Course 21H: History
IAP/Spring
2025
Seminars
21H.315 American Consumer Culture
  ( ) 
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Examines the role of commerce and consumption in shaping American life. Introduces theoretical approaches to commodities and consumerism. Explores social and cultural transformations linked to the emergence of a market economy in the 19th century, the rise of a mass consumer society in the 20th century, and the development of a global digital marketplace in the 21st century.
C. Horan
21H.317 Free Expression, Pluralism, and the University
(New)
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores how American higher education has grappled with the hard questions that live at the intersection of free expression, academic freedom, and the commitment to a diverse and inclusive learning environment. Discusses the history and law of free speech and academic freedom and considers the contemporary disputes that have arisen over these values. Studies the responses of American university communities (public and private) to these conflicts since the 1950s: the bitter contests over McCarthy-era loyalty oaths, the student-led civil rights and anti-Vietnam War protests of the 1960s, the hate speech codes of the 1990s, and today's ongoing turf wars over so-called "cancel culture" and control of teaching and the curriculum.
M. Ghachem
21H.319 Race, Crime, and Citizenship in American Law
 () 
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Provides an introduction to the law of race in the United States, focusing on the development of America's criminal justice system since Reconstruction. Examines ongoing debates over whether "mass incarceration" amounts to an instrument of racial control. Considers the relationship between American race legislation and changing definitions of citizenship at key moments in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Case studies include immigration restriction, the death penalty, criminal procedure, and national security policing before and after 9/11.
M. Ghachem
21H.320[J] Gender and the Law in US History
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as WGS.161[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores the legal history of the US as a gendered system. Examines how women have shaped the meanings of American citizenship through pursuit of political rights such as suffrage, jury duty, and military service, as well as how the legal system has shaped gender relations through regulation of such issues as marriage, divorce, work, reproduction, and the family. Readings draw from primary and secondary materials, focusing on the broad historical relationship between law and society. No legal knowledge is required or assumed.
C. Capozzola
21H.321[J] Downtown
( )
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as 11.026[J])
(Subject meets with 11.339)
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-7
Seminar on downtown in US cities from the late 19th century to the late 20th. Emphasis on downtown as an idea, place, and cluster of interests, on the changing character of downtown, and on recent efforts to rebuild it. Considers subways, skyscrapers, highways, urban renewal, and retail centers. Focus on readings, discussions, and individual research projects. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
Staff
21H.322 Christianity in America
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines Christian encounters with Judaism, Islam, and the indigenous religions of Africa and America. Explores the intellectual and social consequences of Christian imperialism and the transformations of Christianity during its American encounters.
C. Wilder
21H.330 Ancient Empires: Persians and Greeks in Antiquity
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores interactions between Greeks and Persians in the Mediterranean and Near East from the Archaic Period to the Hellenistic Age, and works to illuminate the interface between these two distinct yet complementary cultures. Examines the general narrative of Greco-Persian history, from the foundation of the Achaemenid Empire in the middle of the sixth century BCE to the Macedonian conquest of Persia some 250 years later. Discusses how contact between Persia and the Greeks in antiquity has influenced discourse about the opposition between East and West in the modern world. Students examine archaeological, epigraphical, numismatic, and literary materials from a variety of sources including Greek historiography, tragedy, and oratory; Persian royal inscriptions and administrative documents; and the Hebrew Bible.
A. Forte
21H.331 Julius Caesar and the Fall of the Roman Republic
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Ancient Rome from 133 to 27 BC. Explores political, social, and economic factors commonly offered to explain the fall of the Roman Republic: growth of the territorial empire, increased intensity of aristocratic competition, transformation of the Italian economy, growth of the city of Rome and dependence of the urban plebs, changes in military recruitment and dependence of soldiers on their generals. Emphasis on the reading of ancient sources in translation, including Cicero, Sallust, Caesar, Augustus, Appian, Plutarch, and Suetonius. Instruction and practice in oral and written communication provided. Taught in seminar format with emphasis on class participation. Limited to 15.
W. Broadhead
21H.332 Medieval Warfare
(New)
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Investigates the organization and conduct of war in the medieval world, from barbarian invasions in Late Antiquity to the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453. Explores continuities and transformations in warfare from the late Roman empire to the successor kingdoms of medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Muslim world. Examines the complex interplay between war, politics, and society, and problematizes popular images of medieval warfare as primitive, heroic, and chivalric. Topics include the barbarian invasions of the Roman empire, the expansion of Islam, Charlemagne's subjugation of the Saxons, the Viking raids, castle building and siege warfare, the Norman Conquest and Crusades, and ideologies of just war, holy war, and jihad.
Staff
21H.333 Early Christianity
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Introduction to the history of early Christianity, from Jesus to Muhammad. Investigates the origins and spread of the Jesus movement within the ancient Jewish and Roman worlds, the emergence of the Church, and the diversity of early Christian thought, spirituality, literature, and art. Examines such topics as the historical Jesus and Paul, relations among Jews, Romans, and Christians, debates over orthodoxy and heresy, the conversion of the Roman empire, the rise of bishops and monasticism, the Church Fathers, and the cult of the saints.
E. Goldberg
21H.336 The Making of a Roman Emperor
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Through close examination of the emperor Augustus and his Julio-Claudian successors, this subject investigates how Roman emperors used art, architecture, coinage, and other media to create and project an image of themselves, how the surviving literary sources from the Roman period reinforced or subverted that image, and how both phenomena have contributed to post-classical perceptions of Roman emperors. Also considers works of Suetonius and Tacitus, and modern representations of the emperors such as those found in the films I, Claudius, Quo Vadis, and HBO's Rome series. Enrollment limited to 15.
W. Broadhead
21H.343[J] Making Books in the Renaissance and Today
(, ) 
(Same subject as CC.120[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
 Lecture: MW2.30-4 (14N-112)
Explores the impact of new technology on the recording and distribution of words and images in Europe from 1400-1800. Assignments include essays and online projects. Students participate in the design and printing of an eight-page pamphlet on a hand-set printing press. Limited to 12.
Fall: E. Zimmer
Spring: E. Zimmer
No textbook information available
21H.350 Business in China Since 1800
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Analyzes the characteristics of business in China since 1800 to provide a historical context for its contemporary economic development. Topics include China's place in the world economy; early efforts at state-led industrialization; legal and social frameworks for business; foreign investments, companies, and competition; the emergence of a Chinese business class; the influence of socialism and reform-era politics on business. Includes case studies of contemporary companies and a research project.
Staff
21H.351[J] Shanghai and China's Modernization
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as 11.153[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Considers the history and function of Shanghai, from 1840 to the present, and its rise from provincial backwater to international metropolis. Examines its role as a primary point of economic, political, and social contact between China and the world, and the strong grip Shanghai holds on both the Chinese and foreign imagination. Students discuss the major events and figures of Shanghai, critique the classic historiography, and complete an independent project on Shanghai history.
Staff
21H.352[J] Three Kingdoms: From History to Fiction, Comic, Film, and Game
()
(Same subject as 21G.042[J], 21L.492[J], CMS.359[J])
(Subject meets with 21G.133)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Lecture: TR1-2.30 (14E-310)
Analyzing core chapters of the great Chinese epic novel, Three Kingdoms, and its adaptations across diverse media, considers what underlies the appeal of this classic narrative over the centuries. Through focus on historical events in the period 206 BC to AD 280, examines the representation of power, diplomacy, war, and strategy, and explores the tension among competing models of political authority and legitimacy. Covers basic elements of classical Chinese political and philosophical thought, and literary and cultural history. Final group project involves digital humanities tools. Readings in translation. Films and video in Chinese with English subtitles.
E. Teng
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.354 World War II in Asia
()
(Subject meets with 21G.556)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Lecture: T1-4 (1-136)
Examines World War II in the Asia-Pacific region, starting with the rise of the Japanese Empire after World War I and ending with the Allied occupation of Japan from 1945 to 1952. Highlights the diverse and, at times, contradictory forces in politics, society, and culture that shaped the wartime experiences of the empire's inhabitants.
H. Nagahara
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.357 South Asian Migrations
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Studies how and why South Asians, who have migrated to America, Europe, Africa, the Caribbean and the Middle East, are considered a model minority in some countries and unwanted strangers in others. Through literature, memoirs, films, music, and historical writing, follows migrants as they discovered the world beyond their countries of origin: India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Students complete final projects on different aspects of MIT's relationship with the Indian subcontinent including research on South Asian students and alumni.
S. Aiyar
21H.358[J] Colonialism in South Asia and Africa: Race, Gender, Resistance
()
(Same subject as WGS.315[J])
(Subject meets with 21H.958)
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Lecture: T11-1 (E51-390)
Provides a comparative perspective on the history of colonialism in India and Africa. Explores the political, social, and economic changes brought about by colonial rule. Discusses the international context for the emergence of European Imperialism in the 19th century; the nature of early colonial expansion and consolidation; the re-invention of tradition in colonial societies, especially with regard to racial and ethnic identity, gender, religion, and caste; and expressions of anti-colonial resistance. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
S. Aiyar
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.361 Echoes of Slavery: Recovering the Histories of Enslaved People
(New)
() 
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Students conduct archival research about slavery and create a research project to be made available to the public online. Examines archival data from digitized collections online or physical collections in the Boston area. Projects may range from devising an innovative interface for public use of the data or carrying out a demographic study to creating a story map or making a podcast or video. Students write accompanying short essays that situate the data in historical context and document the research projects.
Staff
21H.363[J] Abortion: Global and Interdisciplinary Perspectives
(New)
()
(Same subject as WGS.330[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Addresses topics such as the development of abortion law in the US and around the world, ethics of abortion and forcible pregnancy, pro- and anti-abortion activism, economics of abortion, and terms related to abortion, including reproductive justice, reproductive rights, bodily autonomy, and fetal politics. Tackles questions including how different societies at different times have approached the question of the removal of a fetus from a human body, who are (or should be) stakeholders in making the decision to deliberately terminate a pregnancy or ban such a decision, and whether abortion was always a "question" that different groups and individuals discussed, evaluated, and regulated. Encourages students to think about this issue in historical context to help them form analytically sound arguments.
Staff
21H.365 Minorities and Majorities in the Middle East
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Seminar considers "difference" and "sameness" as they have been conceived, experienced, and regulated by peoples of the Middle East, with a focus on the 19th and 20th centuries. First half discusses the Ottoman Empire. Explores how this multiethnic, polyglot empire survived for several relatively peaceful centuries and what happened when its formula for existence was challenged by politics based on mono-ethnic states. Second half focuses on post-Ottoman nation-states, such as Turkey and Egypt, and Western-mandated Arab states, such as Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq. Concludes with a case analysis of Israel.
L. Ekmekcioglu
21H.380[J] People and Other Animals
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as 21A.411[J])
(Subject meets with 21A.419[J], 21H.980[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Historical exploration of the ways that people have interacted with their closest animal relatives, for example: hunting, domestication of livestock, exploitation of animal labor, scientific study of animals, display of exotic and performing animals, and pet-keeping. Themes include changing ideas about animal agency and intelligence, our moral obligations to animals, and the limits imposed on the use of animals. Students taking the graduate version complete additional assignments.
Staff
21H.381[J] Women and War
()
(Same subject as WGS.222[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines women's experiences during and after war and genocide, covering the first half of the 20th century in Europe and the Middle East. Addresses ways in which women's wartime suffering has been used to further a variety of political and social agendas. Discussions focus on a different topic each week, such as sexual violence, women survivors, female perpetrators of genocide, nurses, children of genocidal rape, and the memory of war.
L. Ekmekcioglu
21H.383 Technology and the Global Economy, 1000-2000
()
(Subject meets with 21H.982)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines the global history of the last millennium, including technological change, commodity exchange, systems of production, and economic growth. Students engage with economic history, medieval and early modern origins of modern systems of production, consumption and global exchange. Topics include the long pre-history of modern economic development; medieval world systems; the age of discovery, the global crisis of the 17th century; demographic systems, global population movements; the industrial revolution, the rise of the modern consumer; colonialism and empire building; patterns of inequality, within and across states; resources and development; and the threat of climate change to modern economic systems. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
A. McCants
21H.385[J] The Ghetto: From Venice to Harlem
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as 11.152[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Provides an in-depth look at a modern institution of oppression: the ghetto. Uses literature to examine ghettoization over time and across a wide geographical area, from Jews in Medieval Europe to African-Americans and Latinos in the 20th-century United States. Also explores segregation and poverty in the urban "Third World."
C. Wilder
21H.388 Global Commodities, American Dreams
()
(Subject meets with 21H.988)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores how American actors and institutions got the raw materials that built the nation. Approaches commodities as a lens through which to understand a more specific relationship between the United States and the wider world in political, economic, and environmental terms, and examines a global cartography of commodities, resources, and other "stuff" that became enmeshed in American life. Examines materials like sugar, cotton, wheat, bananas, rubber, aluminum, petroleum, uranium, drugs, and others, to trace a pattern of global resource exploitation back to sites of policymaking and consumption in the United States. Explores interconnections between human society and the non-human environment, troubling the boundary often understood to divide them. Includes themes of US empire, environment, labor, consumption, modernity, race, gender, class, and transnationalism. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
M. Black
21H.390 Theories and Methods in the Study of History
()
(Subject meets with 21H.991)
Prereq: Two History subjects or permission of instructor
Units: 3-0-9
Examines the distinctive ways in which historians in different parts of the world have approached the task of writing history. Explores methodologies used, such as political, social, economic, cultural, and popular histories through the reading and discussion of relevant and innovative texts. Introduces a variety of sources (archival documents, statistical data, film, fiction, memoirs, artifacts, and images) and the ways they can be used to research, interpret, and present the past. Assignments include an original research paper. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
T. Padilla
21H.391 Undergraduate Independent Study
(,  )
Prereq: None
Units arranged
 TBA.
Individual supervised work for students who wish to explore an area of interest in history. Before registering, a student must plan a course of study with a member of the History Faculty and secure approval from the Head of the History Faculty. Normal maximum is 6 units; exceptional 9-unit projects occasionally approved.
Fall: Staff
IAP: C. Horan
No textbook information available
21H.392 Undergraduate Independent Study
()
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units arranged
TBA.
Individual supervised work for students who wish to explore an area of interest in history. Before registering, a student must plan a course of study with a member of the History Faculty and secure approval from the Head of the History Faculty. Normal maximum is 6 units; exceptional 9-unit projects occasionally approved.
S. Aiyar
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.C30 Encoding Culture: Computation Methods in the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences
() 
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: 6.100A, 6.100B, or 6.100L
Units: 3-0-9
Applies computational methods for manipulating and analyzing encoded media, and draws from a wide range of practices including computational linguistics, audio processing, computer vision, and machine learning. Explores what it means to digitally encode and analyze culture. Studies the history and current practice of digitally encoding text, images, audio, and tabular datasets, along with the cultural and social issues implicit in these systems. Confronts the underlying issues of what is lost and gained when we encode culture. Limited to 25.
Staff
Special Subjects
21H.S01 Special Subject: History
(, )
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units: 3-0-9
URL: https://history.mit.edu/subjects/special-subject-history/
Lecture: M2-5 (2-103)
Opportunity for group study of special subject not listed in the regular History curriculum.
Fall: M. Kars & A. McCants
Spring: E. Kempf
No textbook information available
21H.S02 Special Subject: History
()
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units: 3-0-9
URL: https://history.mit.edu/subjects/special-subject-history-2/
Lecture: MW2.30-4 (4-261)
Opportunity for group study of special subject not listed in the regular History curriculum.
T. Padilla
No textbook information available
21H.S03 Special Subject: History
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units arranged
Opportunity for group study of special subject not listed in the regular History curriculum.
E. Wood
21H.S04 Special Subject: History
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Opportunity for group study of special subject not listed in the regular History curriculum.
S. Aiyar & B. Rajagopal
21H.S05 Special Subject: History
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
URL: https://history.mit.edu/subjects/special-subject-5/
Lecture: MW11-12.30 (2-103)
Opportunity for group study of special subject not listed in the regular History curriculum.
E. Kempf
No textbook information available
Undergraduate Research
21H.THT History Pre-Thesis Tutorial
()
Prereq: None
Units arranged
Students writing a thesis in History develop their research topics, review relevant research and scholarship, frame their research questions and arguments, choose an appropriate methodology for analysis, and draft the introductory and methodology sections of their theses. Includes substantial practice in writing (with revision) and oral presentations.
T. Padilla
21H.THU History Thesis
()
Prereq: 21H.THT
Units arranged
TBA.
Completion of work on the senior major thesis under supervision of a faculty thesis advisor. Includes oral presentation of thesis progress early in the term, assembling and revising the final text, and a final meeting with a committee of faculty evaluators to discuss the successes and limitations of the project. Required for students pursuing a full major in History.
T. Padilla
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.UR Undergraduate Research
(, , ,  )
Prereq: None
Units arranged [P/D/F]
IAP: TBA.
Spring: TBA.
Individual participation in an ongoing research project. For students in the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.
Fall: C. Horan
IAP: C. Horan
Spring: C. Horan
Textbooks arranged individually (IAP 2025); No required or recommended textbooks (Spring 2025)
21H.URG Undergraduate Research
(, , , )
Prereq: None
Units arranged
IAP: TBA.
Spring: TBA.
Individual participation in an ongoing research project. For students in the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.
Fall: L. Ekmekcioglu
IAP: L. Ekmekcioglu
Spring: L. Ekmekcioglu
Summer: L. Ekmekcioglu
Textbooks arranged individually (IAP 2025); No required or recommended textbooks (Spring 2025)
Graduate Subjects
21H.902 Reading Seminar in American History: 1877 to Present
 ()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: 21H.991 and permission of instructor
Units: 3-0-9
Develops teaching knowledge and research skills through extensive reading and discussion of major works in modern US history. Readings cover a range of topics and historical methods. Students make frequent oral presentations and submit a major work consisting of original research or historiographic interpretation.
Staff
21H.920 Economic Classics: The History of Economic Ideas from Ancient Times to the Present
(New)
()
(Subject meets with 21H.290)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Lecture: TR3-4.30 (4-261)
Surveys the history of economics by introducing students to some of the most powerful and influential economic thinkers, from Xenophon and Huan K'uan through Adam Smith, Karl Marx, and Paul Samuelson, to Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo. Explores the evolution of key economic concepts — the state and the market, natural resources, and crises — by situating them in historical context and perspective. Through the close reading, analysis and discussion of some of the most important texts in the history of economic thought, traces the development of ideas, norms and ways of thinking that continue to shape decision-making in both daily life and global policy. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
Anne McCants
No textbook information available
21H.958 Colonialism in South Asia and Africa: Race, Gender, Resistance
()
(Subject meets with 21H.358[J], WGS.315[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Lecture: T11-1 (E51-390)
Provides a comparative perspective on the history of colonialism in India and Africa. Explores the political, social, and economic changes brought about by colonial rule. Discusses the international context for the emergence of European Imperialism in the 19th century; the nature of early colonial expansion and consolidation; the re-invention of tradition in colonial societies, especially with regard to racial and ethnic identity, gender, religion, and caste; and expressions of anti-colonial resistance. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
S. Aiyar
No required or recommended textbooks
21H.960[J] HASTS Dissertation Writing Workshop
(New)
()
(Same subject as 21A.989[J], STS.860[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 1-0-5
Bi-weekly seminar for students in the doctoral program in History, Anthropology, and Science, Technology & Society (HASTS) who have completed research and are in the process of writing their dissertations. Each class focuses on a particular element of the writing: organizing chapters, engaging the secondary literature, the art of the vignette, etc. Depending on student needs, some classes may be tailored to anthropological writing or to historical writing. Students are given ample opportunity to workshop draft passages and chapters. For PhD students only. PhD students outside the HASTS program require permission of instructor.
W. Deringer
21H.980[J] People and Other Animals
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
(Same subject as 21A.419[J])
(Subject meets with 21A.411[J], 21H.380[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 2-0-10
Historical exploration of the ways that people have interacted with their closest animal relatives, for example: hunting, domestication of livestock, exploitation of animal labor, scientific study of animals, display of exotic and performing animals, and pet-keeping. Themes include changing ideas about animal agency and intelligence, our moral obligations to animals, and the limits imposed on the use of animals. Students taking the graduate version complete additional assignments.
Staff
21H.981 Seminar in Nature, Environment, and Empire
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores the relationship between the study of natural history, both domestic and exotic, by Europeans and Americans, and concrete exploitation of the natural world. Focuses on the 18th and 19th centuries.
Staff
21H.982 Technology and the Global Economy, 1000-2000
()
(Subject meets with 21H.383)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines the global history of the last millennium, including technological change, commodity exchange, systems of production, and economic growth. Students engage with economic history, medieval and early modern origins of modern systems of production, consumption and global exchange. Topics include the long pre-history of modern economic development; medieval world systems; the age of discovery, the global crisis of the 17th century; demographic systems, global population movements; the industrial revolution, the rise of the modern consumer; colonialism and empire building; patterns of inequality, within and across states; resources and development; and the threat of climate change to modern economic systems. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
A. McCants
21H.983[J] Gender: Historical Perspectives
()
(Same subject as WGS.310[J])
(Subject meets with 21H.109[J], WGS.303[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Lecture: W2-5 (4-144)
Examines the definition of gender in scientific, societal, and historical contexts. Explores how gender influences state formation and the work of the state, what role gender plays in imperialism and in the welfare state, the ever-present relationship between gender and war, and different states' regulation of the body in gendered ways at different times. Investigates new directions in the study of gender as historians, anthropologists and others have taken on this fascinating set of problems. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
E. Wood
No textbook information available
21H.984[J] Risk, Fortune, and Futurity
()
(Same subject as STS.414[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Lecture: W2-5 (2-103)
Exploration of interdisciplinary scholarship on risk, chance, and fortune. Begins with a survey of theoretical approaches to the field, then proceeds chronologically to explore the emergence of risk and its impacts on human life in multiple arenas including economics, politics, culture, environment, science, and technology from the 16th century to the present. Open to undergraduates with permission of instructor; consult department for details.
W. Deringer, C. Horan
No textbook information available
21H.985 Money, Credit, and Financial Crisis, 1600-1850
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines the role of money and credit in the "boom and bust" dynamic that has characterized North Atlantic financial capitalism since its emergence in the late 17th century. Studies the late 17th to the early 19th centuries when the North Atlantic economies (France, Britain, the Netherlands, and their colonial dependencies) developed modern, capitalist institutions and practices of money, credit, and finance. Studies the creation of state banks, stock markets, the relationship between war and finance, and the transition from metallic to paper currency. Explores the explosive politics of speculation, banking, and paper money in the Atlantic revolutionary era and the interdependence of plantation slavery and credit markets in the antebellum period. While 21H.985 and 21H.986 are sequential, students have the option of taking either or both. Open to undergraduates with permission of instructor; consult department for details.
M. Ghachem
21H.986 Money, Credit, and Financial Crisis, 1850-2020
()
Not offered regularly; consult department
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines some of the major turning points in the development of the modern (American) financial system: the Civil War Greenback movement, the rise and fall of the gold standard, Wall Street's role in the Caribbean during the interwar period, the crash of 1929, the development of the Federal Reserve, the subprime crisis of 2007-2008, and the international effort to maintain the public bond and corporate borrowing markets under the strains of Covid-19. Concludes with the dollarization of large parts of the global economy, contemporary crises of currency devaluation and hyperinflation in the developing world, and the emergence of cryptocurrencies and digital money. While 21H.985 and 21H.986 are sequential, students have the option of taking either or both. Open to undergraduates with permission of instructor; consult department for details.
M. Ghachem
21H.988 Global Commodities, American Dreams
()
(Subject meets with 21H.388)
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores how American actors and institutions got the raw materials that built the nation. Approaches commodities as a lens through which to understand a more specific relationship between the United States and the wider world in political, economic, and environmental terms, and examines a global cartography of commodities, resources, and other "stuff" that became enmeshed in American life. Examines materials like sugar, cotton, wheat, bananas, rubber, aluminum, petroleum, uranium, drugs, and others, to trace a pattern of global resource exploitation back to sites of policymaking and consumption in the United States. Explores interconnections between human society and the non-human environment, troubling the boundary often understood to divide them. Includes themes of U.S. empire, environment, labor, consumption, modernity, race, gender, class, and transnationalism. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
M. Black
21H.989 Histories of Extraction and Mining
()
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Explores the period after the Industrial Revolution, with a geographic emphasis on the United States, a major mineral producer and seeker in the wider world. Surveys mineral components of the lithosphere that became valued for an array of purposes above ground. Follows miners, geologists, engineers, investors, policymakers, and canaries into mines from the continental United States to Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Extends beyond political territories to zones of activity, from the oceans to the Arctic to outer space. Asks how mining, unfolding at the local level, interacted with global processes, including the Anthropocene, the latest planetary-scale transformation. Examines the relationship between economic activity and environmental wellbeing, and the consequences of this relationship. Open to advanced undergraduates with permission of instructor. Limited to 15.
M. Black
21H.990[J] Narrating the Anthropocene: Understanding a Multi-Species Universe
()
(Same subject as STS.432[J])
Prereq: None
Units: 3-0-9
Examines human concern about the planet and how that fixation shapes concepts of time & space, knowledge-production, understandings of what it means to be human and non-human, as well as trends in scholarship, art, culture & politics. Indexes the way numerous actors and institutions came to understand, debate & narrate the Anthropocene, a geological epoch defined by human-induced climate change. Explores how it as a concept has opened up new ways of understanding relations within the planet, including care, accountability & multi-species mutualism. Considers narrative registers as well, how scholars, writers, artists & working people narrate the Anthropocene. Students undertake an original project in research &/or experimental narrative forms inspired by the reading. Limited to 12.
K. Brown, M. Black
21H.991 Theories and Methods in the Study of History
()
(Subject meets with 21H.390)
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units: 3-0-9
Examines the distinctive ways in which historians in different parts of the world have approached the task of writing history. Explores methodologies used, such as political, social, economic, cultural, and popular histories through the reading and discussion of relevant and innovative texts. Introduces a variety of sources (archival documents, statistical data, film, fiction, memoirs, artifacts, and images) and the ways they can be used to research, interpret, and present the past. Assignments include an original research paper. Students taking graduate version complete additional assignments.
T. Padilla
21H.992 Graduate Independent Study
(, )
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units arranged
TBA.
Individual supervised work for students who wish to explore an area of interest in history. Before registering, a student must plan a course of study with a member of the History Faculty and secure approval from the Head of the History Faculty.
Fall: Staff
Spring: Staff
No textbook information available
21H.993 Graduate Independent Study
(, )
Prereq: Permission of instructor
Units arranged
TBA.
Individual supervised work for students who wish to explore an area of interest in history. Before registering, a student must plan a course of study with a member of the History Faculty and secure approval from the Head of the History Faculty.
Fall: Staff
Spring: Staff
No textbook information available
21H.999 Teaching History
(, )
Prereq: None
Units arranged [P/D/F]
TBA.
For qualified graduate students serving as either a teaching assistant or instructor for subjects in History. Enrollment limited by availability of suitable teaching assignments.
Fall: Staff
Spring: Staff
No textbook information available
For individual research in History, register for 21H.UR or 21H.URG. Descriptions of these subjects can be found in the beginning of this section under 21.UR and 21.URG. For History pre-thesis tutorial, register for 21H.ThT. For undergraduate thesis, register for 21H.ThU.
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