutions, cultural and gender violence, slavery and race, religion and sacred violence, and other themes that provide the core narrative for a violent history of early America.

MWF 9:00-9:50 and MWF 11:00-11:50

Ms. Elizabeth Dahl

HIST 1701 offers students a global perspective on the diversity of human history: the many ways that different peoples, societies and cultures have encountered one another. By examining the interactions between distinctive communities in specific times and places, students become familiar with parts of the past that are seemingly foreign and remote, and explore how they have shaped our turbulent world today. This course examines the connection between Protestant missions and the geographically expansive British Empire in the eighteenth through twentieth centuries. We will learn about the imperial “civilizing mission” and how the influx of missionaries into places including India, Sierra Leone, Madagascar, China, and Japan can thus be studied as “contact zones,” meaning the social spaces where missionaries and local communities met and interacted with one another.

TTh 2:00-3:15

Dr. Peter Staudenmaier

Germany stands at the center of some of the most infamous events of the last century, above all the crimes committed by the Nazi regime between 1933 and 1945. This course traces the difficult search for historical justice in the aftermath of World War II and the Holocaust, examining the very different ways that Germans and others responded to the horrifying atrocities of the Nazi era. Key aspects of our inquiry will concern the tensions between legal and historical standards of justice, and the search for justice in the midst of terrible injustice as a defining feature of German post-war culture and society. 

TTh 3:30-4:45

Dr. Peter Staudenmaier

This upper-level Readings in History course explores the development of Western racial thought and practice from the Enlightenment era to the age of the genome. Though presumed to represent a permanent biological reality, racial ideas are remarkably mutable and have shifted continually over the past three centuries. Examining the changing ways people have thought about race, past and present, particularly in European and North American societies, we will trace the impact of racial beliefs in economic, political, and judicial contexts. Through critical appraisal of the works of writers, philosophers, scientists, government officials, and cultural figures, we will consider how various peoples were sorted into racial groups, what social meanings such racial differences carried, and why these questions continue to cause controversy today.

The subject of this course is the history of Britain over the long 18th century, from the Glorious Revolution to the French Revolution, through the lens of art. We will explore the many ways in which power was exercised: high politics and street politics, war and revolution, science and industry, trade and empire, class and gender relations, and race and slavery. Focusing on cultural politics, students will study power as a force for shaping art—and art as a force for exercising power. While concentrating on high-style oil paintings, the course will consider a wide range of visual and material culture, including raunchy cartoons, architecture, landscape design, and household ceramics, while addressing key artists, art movements, and iconic works. Students will learn through lecture, discussion, field research with museum collections, and above all, object analysis as a means of cultivating “visual intelligence.” This course serves as a Public History Minor elective and MCC credit in the Humanities Area of the Discovery Tier, under the theme of “Cognition, Memory, and Intelligence.”

TTh 9:30-10:45

Dr. Jessica Cooley

This course offers a selective survey of painting, sculpture, architecture, and material culture across global cultures from c. 1500 CE to the contemporary world, drawing particularly from the collections at Marquette’s Haggerty Museum of Art and other local institutions.  It explores how humans create and interact with various material forms as expressions of social, religious, and political values.  While aesthetics constitutes a component of artistic expression, students also will assess how humans have used physical materials and the environment to represent their relationship with the surrounding world and raise questions about the unknown.  (NB: this survey course does not count for the major in History or Military History, but it may be used for the Public History minor and it counts as an EXPL-HUM course in the MCC Discovery Tier.)

TTh 11:00-12:15

Dr. Laura Matthew

The twenty-odd nation-states that constitute Latin America share a common Iberian and/or colonial heritage, but are also distinguished by their local, regional, and ancient pasts. Their histories overlap with that of the United States yet are rarely discussed. We will take note of hemispheric commonalities while identifying the particularities of different regions and countries. We will also consider how Latin America's history resonates in the world today. HIST1301 counts towards the major and/or minor in History, International Affairs, Peace Studies, Latin American Studies, and Latinx Studies, as well as the Core Curriculum’s Discovery Tier theme “Crossing Boundaries” and the Core Writing Intensive requirement.

TTh 9:30-10:45

Dr. Chima Korieh

This course is an overview of the history of Africa from the earliest times to the present. We will begin by exploring the emergence of early African societies and their interaction with the outside world. We will continue with the exploration of Africa’s encounter with Europe. Specific attention will be paid to the development of the Atlantic slave trade, the post-abolition developments, and the European colonization of Africa in the late nineteenth century. We will also examine the themes related to the economics of colonialism as well as the racial prejudices and “civilizing missions” of European colonial powers. Our exploration will extend to the post-colonial era and the Cold War's impact on African societies. We will conclude by looking at the place of Africa in the changing global configuration and the structures through which Western nations still impose forms of neo-colonialism upon Africa today. This class meets the EXPL-HUM requirement for the Marquette Common Core.

MWF 10:00-10:50

Staff

This course will compare and contrast differing constructions of race and democracy in North and South America from the colonial period to the present day.   We will analyze how varying concepts of self-governance, republicanism, and democracy evolved over time and application simultaneous to changing notions of race and racial identities in these distinct regions throughout several centuries of historical development.   Weekly discussions and quizzes on the course readings will be held - and a paper and participation in a group oral presentation are also required for all students.

TTh 2:00-3:15

Dr. Laura Matthew

This course is designed to introduce History majors to the basic practices of historical inquiry and argument. We will explore the diverse ways historians make sense of the past while learning the skills and habits of historical thinking. Through reading, writing, and practical experience, we will work toward an informed understanding of history in its many senses, from methods for studying sources about the past to debating its significance in the present.

TTh 3:30-4:45

Dr. David McDaniel

The theme of this course is reflected in the words of one of the war’s chief architects Henry A. Kissinger who said: “Vietnam is still with us. It has created doubts about American judgment, about American credibility, about American power—not only at home, but throughout the world.” History 3127 will examine the history of the Vietnam War from the perspective of the United States. It will provide the student with the historical background that set the stage for the conflict, the events that led directly to the war, the primary political and military issues involved at home and abroad, and an overview of the major battles. Further, and quite significantly, this course will also consider the non-military aspects of the war, such as the changing political climate in the United States during the late 1960s, the rise of a determined anti-war movement that exerted a profound impact on the outcome of the struggle, the nature of the cultural and political polarization wrought by America’s longest war, and finally the lingering scars caused by division and defeat. 

TTh 11:00-12:15

Dr. Lezlie Knox

It is much more interesting to study pandemic than to live through one!

 This course takes an interdisciplinary approach to the second medieval plague pandemic in the context of other historical pandemics and contemporary concerns about society and disease.  Between 1346-1353 what we now call the Black Death killed roughly one-third of Eurasia’s population (with some places experiencing mortality as high as 60%).  That dramatic claim has long been known but new research has extended the plague’s chronological parameters to the 13^th-16^th centuries, as well as recognized its global impact in China, Russia, and sub-Saharan Africa.  This dynamic field thus allows us to consider historical evidence from sources traditional to the Humanities such as chronicles, literature, and art, but also draw from bioarcheology, genomics, and climate science.  History majors can apply this class to either the European or Global distribution requirement with department permission. 

This class also fulfills two MCC requirements that help frame our questions about pandemics: WRIT and EXP-Hum (Disco tier).  Expanding Our Horizons focuses on how humans ask questions and explore the unknown.  People in the later Middle Ages confronted a series of unfamiliar events that unsettled their societies including climate change, famine, and plague, as well as more familiar ones like wars and globalized trade networks. We will consider how human creativity, technologies, and inventiveness were deployed to make sense of these challenges and opportunities. We will also consider how plague changed how medieval people understood their place in the world and relationships to their community. 

Assessments will focus on the process of building historical knowledge (low-stakes writing assignments and discussions), as well as developing digital skills for presenting arguments about the past.  The first half of the class will include a group digital project (to learn and evaluate platforms). Over the second half, students will focus on an independent research project which can examine any topic related to disease and history (chronology and geography subject to approval).  This final project will combine digital, written, and oral presentations. 

MA and PhD students in all fields are very welcome to enroll in 5210.  In addition to the class assignments, we will have an additional reading group focusing on historiographical debates (e.g. “plague concept”), especially around the first plague pandemic (aka Plague of Justinian) where the gloves were taken off long ago….

MWF 9:00-9:50

MWF 1:00-1:50

Dr. Alan Ball

“Honors for All”: Class is open to all students.

HIST 4271/4271H is a survey of modern Russian and Soviet history that begins with an introduction to tsarist Russia in order reach an understanding of the revolutions in 1917 that swept away much of the old regime and left the Bolshevik (Communist) Party in power.  The bulk of the course will concentrate on the Soviet period, featuring the tumultuous development of “the world’s first socialist state,” the emergence of the Soviet Union as one of the world’s two superpowers, and the country’s subsequent collapse.  In particular, we will examine the Bolsheviks’ aspirations in 1917 and then see to what extent these hopes for a new society were realized as the Communist Party confronted both domestic and foreign challenges. 

The course is composed of lectures, a few Soviet films, and eight periods set aside for discussion.  On these eight weeks, in place of a Friday lecture, students will meet with me in small groups to discuss sources pertaining to major topics in the course.  These readings include a variety of primary documents, memoirs, and selections from the wealth of Russian literature that provoked tsarist and Soviet authorities alike.

Syllabus on request; questions welcome: alan.ball@marquette.edu

This course meets the BNJ-HUM requirement for the Marquette Common Core.

MWF 10:00-10:50

Dr. Michael Wert

The purpose of this course is to introduce students to basic themes in pre-1900 Japanese history, in particular the time when Japan was ruled by samurai.  Topics include the rise of the military government, regional and global interaction, as well as changes in culture, economy and society throughout ancient, medieval and early modern Japan.  I want us all to improve our critical thinking skills and question the assumptions we have about Japan and the pre-modern world in general.  Even though this class is about “old Japan” there will be a constant dialog with modern-day issues.  This class will consist of lectures and discussion. 

TTh 12:30-1:45

Dr. Chima Korieh

Humanity has witnessed unparalleled development in the modern era; yet these unparalleled developments have come at an unprecedented cost and destruction. The nineteen and twentieth centuries have witnessed mass killings and examination on a scale never witnessed in the previous centuries. Over the course of the twentieth century, in particular, millions of people have become victims of mass murder, often driven by nationalism. These historical catastrophes challenge us to question the fundamental assumptions we make about humanity and the basic values we assume to be part of “civilization,” and the morality of humanity in the face of genocide and mass murder. This seminar, therefore, is an introduction to the field of genocide studies from a historical, comparative, and thematic perspective. The course is designed to provide students with a variety of ways of understanding genocide as a phenomenon, focusing particularly on the dynamics that produce mass atrocity, so that students are equipped to think creatively about genocide as a form of mass killing and the social and political circumstances that facilitate it. We will provide a good understanding of the extreme diversity of this form of mass killing, especially in the twentieth century. We will begin with a broad examination of genocides in world history and the current state of the historiography. We will examine through the case studies: the Holocaust, Stalin's genocides, the Cambodian genocide, ethnic cleansing and genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Rwandan genocide, the Herero in German South West Africa (1904-08), the Rwandan genocide, and the lesser-known genocide against the Igbo people in postcolonial Nigeria. Finally, we will focus on the strategies that victims and perpetrators have used to cope at the time and afterwards with the moral issues involved, as well as the international responses to genocide, and the contemporary tension between the principle of national sovereignty and `humanitarian intervention'.  

MWF 11:00-11:50

Dr. Timothy McMahon

This course has been created specifically for the university core discovery tier, under the theme "Cognition, Memory, Intelligence." We will explore the relationship of history and memory, particular public and collective memory as experienced through commemoration, public art (especially statuary), and public celebration. While our readings will be historical in nature, they will draw from the fields of film study, literature, historical geography, anthropology, and folklore. Students will explore the relationship between history and memory broadly defined. Topics might include, but are not limited to, popular culture and memory, politics and commemoration; and public history, memory, and forgetting. We will focus our attention on the modern period and most specifically on the British Empire and Ireland, but we will also take a significant look at parallels to the United States, particularly on questions of race and commemoration. The crux of what we will explore can be summed up in the following questions: How does a particular historical moment affect expressions of collective memory? And how do new conditions and new information affect the acceptance or lack of acceptance of past expressions of the collective?

W 2:00-4:30

Dr. Timothy McMahon

This undergraduate seminar raises questions about the phenomena of empires in various parts of the world at different moments in time. We will begin the term with a series of readings aimed at familiarizing students with several different empires in order to find commonalities and difference among them. We will be cognizant of how the timing and assumptions of scholars has shaped our views of empires, and we will also discuss various forms of resistance to empires deployed by indigenous peoples in different eras. Students will then design research projects based in their areas of regional interest to interrogate a specific empire or the interactions of multiple empires at a particular point in time.  

T 5:00-7:30

Dr. Alison Efford

This seminar offers an introduction to the study of history at the graduate level. Our goal is to become conversant with the range of theories and methodologies used by twenty-first century historians. We will examine different approaches to historical research and analysis, debates around the nature and meaning of history as a discipline, and the potentials and pitfalls of academic scholarship about the past. Through readings, discussions, short writing assignments, and discernment activities, we will explore history in theory and practice.

M 5:00-7:30

Dr. Michael Wert

This course will introduce students to the historiography of the early modern world. Topics include: the rise of capitalism, diverging trajectories among world regions, the construction of spatial categories, state-building, colonization, and the relationship between societies and the environment. In addition to studying broader historiographical themes we will learn how to incorporate questions raised in world history into our own projects, and discuss approaches to teaching world history.

W 5:00-7:30

Dr. Alan Ball

Political and institutional propaganda has been with us for thousands of years.  Not just the specialty of fascist or communist dictatorships, propaganda can be found among the ancient Greeks and Romans, the medieval Papacy, along with modern political and advertising campaigns, to suggest just a handful of examples.  We’ll begin the course by formulating a more precise understanding of the term “propaganda” than you may have at the moment, and then—with this background as your guide—you’ll be able to choose a version of propaganda that interests you and which will serve as a suitable subject for investigation.  Given that HIST 6954 is a research seminar, the bulk of the semester will be devoted to the research and writing of a paper (approximately 20-25 pages) on your chosen topic, relying on primary sources as far as possible.  During the last week or two of the semester, we will schedule group sessions to discuss the fruits of our labors.