Course Descriptions

Sections of this course examine how history has shaped – and been shaped by – human thought and culture. They might examine how the ideas of intellectuals, philosophers, writers, artists, or religious thinkers related to historical developments such as the spread of Christianity or Islam; the rise of modern secularism; or the various revolutionary movements of the modern world, whether political, economic, social, or artistic. They might examine elite, middle-brow, or popular culture for clues about how past societies responded to the realities of being human – birth, illness, death, the need to work, prepare food, raise children, establish communities, or make sense of one’s place in the universe. Examples of courses include: “An Introduction to Modern European Thought and Culture,” “Religious Reformations of the 16th Century,” “A Global History of Food and Eating.” All sections of this course emphasize how historians have understood the relationship between ideas, culture, and historical change.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention: A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine the peoples and processes shaping indigenous societies, their imperial rulers, and the postcolonial experience. Topics will range from local case studies of First Nations to broader histories of European imperial expansion and national independence movements. The problems of identity, power and policy are at the forefront of these investigations, emphasizing the ways that communities accepted, resisted or transformed colonial agendas. Courses will also foreground variations among colonizing projects, and responses to them, in different eras. Examples of course foci include Britain and British Empires since Caesar, the Arab Spring, the scramble for Africa, aboriginal activism in Canada, USA, and Australia, a global history of slavery, perspectives on community and sovereignty in North America, and colonial Latin America. All sections of this course will emphasize how historians have understood different practices of colonization and their relationship to political, economic and social change.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine how histories of gender, sex and society have interacted and evolved throughout time. We will explore how, in various societies, social, cultural, political, legal, and medical views of gender and sexualities have both regulated gender and sexual norms and acted as levers of change. Topics include national and transnational histories of sexualities, gender and social change (in the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia). Possible areas of exploration include: media and cultural depictions of masculinity and femininity; medical, legal, cultural, and theoretical discourses on gender and sexuality; race, class, ethnicity, and indigeneity; gendered performance and geographies of sexual possibilities; demographic continuities and change; artistic representations of sexuality and gender; and, finally, histories of the family, of labour, of migration, as well as of activism, resistance, and repression as they intersect with the history of gender and sexuality.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine the history of war and violence, cutting across periods and historical specializations. Areas of exploration may include: the factors that have shaped human conflict (social, cultural, political, and religious); specific cases, campaigns or systems of conflict (including interpersonal, intergroup, and international violence); wars hot and cold; historic forms of oppression and injustice, and their relationship to conflict; and the history of resistance to interpersonal, intergroup and systemic violence including the history of peace and reconciliation and non-violent movements.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine the history and conceptualization of science, the cosmos, or the environment and their relationships to society and culture. The term science is understood broadly to include not only modern science but pre-modern and non-western approaches to understanding and manipulating the natural world. Historians focus on the human history of the environment, with a particular attention to the ever-changing relationship between societies and their ecosystems. Possible areas of exploration might include: the scientific revolution; North-American environmental history; global commodities, imperialism and the environment; and science, magic, and rationality. With reference to historical examples, these courses will seek to nuance concepts such as scientific rationality, and ‘nature’ and also to examine broad conventional historical narratives such as ‘disenchantment’, ‘enlightenment’, ‘industrialization’ or ‘globalization’.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine how historians have understood the complex relationship between health, society, and historical change. Health is used as a vehicle for understanding political, social and cultural change throughout history. Topics range from antiquity and the birth of Galenic healing through western and non-western traditions that have guided our understandings of bodies, pain, gender, and power and into the modern era of health and medicine with the rise of professional medicine, ethics, experimentation and institutionalized healing. Health is widely defined to capture experiences that fall outside the traditional doctor-patient relationship, and to explore issues including: mental health; the politics of healthcare; health economies; the health professions; disease’s power to shape human history. These courses rely on a variety of sources: food and nutrition, to medical treatises, patient narratives, activist and anti-medical establishment texts, artwork, and institutional reports, and a rich historical tradition of examining health and medicine and its influence on human history. Possible areas of exploration include: madness; the body; pain; health and disease.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine the complexity of identity and the ever-changing and complicated nature of community through an exploration of history. Identities are never ‘fixed’ or constructed in isolation; they are always both ‘invented’ and the result of historical change. Communities are similarly complex: never autonomous, always shaped by history and the interplay between internal dynamics and relationships with forces outside of the community. All sections of this course are linked through their exploration of the history of identities and communities but they explore that history in different places and times. Some courses will take a micro-level view, exploring the history of identity in one particular location or community over time and relating those changes to broader perspectives; others will look at the way broad historical forces shaped identities. Possible areas of exploration may include: historical roots and myths surrounding so called "tribalism" in Africa and the contemporary impacts of this discourse; the spread nationalism in the 18th and 19th centuries and the rise of the modern nation-state; how such groups as Kurds have been able to maintain a distinct identity over time; Quebec’s status as a separate ‘nation’ in Canada.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Sections of this course examine the complex relationship between conflict, law, politics, and state power, from medieval times to the Cold War. Possible areas of exploration may include: war, political systems, feuds, violence, crime, injustice, vengeance, weapons, arms races, environmental degradation, treaties, law, and security.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Courses offered under this heading examine focused topics in Canadian History. These courses explore historical issues, events, or trends of importance in Canadian history. The courses are designed to provide a basic understanding of the historical narrative from multiple perspectives, to explore how and why such narratives have been constructed the way they have been, and—through such explorations—to introduce students to ‘thinking historically’. Lectures will explore historical narratives, their genesis, and the sources used to produce such narratives. Seminars will dig deeper into the tools and methodologies used by historians, provide instruction and practice in critical thinking and clear expression.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

Courses offered under this heading examine focused topics in European History. These courses explore historical issues, events, or trends of importance in European history. The courses are designed to provide a basic understanding of the historical narrative from multiple perspectives, to explore how and why such narratives have been constructed the way they have been, and—through such explorations—to introduce students to ‘thinking historically’. Lectures will explore historical narratives, their genesis, and the sources used to produce such narratives. Seminars will dig deeper into the tools and methodologies used by historians, provide instruction and practice in critical thinking and clear expression.

Weekly hours: 2 Lecture hours and 1 Seminar/Discussion hours
Attention:A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students may not take this course more than once for credit, even if the specific focus is different.
Note: Multiple sections of this course may be offered in the same term, each with a different focus. Consult the CRN for each section of the class in the Class Search to find its specific focus. The History Department’s annual handbook (on the department homepage) also contains this information.

This course addresses and challenges settler-colonialism from Indigenous perspectives. It examines Indigenous societies, with specific focus on Plains communities in what became Canada. We focus on a broad historical span from the distant past to the early twentieth century. Drawing on Indigenous voices and perspectives, the course focuses on how historic and ongoing events and structures have displaced Indigenous peoples from their lands, forced change and re-enforced continuity for Indigenous peoples, while simultaneously highlighting the way Indigenous peoples have shaped those events and structures.

Attention: A maximum of nine credit units of 100-level HIST may be taken for credit.
Note: Students who take one version of this course may not take a second version of it. To see which specific topic(s) will be offered each term, click on the CRN for each lecture in the Class Search to see the specific description for that class.

This course surveys the political, cultural and social history of ancient Greece from the Bronze Age (ca. 3000 BCE) to the beginnings of Roman influence in the Greek world in the late Hellenistic period (ca 200 BCE).

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 30 credit units of University courses.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 200.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course introduces students to the wide variety of ways that animals shaped the lives and thoughts of the ancient Greeks and Romans. We’ll examine a diverse range of primary sources to explore the full spectrum of human-animal encounters. Special attention will be given to the social dimensions of how people interacted with animals in numerous areas of life, including at home, in social settings and at war. We'll also examine how animals were cared for, from animal husbandry to the beginnings of veterinary medicine. We'll analyze the myriad roles that animals played in classical literature to shed light on expectations and ideals for human life. We’ll see that some viewed them as mere tools for human use, while others viewed them as rational, moral beings deserving of just treatment. Ultimately, we'll see that it is only by examining society’s relationship with animals that we can understand the human experience in the Greco-Roman world.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University courses.

Focusing on the lived experience of women and men during one of the most dynamic periods in pre-modern Western history, including the transition from feudalism to royal government; the Crusades and interaction among Christian, Muslim and Jewish populations in Europe and the Middle East; monasticism; the conflict between Church and State; popular and high culture and the development of the Romanesque and Gothic visual arts, architecture, and material culture; the growth of cities; mysticism, new religious movements, and popular religion; the crisis of the fourteenth century brought on by famine and plague; popular revolts and the Hundred Years’ War.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University.

This course introduces Chinese civilization within an historical perspective, from prehistory to the beginning of the 20th century. Using written records, archaeological relics and works of art to cover over three thousand years and a vast geographical area, we will focus on several key topics including important issues and historical moments in time. These include, but are not limited to: technology (e.g., paper, printing), governance (so-called Confucians and the Classics), religion (Buddhism, Daoism, Islam, etc.), systems of thought, food, language, daily life, social forms, identity, gender, the state, art, literature, architecture, and historiography. Some of the questions we will ask include: Where can we find connections or discontinuities? How can – and cannot – textual and archaeological sources help us understand people and their daily lives? How have Chinese thinkers, leaders, religious professionals, and ordinary people understood the past and used it to address pressing concerns even today? Part of your task as a student is to pay attention to recurring themes and topics presented, draw comparisons, and ask your own questions.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course examines the early history of ancient Rome and its domination of the ancient Mediterranean world, chronologically spanning the foundation of Rome in 753 BCE to the end of the Republic at the Battle of Actium in 30BCE. Two overarching questions will shape our investigation: what internal and external factors allowed Rome to extend its empire first over Italy and then over the Mediterranean basin? Why did the government of Rome by the SPQR - the senate and people of Rome - the system called the Republic- ultimately fail and fall to civil war and a monarchy established by Julius Caesar and his successors? Seeking answers to these questions will entail the exploration not only of events and actors in Roman history but also the underlying political and social factors that shaped Rome: Rome’s political system; its ideas about family; aristocratic competition; economy, agriculture and slavery; the roman army and society; the city of Rome and urban violence; the nature of Roman imperialism.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 201.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course examines Rome under the rule of emperors, its chronological frame extending from circa 27 BCE to the time of Constantine in the 4th century CE. The first part of the course focuses on the establishment of monarchy - the rule of emperors - in Rome during the age of Augustus and the Julio-Claudians, since many features of imperial rule were fixed in this time, such as the emperor’s relations with the senate, the role of the members of the imperial household in the management of power, the nature of imperial patronage, and the diffusion of the imperial image. We will then turn to examine the effects of empire on the ruled, both in Rome and in the provinces, focusing on issues such Roman military and administrative presence in the provinces, economic exploitation, and the diffusion of Roman style spectacles and religious cult.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 201.6 may not take this course for credit.

In the world of late antiquity, the veneration of saints became a focus of the religious and cultural life of Christian communities. But what is it to be a saint? Many were martyrs and miracle workers, but we also find holy madmen, transvestites, prostitutes. In this class we explore the diverse representations of sanctity in the hagiographical tradition of the Middle Ages, addressing both the literary and the historical questions raised therein. We ask how Christian communities in the later Roman Empire conceived of sanctity. We address questions of gender and empire, ritual and the body, memory and the use of the past. We explore the array of evidence for the cult of the saints—both literary and material—first in an attempt to understand the complex of practices and beliefs that accompany its emergence, but also to recognize more broadly what this institution can tell us about the Mediterranean world of late antiquity and Medieval Europe.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level; or 30 credit units of university level courses.

A survey of various film portrayals of historical individuals and culture. Popular ideas about the past are largely a creation of fiction writers' and film directors' depictions of the past. This course focuses on historical figures and their representation in primary sources, literature, and film. In this context, students consider several broad themes, including historicity and authenticity, contemporary appropriations of past ideals or ideologies. Through the study of primary source texts and related films, the student will explore the many interpretations of past culture and the ways in which historical ideas, figures and events have been used as commentaries on modern issues.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note: Students may take this course more than once for credit, provided the topic covered in each offering differs substantially. Students must consult the Department to ensure that the topics covered are different.

In this course meet the Late Roman Empire as it transitions from the Classical Era into “Late Antiquity.” We begin with the Reforms of Diocletian in response to the near fatal “crisis of the third century.” We study the Roman Empire shifting its center of balance from Italy and the West to the urbanized and Greek speaking East. With the conversion of Constantine and the coming of Imperial Christianity the basic structures of Byzantine civilization arise. The reign of Justinian and Theodora represent the acme of early Byzantium with the codification of the Roman Law, the building of Hagia Sophia and Justinian’s gamble on the re-conquest of the lost provinces of the former western Roman Empire.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 215.6 may not take this course for credit.

Western Christendom, once unified under a single church, was fractured permanently in the sixteenth century giving rise to religious wars and the widespread action against heresy. In the same period, the earth centred model of the universe was demonstrated to be false and new scientific epistemologies emerged. Seemingly in contradiction to these scientific developments, this was also the main period of witch trials. While Europe remained profoundly misogynist and hetero-normative, we also find startling cases of feminist ideas, radical gender expression, and queer sexualities. Focussing on original texts, this course explores the relationship of tradition and dissent, rebellion and authority in this tumultuous period.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 100-level HIST; or 30 credit units of university level courses; or by permission of the instructor.

This course examines the period from the departure of the Romans through to the coming of the Normans. It was an epoch that saw the gradual conversion of the peoples of the British Isles to Christianity and (with the exception of Ireland) the redrawing of the ethnic and political map of the islands. The following three centuries from 800 to 1100 A.D., from the Vikings incursions of the ninth century through to the Norman Conquest of England were a highly formative period in the history of the Isles, witnessing the emergence of England and Scotland as identifiable political entities.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 213.6 may not take this course for credit.

Beginning in the long twelfth century with the Norman Conquest of England, through to the early fifteenth century, this course provides a social and cultural history of England in the medieval period. Although a temporal overview will be provided in the first lectures of each section, the course will focus on themes rather than an events-based narrative. Examining in detail the issues of community and social binds, economic change, population change, disease, political structures, ecclesiastical structure and political upheaval, students will gain a foundational understanding of the process of conquest, the expansion of art and of a written culture, the impact of warfare; also the relationships between lords and labourers; development of trade and urbanization, the spread of written culture, the development of the common law and parliament.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s):3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 213.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course introduces the student to world of Western Europe in the fourteenth through the sixteenth centuries. It covers the major developments in the period: the Renaissance and Reformation, the development of centralized monarchies, and the start of the Scientific Revolution. In addition, it examines topics such as magic and witchcraft and their relationship to these larger events or movements.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University
Note:Students with credit for HIST 225 may not take this course for credit.

This course introduces students to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Lectures, readings, and in-class conversations will explore the distinct, yet interconnected, histories of Palestine and Israel at various times since the dawn of Zionism and Palestinian nationalism. Particular attention will be given to inter-cultural relations, religion, and the idea of coexistence; violence, identity (re)formations, and respective national myth-making; settler colonialism, imperial culture, and decolonization; gender and sexuality; globalization, capitalism, and world affairs; racial difference, exclusion, and segregation; the so-called peace process; social justice and the tensions within human rights imaginations; as well as the politics of history and memory.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 389 cannot receive credit for this course.

The practice of warfare has consistently demanded the skills, resources and labour of healers. This course aims to explore some of the key aspects of the relationship between medicine and warfare in Europe and North America since 1500. Particular attention is paid to the role of medicine in the rise of modern forms of warfare, especially the contribution that medicine played in both disciplining bodies and maintaining the morale of armed forces personnel. The course’s key themes situate military-medical developments within historical debates about the processes of modernization, state formation, and the global pre-eminence of European empires to 1945. The course also explores the connections between war and medical innovation, as well as between warfare and welfare, in the early modern and modern eras. As we go about addressing these and other questions, students will work through a series of assignments designed not only to help them master the course material, but to develop and enhance their academic and lifetime skills of writing, research, analysis, and discussion.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level; or 30 credit units of university level courses.

This course surveys major developments in European history between 1870 and the outbreak of the Second World War. Topics covered include the geopolitical, intellectual, cultural, and other legacies of the late nineteenth century; the origins and outcomes of the First World War; the Russian Revolution and the rise of communism; artistic and cultural movements of the interwar years; the emergence and spread of fascism; the Great Depression; Nazi Germany; the Spanish Civil War; and the diplomatic crises of the late 1930s.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 229.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course surveys major developments in European history since 1939. Topics covered include the Second World War and the Holocaust; postwar reconstruction; the Cold War; Europe and the colonial world; stages in the formation of the European Union; the social movements of the 1960s (the student and women’s movements, environmentalism; the sexual revolution); the economic challenges of the 1970s and 80s; the fall of communism in Eastern Europe; and the issues and challenges facing contemporary European society.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 229.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course introduces students to the history of infectious disease and the various attempts to manage disease outbreaks over time. It uses interdisciplinary perspectives to engage students in a research-intensive course about disease management, science communication, ethical considerations, and above all, historical thinking about health and public policy. The course is jointly taught by faculty in History and in Biochemistry, Microbiology, and Immunology. Grounding this course in historical approaches, History instructors lead students through a history of infectious disease in Canada and in the Global South to illustrate the different kinds of ethical and resource-based concerns that have shaped disease narratives over time. Faculty from BMI provide scientific information about infectious diseases and vaccines, and we jointly provide material about science communication and how public information about diseases has changed over time.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course focuses on the formation of the modern Ukrainian nation with special emphasis on its historical relations with Russia and its recent prominence in international politics. Beginning with the medieval state of Kyivan Rus′, the Cossack past and the Ukrainian movement within the Russian and Austro-Hungarian empires, the course will focus on the events of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It will examine such major themes as the origins of modern Ukrainian nationalism, the Great Famine of 1932–33, WWII in Ukraine, and Ukrainian independence. We will pay special attention to two recent popular revolutions in Ukraine and the ensuing Russian-Ukrainian conflict, which will be examined in the wider historical context of imperial disintegration.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course examines three of the Atlantic World’s influential revolutions – the American, French, and Haitian Revolution. Students will examine both intellectual traditions and on the ground realities, from the emergence of Lockean liberalism, the rights of man, and republicanism to the violence and the horrors war, slavery, and revolutionary terror. In doing so we will begin to unpack deeply entrenched national myths and develop a deeper understanding of the lasting legacies of the Age of Revolutions in the Atlantic World.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course is an introduction to the history of Britain and Ireland, the British Empire and the early modern period. The course will largely attend to the major political, religious and economic transformations that were the hallmarks of early modernity and the first British Empire. Along the way, we will consider important aspects of everyday life for ordinary people, some of which endured throughout the period. Suitable for students interested in violence, sex, religious conflict, and outrageous clothes.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 242 or HIST 246 will not receive credit for this course.

The story of how Britain gained the world’s biggest ever empire over the course of two and half centuries (Anglobalization) and then lost almost all of it over two generations is a remarkable episode in human history, raising many complex and vital questions. This course will introduce students to the ways historians have tried to answer these questions, and the controversies they sparked then and now. Suitable for students curious about how a traditional society underwent major economic and social transformations while avoiding a political revolution and without losing its sense of humour.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 246 will not receive credit for this course.

Was there an Industrial Revolution? This seems like an odd question given the importance of industrialization in the modern world, but when historians searched the evidence many concluded the Industrial Revolution was “neither very industrial nor very revolutionary”. We’ll work to understand why industrialization started in Britain and debate whether it needs to be renamed. We will then explore the economic, social, political and environmental consequences of industrialization in England, Scotland and Wales; including how urbanization and industrialization changed social and gender relations, creating new demands for democratic reform, unionization and women's rights. We will look at the global history of industrialization, from the cotton plantations, wheat fields, sheep stations, palm groves and copper mines that supplied raw materials to British factories, to the spread of industrial economies to Germany, North America, Japan and China. While exploring these interconnected histories, we will learn about different methods and approaches to history such as economic, social, political and environmental history. The history of the first modern industrial society; urbanization, democratization and class conflict; the rise of the labour movement, the triumph of middle-class values, the decline of the aristocracy; the changing religious and moral climate; the domestic consequences of world power; the social and economic impact of two world wars, the loss of world power.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course examines the history of the Russian Empire from its origins to the fall of the monarchy in 1917. Understanding Imperial Russia is particularly important today, as Russia and the other former Soviet republics are searching for new political and social forms in the wake of communism’s collapse and are looking to the pre-revolutionary past as a source of political inspiration and national identity. The Russian tradition, from Peter I to Nicholas II, has become a hotly debated field of current political discourse both in Russia and in the West. A central question is whether the Russian tradition was a historical dead end, or a promise cut short by revolutionary violence? In considering this question, topics involving politics, social history, culture, gender, religion, and ethnicity will be discussed.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University courses.

This course will explore the rise, evolution and demise of the Soviet Union. Topics such as the revolutionary upheaval of 1917, socialist renewal under NEP, Stalinism, the Soviet Union’s participation in WWII, the Cold War, Khrushchev's Thaw, ‘Stagnation’ and detente, Gorbachev’s reforms, and Soviet collapse will be examined through a variety of sources and methodologies. As a broad survey, the course will not dwell on particular eras or personalities, but rather place these within context. The course will conclude with an assessment of the Soviet legacy.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University courses.

This class is focused on the extensive analysis of the World Wars. We will learn about life in the trenches during WW1, the role of women in the “home front,” and the encounters between Europeans and colonial troops during the Great War. Moreover, we will read about Western and Eastern Fronts during WW2, and the war in the Pacific. Finally, we will focus our attention on race and gender dynamics during the Second World War, and on the Holocaust. This course will give you the opportunity of studying the World Wars, their premises, and their consequences from different historiographical perspectives and methodological angles.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University courses.

This course is an introduction to the history of Canada up until Confederation in 1867. The lectures will examine major events, issues, and themes in pre-Confederation history, with a specific focus on key historical debates and our understandings of Canada's colonial past. A few of the topics for this course include native-newcomer relations, European empires and conquest, colonial cultures, and rebellion and nationhood.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students who have received credit for HIST 151.3 may not take HIST 255.3 for credit.

This course is an introductory Canadian history lecture course that covers Canadian history from 1867, the year of Confederation, to the present day. It combines political, social, cultural and gender history approaches to the study of Canada' past. This course surveys the development of the Canadian nation-state and its people. Topics include: First Nations people; federal politics; society and gender; war; activism; regional politics and economy and Canadian culture.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of University courses
Note:Students with credit in HIST 152.3 may not take this class for credit.

A study of Rupert's Land and the North-West to the early 20th century, including early contact between European and Aboriginal societies, the development, expansion, and decline of the fur trade, early western communities, environmental changes, Canadian expansionism and national development policies, regional responses, and developments leading to province-hood.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.

An examination of the three prairie provinces, including the impact of the two World Wars and the Depression, protest movements and parties, urban growth and the modernization of rural life, environmental disasters and new resource developments, Aboriginal renewal, and western alienation.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.

Examines Canadian women’s and gender history from the pre-contact period until the end of World War I, emphasizing the complexities of women's and men’s experiences and the interplay of such factors as gender, class, race, ethnicity, and sexuality. Employs chronological and thematic approaches while also referring to historical debates and historiographical developments.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.

Examines Canadian women’s and gender history from the end of World War I to the present, emphasizing the complexities of women and men’s experiences and the interplay of such factors as gender, class, race, ethnicity, and sexuality. Employs chronological and thematic approaches while also referring to historical debates and historiographical developments.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.

This course considers how relations between Indigenous peoples and Settlers have been shaped by divergent and sometimes contentious interpretations of pivotal historical events, processes, and contexts. By examining how Indigenous peoples and Settlers have addressed topics such as Indigenous identity, political rights, spirituality, education, fisheries, self-government, casinos, research ethics, and oral history, this course will shed light on crucial issues that have conditioned the shifting relationship between these groups in the past and present.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of university level courses.

Using a field trip to Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) in Winnipeg as their point of departure, students in this experiential learning course examine human rights as a product of history, the result of the changing moral frameworks that shape how people define and grapple with injustice in the world. Where did the concept of human rights come from? Why have demands for justice in the modern world so often been articulated as matters of human rights? How has the meaning of human rights changed over time? Finally, how does the CMHR present the history of human rights (or their violation), and in what ways do the museum’s choices influence the public’s understanding of that history? By engaging our senses as well as our critical faculties, the encounter with the museum will heighten our interest in the subject and facilitate transformative learning.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 30 credit units of university-level courses or 3 cu of HIST at the 100-level
Note: The requirements of this course include a 3-day trip to Winnipeg. The cost of this travel, less any funding the instructor is able to arrange, is in addition to the tuition fees for the course. Students with credit for HIST 298.3: Human Rights in History may not take this course for credit. Students with credit for HIST 298.3 (Human Rights in History) may not take this class for credit.

This course will introduce students to the full spectrum of Greco-Roman medical practices, from the healing rituals of the cult of Asclepius to the rational medicine of Hippocrates and Galen. Special attention will be given to the social dimension of ancient medicine, including medical ethics, the social status of doctors and their patients, and the role of women, both as patients, whose anatomical differences from men were thought to necessitate an entirely separate branch of medicine (i.e. gynecology), and as midwives, an important but often overlooked group of medical practitioners. After tracing the development of ancient medicine from the earliest evidence for Greek concepts of health and disease through to the flourishing of Greek medicine at the height of the Roman Empire, this course will conclude by examining the continuing influence of Greco-Roman medicine throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level; or 30 credit units of university level courses.

This lecture course examines many of the significant social, economic, environmental, political, diplomatic and military developments in American history, from the pre-colonial period to 1865. It focusses on several important historical topics including: Native American cultures; the European background of American settlement; the establishment of colonies and development of an American nationality; the American Revolution; the formation of the Union; and the struggle to maintain it leading up to the Civil War.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 270.6 may not take this course for credit.

This lecture course examines many of the significant social, economic, environmental, political, diplomatic and military developments in American history, from 1865 to the present. It focusses on several important historical topics including: Reconstruction; westward expansion; industrialization and urbanization; imperialism and the rise to global power; World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II; the Civil Rights Movement and the counterculture; the Cold War and its aftermath.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level or 30 credit units of university level courses.
Note:Students with credit for HIST 270.6 may not take this course for credit.

This course surveys the history of the Middle East during the long 20th century. Topics covered include the so-called demise of the Ottoman empire; republicanism and constitutional reform; modernization and westernization; the nation-state system and the many shades of nationalisms; women, gender, sexuality; imperial culture, decolonization, and post colonialism; Zionism and the creation of Israel; oil and the environment; political Islam and the Iranian revolution of 1979; 9/11 and the Global War on Terror; and the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-Level or 30 credit units of University

We consider how the different expansions and decline of the Qing Empire affected the movement of people, as well as the Qing’s dramatic clash with European Imperialism. We explore the socio-political structures and conception of imperial power during the Qing and patterns of semi-colonialism. Simultaneously we pay attention to the formation of influential social movements in China such as nationalist, Marxist and feminist movements. Students familiarize themselves with Chinese intellectuals at the turn of the century and during the New Culture Movement, and in particular with the woman problem. We examine Maoist China, both in its particularities but also embedded in a global context, by considering the global relationship between revolution and modernization in China. We take into account global forces such as Japanese, European Imperialism, Soviet Socialism that have shaped Chinese history, but also the meaning of culture during the Cultural Revolution and post-Mao politics and social life.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units of HIST at 100 level or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course explores the process of, reasons for, and arguments about European colonialism from the 16th to the mid-20th centuries. It links European colonialism to changes in Europe itself, most especially ideas of progress linked to the Enlightenment and capitalist relations of production. The dispossession of marginalized populations in Europe, and the rationales used for such dispossession, are compared to rationales for colonialism and colonial dispossession. The violence of colonial dispossession in various locales in Latin America, Africa and Asia, and heightened racism are explored as is the trend towards a focus on colonial 'development' in the 20th century.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 289.6 may not take this course for credit. This course is typically offered every other year.

This course examines the promise and ultimate failure of development. Stemming from the dismantling of colonial empires and the creation of an infrastructure to manage the international economy near the end of Second World War, 'development' promised to end or dramatically reduce poverty around the world. Development policies ultimately failed to meet those goals and were replaced by neo- liberalism and arguments about good governance by the end of the 20th century. This course explores the idea of development and suggests the difficulties encountered in living up to its promises lie in its basic premises; reliant as they are on the continued desire to impose specific types of economic and social relations around the world---the continuation of what might be called the Menace of Progress. The course explores this history through an examination of post-independent economic policy in Africa, Asia and Latin America and an exploration of the history behind various ideas important to the concept of development: poverty, population and the expanded role of the market.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100-level or 30 credit units of University level courses.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 289.6 may not take this course for credit. This course is typically offered every other year.

This course introduces students to the history of 20th century international relations, broadly defined. It focuses on the ways in which disparate individuals, communities, ideas, goods, nation-states, environments, and economies interacted with transnational networks, international organizations, global processes, and universal human inequalities in a changing, interconnecting world. Key themes covered include: cross-cultural encounters and coexistence; conflict and cooperation; trade; and development. Particular attention will be given to marginalized peoples, perspectives, places, and situations.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s):3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; 30 credit units of University level courses; or permission of the department.

This course introduces students to the history of Japanese civilization from prehistory to the beginning of the 17th century. Using written records, archaeological relics or objects of material culture and works of art from the Paleolithic period to the beginning of the Edo era in 1603, we will investigate several key topics, issues, and moments in time that significantly affected the lives of the people who lived on the Japanese archipelago. These topics include, technology (metallurgy, wet rice cultivation, paper making), governance (indigenous versus continental East Asian models), religion (Buddhism, Shintō, Christianity), systems of thought, food, language, daily life, social forms, identity, gender, the state, art, literature, architecture, and historiography. Some of the questions include: Where can we find connections or discontinuities? How can—and cannot—textual and archaeological sources help us understand people and their lives? How did Japanese thinkers, leaders, religious professionals, and ordinary people understand the past?

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

This course explores the history of Japanese civilization during the early modern and modern periods. Using written records, archaeological relics, objects of material culture and art from roughly 1603 to the present, we will investigate topics including: technology (from swords and guns to cameras, microchips and robots), governance (generals, restoration of the emperor, constitutional monarchy), religion (Buddhism, Shintō, Christianity, and New Religions), systems of thought, food (sushi and western food like tenpura), language, daily life, social forms, identity, gender, the state, art, literature, architecture, and historiography. Some questions include: Where can we find connections or discontinuities? How can—and cannot—textual and archaeological sources help us understand people’s lives? How have Japanese thinkers, leaders, religious professionals, political leaders, and ordinary people understood the past?

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 100 level; or 30 credit units of University level courses.

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours

History began with the Greeks. Or at least, the Western tradition of the writing of history began with them; after all, it was the Greeks who gave us the term “history.” Literally meaning “inquiries” in the original Greek, it served as the title of an account of the Persian Wars written by Herodotus, the so-called “Father of History”. But not everyone agreed with Herodotus’ approach. Most strikingly, his immediate successor, Thucydides, emphatically rejected his methodology and proposed an alternative. And subsequent writers regularly proposed alternative viewpoints regarding best approach to writing history. This course will trace the development of historical writing in the ancient world and explore the different approaches that Greek and Roman historians brought to the discipline by analyzing a variety of primary sources (in translation). In the process, we’ll explore questions about the purpose and methodology of history more broadly, including about how we practice it today.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units of university studies; or by permission of the instructor.

Recent scholarship on sex, gender and sexuality in Africa has focused on the relationship between a constructed African sexual deviance and the rising rates of HIV/AIDS on the continent. This course seeks to understand how the stereotypes of African sexuality, same-sex relationships and gender oppression were formed. Through a wide range of scholarly literature, primary sources, biographies and visual texts we will then move beyond this narrow focus and use historical studies to destabilize dominant assumptions about gender and sexuality in Africa. To do this we will use predominantly African texts and develop analytical tools appropriate to African contexts. In this way the course will provide rich accounts of African lives and how they shape and are shaped by issues of gender and sexuality.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level or permission of the instructor.

By fusing humour with social criticism, satire allows authors to skewer societal customs and traditional practices while providing entertainment. Satire was popular among Greco-Roman authors, who found a ready audience for their biting critiques of prominent figures and contemporary social practices. Nothing was off limits for these writers, from destructive warmongering to illogical religious beliefs to the self-serving customs of the elite. And because these satires cover such a wide array of subjects, they provide the perfect lens through which to study the society and culture of the ancient world. In this course, we will analyze the satirical works of a number of Greek and Roman authors (e.g. Aristophanes, Lucian, Juvenal, etc.) in order to examine how they utilized this genre for social criticism and comedic effect, as well as what these works can tell us about the Greco-Roman world.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units of 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units of university-level courses; or permission of the instructor.

History viewed through documents related to a single individual. Students will work from various perspectives, including social, institutional, cultural, intellectual, and gender history. Possible individuals to be studied include Peter Abelard, Elizabeth I, Erasmus, and Joan of Arc.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.
Note:Students may take this course more than once for credit, provided the topic covered in each offering differs substantially. Students must consult the Department to ensure that the topics covered are different.

This 3-week intensive, lecture-seminar summer study abroad class takes place in Italy every two years and focuses on the study of the ancient city of Rome (8th century BCE to 4th century CE). Urban planning and development, architectural history, monuments and authority, aspects of life in the largest ancient metropolis, Christianity in urban space, are some of the subjects that we cover; first in the classroom, and then during site visits in the city of Rome. This course will benefit especially students who have taken classics, archaeology, CMRS, history or art and art history at the 100 and 200 levels, and who would like the opportunity to expand their knowledge of Rome, its urban culture and architectural history.

Weekly hours: 4 Lecture hours and 9 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST, CLAS, ARCH or ARTH, or 45 credit units of university level courses and permission of the Instructor.
Note: Costs in addition to tuition will apply to this course. Please contact the department for details.

Examines the socio-economic pressures and spiritual goals basic to the Crusades, military encounters, the organization of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1099-1291), and ensuing contacts between Christians and Muslims to the eighteenth century.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.

This course focuses on the methods, approaches, and research of scholars who merge a historian’s interest in time with geographer’s interest in place and space. It will provide students with an overview of the potential and challenges this kind of research poses and provide them with the technical expertise necessary to conduct research of their own in this field of study. The course is organized in a series of thematic topics aimed at demonstrating the applicability of Historical GIS and other spatial history approaches at the local, regional, national, and transnational scales.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST courses, or 60 credit units of university studies, or at the permission of the instructor.

The course will take shape around intensive workshops organized into modules representing distinct aspects of community-engaged historical research. Students will attend discussions, engage in workshop related events and do assigned readings. Some days classes will be broken up by visits to specific sites in Saskatoon and elsewhere. Students will be expected to read for each class, engage in discussions, work effectively in methods workshops, and prepare a proposal for a community-engaged research project. A sub-set of the students taking HIST 314.3 each year will be subsequently employed through the History Department’s “Collaboratorium” to conduct historical community-engaged research. For these students, research project proposals will necessarily be explored with the project partners in mind. For other students, the project proposals will be developed in close consultation with the course supervisor and instructors of modules.

Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units of university studies; or by permission of the instructor.

In this course, we will focus primarily on the multiple physical, mental, and spiritual health risks that First Nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples have faced as a direct result of European exploration, missionization, trade, and colonization from 1492 to present day. We will consider Indigenous teachings and practices related to health and wellness both before and after European contact. We will also consider how new disease epidemics, poverty, food insecurity, the delivery (or withholding) of Western style medical care, and institutionalization in schools and hospitals affected Indigenous peoples’ health status over time.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level; or 60 credit units of university studies; or by permission of the instructor

This lecture/seminar course provides a comparative analysis of the diversity of Métis communities across the Canadian Prairies in the Twentieth Century. It is organized around historical social, cultural, and economic themes. It includes examination of concepts of resistance, resilience, mobility, dispossession, displacement and relocation as they relate to Métis experience. A significant focus of this course is a critical review of Indigenous narratives of life on the “road allowance” as presented through Métis stories and personal reminiscences as they complement existing historical scholarship.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units of university studies; or by permission of the instructor

Warfare was a force for incredible creative destruction on the German lands between 1500 and 1800. It accompanied and catalysed confessional division, political fragmentation, demographic catastrophe, state formation, and national revitalization. The German peoples’ particular entry into and exit from early modernity are inseparable from their experiences of war. This course introduces students to key themes in the military, social, economic, political, and intellectual history of the German lands between the careers of the theologian Martin Luther and the military theorist Carl von Clausewitz. It highlights the complex ways early modern warfare shaped and was shaped by structural and contingent factors, often with profound consequences for broader German societies and subsequent generations.

Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST courses, or 60 credit units of university studies, or by permission of the instructor.

This course addresses the interaction of diverse cultural and religious identities in the Roman world, especially from the rise of Christianity in the early Empire through late antiquity. This encounter between Christianity and traditional Roman culture is one often defined in terms of conflict and triumph, but it is also one of toleration and exchange: by the time Christianity became an official religion, it was also deeply Roman. In the process of tracing these historical developments, this course will likewise consider how cultural and religious differences are constructed, resisted and adopted. Readings include a combination of modern scholarship and ancient literary and documentary texts.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST or CLAS at the 200-level.

No present-day term adequately captures the dynamic marketplace for curing what ailed you in pre-modern England. "Helping-Care" services were provided by a wide variety of healers and helpers: cunning folk, diviners, empirics, midwives, apothecaries, barber surgeons, and physicians all provided treatments focused on client physical, mental, and sometimes spiritual well-being. Practitioners, both formally and informally educated, often served clients from every rank of society, and were frequently well known in their communities for specialized treatments and cures. This course examines the wide range of standard magical and medical helping and healing practices that were in everyday use in pre-modern England. It also studies the charlatans who hoped to take advantage of people in such a dynamic setting.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST courses, or 60 credit units of university studies, or by permission of the instructor.

Ridley Scott’s film Gladiator (2000) brought the bloodlust of the Roman arena to a 21st century audience. The film appears to confirm that the Romans, especially emperors and the plebeian masses, were a cruel and bloodthirsty lot. Trained killers- gladiators- slaughtered innocent victims, or savage lions mauled and devoured them, all for the pleasure of the Roman people. This course takes a critical look at the varied deadly activities (munera, venationes, damnatio ad bestias), held in the Roman arena by examining ancient textual and visual sources, and modern scholarship. We will examine these spectacles in the broader context of Roman performance culture, religion and politics. Were these spectacles merely the product of a debased and declining culture? How has modern scholarship understood the apparent madness of the Roman arena?

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST or CLAS

This hybrid lecture-seminar class provides students with an historical examination of the peoples, practices, doctrines, and institutions of the Buddhist religion through history, emphasizing socio-cultural dimensions. Topics include: early Buddhism and its evolution in India; cultural contacts and the spread of Buddhism to southeast Asia, central Asia, China, Japan, Korea, Tibet and Mongolia. We will also consider Buddhism in modern Asia and in the west. Class meetings will combine lectures that provide historical and cultural context with discussions—and films—to clarify and interpret the assigned readings. Readings center on primary materials in English translation rather than on secondary scholarship so that students will define Buddhism on their own terms. Several questions guide this class: How has the world been imagined and experienced by Buddhists over time and over different geographies and cultures? What aspects of Buddhism are Westerners eager to see and what are they not interested in?

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200 level; or 60 credit units of University level courses; or permission of the instructor.

This hybrid lecture-seminar class offers an introduction to the history of world views characteristic of the popular religious traditions of China and of popular religious concepts and practices including mythology, divination, magic, and communal worship. We will also investigate Chinese institutional religions including Daoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism in terms of how their practitioners have incorporated these and other popular religious concepts and practices into their methods, regulations, and teachings. Features of sacred sites, including foundational and enduring myths, architecture, art and socio-cultural dynamics, and historiography will receive careful consideration in this course. We will explore religion as it has been and continues to be practiced in everyday life for individuals, families, communities, and the state in China and within Chinese communities. Our historical analysis will consider religion and culture not as abstract, monolithic and ahistorical phenomena, but as expressions of the social realm.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200 level; or 60 credit units of University level courses; or permission of the instructor.

The British conquest of 1759-1763 assessed primarily in terms of its effect upon French Canadian society. Historical interpretations of this central event in Canadian history will form the core of this course.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.

Canadians emerged from World War II confident, optimistic and well positioned to play a leading role in world events. What happened? Seminar topics devoted to political, social, cultural and economic developments allow students to study the central dichotomy of modern Canadian life: angst in an era of affluence.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.

This course offers students the opportunity to engage with a newly emerging field of historical scholarship: food history. Food, its production, marketing, preparation and consumption is the product of particular societies and cultural practices and, ultimately, food has a history. Drawing upon the recent international and national literature this class offers a social and cultural history of Canada through food. Employing the traditional analytical categories of social history (race, gender, class and nation/region) provides us with the tools to understand the expansion of food products and commercialization; the growth of fast food empires; immigration and "ethnic" cuisine, the gendered dynamics of the kitchen, the farmyard and the grocery store; food safety and social justice; and now, most recently, our fascination with sustainability, organic foods and so-called '100 mile diets.'

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Permission of the Department.
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST
Note:Students who took the earlier iteration of this class as a HIST 398.3 (2011 and 2012) may not take this course for credit.

A focus on life stories can shed “light far beyond the individual” and allows the historian to make connections to broader historical change (Salvatore, 2004). As one of the oldest forms of historical practice, biography serves many purposes in society such as to construct and validate ethical and social practices as well as commemorate key players. More recently, biography has been recognized as an important decolonizing methodology, with scholars attempting to highlight marginalized actors who have been obscured and/or erased from colonial narratives. This course reflects this trend and will study the life (her)stories of Indigenous women who have shaped Early North America. Critical analysis will include research based in both primary and secondary sources. The course consists of one three-hour class per week, divided into two parts. The first half the class will consist of a lecture, while the second half will be a seminar discussion based on weekly readings.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units at the university level; or permission of the instructor.

This course looks at early North American history (1600-1900) through the prism of diasporas. Many groups of Indigenous North Americans have experienced both voluntary and forced dispersal from their homeland. This process of migration and settlement has resulted in the creation of new localized communities who simultaneously align themselves culturally, politically and economically within a continental diaspora network. Beyond an introduction to migration and diaspora history, this course will highlight several case studies such as: the Wendat, the Shawnee, the Cherokee, the Odawa, and the Métis. Seminar discussions will draw on themes of colonialism, transnationalism, historic trauma, spirituality, identity and women’s experiences. The course consists of one three-hour class per week, divided into two parts. The first half the class will consist of a lecture, while the second half will be a seminar discussion based on weekly readings.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST; or 60 credit units at the university level; or permission of the instructor.

This course introduces students to the history of borderlands by analyzing what borderlands are, how they form, why they matter, and how they change our conceptions of history. We will study the historic formation of the borderlands of North America paying close attention to the efforts that Canada, Britain, the United States, and Mexico expended to demarcate their national boundaries and the slippages that occurred when nations have tried to force binary categories, such as nationalities, onto historically mobile and interconnected populations. In doing so, we will study inter-tribal borderlands, borderlands between Natives and newcomers, and the creation of borders between European powers. We will assess the impact and contributions that communities such as the Cree, Sioux, Nez Perce, Métis, Comanche, Iroquois and Coast Salish made to the demarcation, enforcement, and placement of European boundaries. Finally, we will compare the borderlands of North America to borderlands across the world, utilizing case studies from Europe, Thailand, Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and Morocco. Throughout this process, we will focus on contentious issues such as violence, warfare, smuggling, prostitution, nation building, abductions, and racial exclusion.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.

This course explores the ways that humans have exploited various sources of energy and fuels in the past, and the implications of the dramatic increase in the total amount of energy used by society. It considers the consequences of the transition from organic forms of energy, such as muscles and wood, to mineral forms of energy, such as coal, oil, and uranium. The course addresses how new technologies, higher standards of living, changing modes of production, and environmental transformations made this pattern of energy use possible, and contextualizes the growth in energy consumption within narratives of colonization, state formation, urbanization, industrialization, rapid population growth, and wealth accumulation.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST or permission of the department.

In the post 9/11 period, interest in the study of American foreign relations has continued to increase. This hybrid lecture/seminar course examines the history and historiography of U.S. foreign relations from 1945 to the present. While the emphasis is on diplomatic history, the course also considers the political, economic, cultural, and social implications of American foreign policies in the United States and the wider world.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level

Examines selected themes in the history of Central America, concentrating on the 19th and 20th centuries.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.
Note: Post-1815; Other Regions. Students may take this course more than once for credit, provided the topic covered in each offering differs substantially. Students must consult the Department to ensure that the topics covered are different.

This course traces the merging of eugenics with birth control in Republican China and globally, such as in the arguments of birth control activist Margaret Sanger, and the intersection between eugenics, hygiene and nation building. By examining the reaction of Chinese intellectuals to such scientific racial ideas, we will enrich our understanding of the utopic potency of eugenics as a solution to social ills such as poverty and disease. Reproduction is connected with ideologies of racial improvement such as eugenics, which also underpinned the One Child Policy in the 1980s. Chinese and international activists, writers and ideologues linked the population question, theories of degeneration and race suicide, birth control, and venereal disease to eugenics. Eugenics is intertwined with mental and physical health. Eugenics functions as an international ideology that also reinforces nationalism. The scientific argument has an explanatory value and legitimates the implementation of birth control and sterilization.

Weekly hours: 3 Lecture hours
Prerequisite(s):3 credit units 200-Level HIST courses.

An examination of major mass killings in the twentieth century. The course analyzes the definitions and theories of mass killings, including genocide and ethnic cleansing. It also discusses how the international community can best detect and prevent a mass killing using such tools as international law and humanitarian intervention.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level or permission of the instructor.

Digital history, the application of new and emerging technologies to the study of history, is an exciting new historical methodology. In this course, we explore the literature on digital history, and then put theory into practice by digitally collecting, evaluating, and producing historical knowledge. Along with discussing what digital history is and how it is evolving, this course will introduce students to text mining, geographic information systems (GIS) and developing historical websites. How digital archives are changing how we preserve and research history. Students will get hands-on experience with a wide range of digital skills and use these new methods to develop a final digital history project.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units 200-level HIST courses

How should (and how do) historians approach their scholarship, and how has this changed in recent generations? This course engages a range of methodological, philosophical, and historiographical readings drawn from a comprehensive survey of topical, thematic, and theoretical fields, collectively aimed at encouraging students to think about the process and methods of doing history.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 3 credit units HIST at the 200-level.
Note: Students with credit for HIST 398 Special Topics Approaches to History may not take this course for credit. HIST 397 is required for the Honours and Double Honours programs.

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours

Offered occasionally by visiting faculty and in other special situations to cover, in depth, topics that are not thoroughly covered in regularly offered courses.

Weekly hours: 1.5 Lecture hours and 1.5 Seminar/Discussion hours

A study of the cultural and intellectual history of Late Antiquity based on the reading of primary sources in translation. Topics include church-state relations, the survival of the classical heritage, education, the early papacy, influential women, early monasticism and the fathers of the church.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior-level HIST of which 3 credit units must be 300-level or permission of the department.

This course explores the particularities of Chinese feminism and Chinese women’s experiences from the Qing Dynasty until the present. We examine the political and ideological dimensions of Chinese feminism, in their intersections with nationalism, anarchism, socialism, and post-socialism. We learn of the contributions to feminist theory of radical anarcho-feminist He Yin-Zhen, explore the writings of talented female writers like swordswoman and revolutionary martyr Qiu Jin, or bourgeois writer turned Marxist Ding Ling, the first female writer to write the feminine self in Chinese literature. We explore prevalent Chinese practices such as foot binding, the separation of the sexes, arranged marriage, concubines, polygamy, free love, suicide, infanticide, leftover women, the marriage market, and Chinese lesbian cinema. We also look at major events and policies in Chinese history that affect women, such as the Rape of Nanjing, Western Colonialism, the Cultural Revolution and the female Red Guards, and the One Child Policy.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior-level HIST of which 3 credit units must be 300-level, or permission of the department.

This class, moving from WWI to the 1990s Balkan Wars, from France to Ethiopia, Auschwitz, Algiers and Saigon, aims at analyzing the relationship between war, gender and sexualities. In this course we will confront not only the issue of sexual violence, but we will also talk about desire and love. By reading works based on thorough research we will see the intimate tie between the history of sexuality and military history. In this class we will expose the constructedness of gender and sexuality, and we will see how military conflicts had distinct impacts on the lives of women, men and children. Our investigation over the course of the semester will allow us to touch on a variety of themes including sexuality, gender, race, colonialism, citizenship, and more. Students taking this course should have some background in modern European history and/or gender studies.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior-level HIST of which 3 credit units must be 300-level, or permission of the department.

This course examines the history of French colonialism in the Americas from the first explorers and settlements to the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. Weekly readings and seminar discussions explore a variety of historical themes designed to critically evaluate the French colonial experience and analyze the character of the French Empire in the Americas. Such themes include native-newcomer relations, empire and conquest, religion, slavery, women and gender, métissage, commerce, and the French in North America after the fall of New France. The French had a profound influence on the Americas, from the Maritimes to the Canadian Northwest, and as far south as New Orleans and the Caribbean. This class puts the Spanish, American, and British North American (Canadian) Empires into context, and sets a foundation for understanding the English/French divide in contemporary Canada and the rise of the Métis in Western Canada.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior level HIST of which 3 credit units must be at the 300-level; or permission of the department

Medieval Europe (including Britain) experienced profound transformation between 1000 CE and 1500 CE. Built upon the institutions of early Christian Europe and the remnants of classical civilization, the high and late Middle Ages produced many of the social, cultural, intellectual, religious, legal, and political institutions that still operate in Europe and the European diaspora today. Investigation of the medieval period is thus interdisciplinary and requires flexible approaches to a wide range of written and material sources. Working closely with the course instructor, senior undergraduate students will work on a narrowly focussed topic of their choice within the framework of the course topic. This course will require students to hone their skills in primary and secondary research, clear communication and presentation, and written argumentation.

Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior-level HIST of which 3 credit units must be 300-level or permission of the department.
Note: Students may take this course more than once for credit, provided the topic covered in each offering differs substantially. Students must consult the Department to ensure that the topics covered are different.

This course will examine history of gender, sexuality, and masculinity in pre-modern Europe through such lenses as medical theory, class and work, legal documents, and literary evidence.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 credit units of senior-level HIST of which 3 credit units must be 300-level or permission of the department.

People around the world and throughout history have consumed plants, brews, chemicals and alkaloids in an effort to change consciousness. Some of these efforts are recreational, some ceremonial, and others part of medicine and experimentation. In this class we explore different ways that alcohol and drugs have been used in the past, by examining themes from different areas of the world. We examine how historians have contributed to popular understandings of drugs, alcohol, and intoxication and we consider what role social sciences and humanities scholars play in shaping our popular understandings of what makes good drugs and bad drugs, or how scholars and policy makers have determined limits for acceptable intoxicating behaviours and who has the privilege to be intoxicated, or who is criminalized for seeking intoxication. Rather than follow a chronological structure, in this course we examine how different psychoactive substances have been viewed in different places, from the perspectives of colonizers and colonized at different time points in history.

Weekly hours: 3 Seminar/Discussion hours
Prerequisite(s): 6 cu of senior HIST courses of which 3 credit units must be 300-level; or permission of the instructor or the department.