History 231: The Origins of the Contemporary World, Prehistory to late 18th century

Spring 2007: Mondays and Wednesdays - Daniel Newsome Presiding

Office: 4308N (Office Hours - Mon. 3:15-4:15 or by appointment)

 

231.07 - rm. 2504N                                             231.09 - rm. 3423N

12:30-1:45 pm                                                     1:55-3:10 pm

email: newsome231.07@kleos-clarus.org                       email: newsome231.09@kleos-clarus.org

 

Syllabus

Class Policies – Research Tools

Final Paper Guidelines

 

I will supply you with the readings as PDF documents found in the Assignment links.

 

Class #s

Class

Date

Class Topic and Alerts

Details and Links to Assignment Pages

 

1-2

1/29

2/31

Early Humans and Evolution and the world (ca. 4 billion years)

Variation + natural selection + a huge amount of time = Evolution

Without billions of years evolution is hard to buy.

Assignment 1a: Darwin and Dawkins and History

3-4

2/5

2/7

Energy, Babylonian Civilization, and Marduk

Human energy and carbon held in fossil form.

Charcoal, coal, oil, natural gasÉ and bicycle-generator comparisons.

Assignment 2a: Crosby, Creation in Mesopotamia, and HammurabiÕs Code.

5-6

2/14

2/15

Gilgamesh, Sumer, Babylonia, Hammurabi, SamarraÉ etc.

Assignment 3a: Gilgamesh and Other Early Civilizations.  Tower of Babel.

7

2/21

How Language changes.  Translation.  Thomas Young storyÉ atoms and languages and light.  Before they became illicit. 

Assignment 4a: Rosetta Stone and Drug Use in Ancient Near East

8-9

2/26

2/28

Homer and Epic Poetry

Assignment 5a: Mycenae, Homer, and Cheese.

10-11

3/5

3/7

Mon.- Review and student comics

Wed.- Exam I:

Assignment 1b: Questions on Plato and Exam note.

12-13

3/12

3/14

Greco-Roman-Afro-Egypto-schizo

Assignment 2b

Black Athena and Early Roman History

14-15

3/19

3/21

Rome: West and East, North and South

Jewish Revolt against Rome

Assignment 3b  GrecoRoman lifeÉ Josephus, Masada, HannibalÉ etc.

16-17

3/26

3/28

Early Christianity

Assignment 4b – Lecture on ConstantineÕs Dream, martyrs, Pagels and early Santa.

 

 

4/2, 4/4, and 4/9 Spring Break-

 

18

4/11

Islam A

Assignment 5b – The Prophet and modern ignorance.

19-20

4/16

4/18

Early Islam - Southwestern Asia, North Africa, Eastern Europe

Ibn Tufail: From Science to God

Assignment 1c: MuhammadÕs story.  Sunni v. ShiÕa.

Hai and DervishesÉ differing paths to God.

21-22

4/23

4/25

Monday Exam II

 

Wednesday: Crusades I: ÒA CrusadeÓ? 

Exam II and Assignment 2c:

Exam II on Monday

Intro to the Crusades

23-34

4/30

5/2

Crusades II

Assignment 3c: Relativism and Research Paper

Stories from the 1st Crusade and Through Arab Eyes

25-26

5/7

5/9

Maya and Aztec

Assignment 4c: Blom, Landa, Zapatistas, Corn, Free Trade, and explosive fertilizer.

Right on cue, this article by the historian Howard Zinn discusses exactly what I was ranting about: Zinn_On_Corn.

27-28

5/14

5/16

Medieval and Early Modern Japan

potpourri

Samurai Lecture Notes  – Catch up and  write your papers.  Lecture on Samurai and early guns and isolationist issues.

Final Paper Guidelines

Final

Exams

See entries to the right

Final for 231.09- (the class which normally meets at 1:55 on the 3rd floor) will be on Mon., 5/21, from 12:30-2:30 in 3423N, our regular classroom.

Final for 231.07 (the class which normally meets at 12:30 on the 2nd floor) will be on Wed., 5/23, from 12:00-2:00 in 2504N, our regular classroom.

Papers due at final exam. [Final Paper Guidelines]

 

Final Exam will mostly cover material starting with and including Islam A on 4/11/07.

 

Final Exam Summary with some essay suggestions and the technical specifications for the exam.

 

No Make-ups

 

Plan well in advance if you cannot make either of these two times.

 *Complete the assigned readings before the class meetings. 

   Warning: This is not a static document.  It will be updated each week.

 

Contact me immediately if you cannot access the readings. 

I suggest that if you have trouble downloading the PDFs at home,

 get them from a John Jay computer and store them on a flash drive or print them out. 

Some people have had good luck redownloading Adobe Reader.

 

If you are having problems opening the PDFs it may be a problem with AOL.  Try another browser like Internet Explorer.  If you insist on using AOL, perhaps read this link which may address your problem: http://www.ukings.ca/kings_3442.html

Here are some other sites with ideas: http://www.adobe.com/support/techdocs/331025.html or http://www.ci.lincoln.ne.us/main/helppdf.htm

 

If you donÕt have a copy of Acrobat Reader (also known as Adobe Reader) with which to view the PDF files, you can download a free copy from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html or just follow links at http://www.adobe.com.

 

Treat me with respect, and I will do likewise.  Let me know ahead of time about any issues that may affect your attendance or any possible disruptions to class. Cell phone disturbances and wandering in and out of the room during class will be noted and considered an absence.  I reserve the right to evaluate your behavior in class.  If I determine your presence to be a detriment to the overall class I will ask you to leave.