Loyola University Chicago

Department of History

Current and Recent Course Descriptions and Schedules

Fall 2023 Coure List

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
HIST 442: Women and Gender History USA
HIST 479: Public History Media
HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
HIST 510: Research Seminar

 

Fall 2023 Course Descriptions

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Dr. D. Bradford Hunt
Wednesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

This course examines the history of twentieth- and twenty first-century historical writing, emphasizing the changing interpretive paradigms, the innovative methodologies, and the social values of historians that have shaped the discipline.

 

HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
Dr. Elizabeth Tandy Shermer
Wednesdays 2:45 pm – 5:15 pm

This course explores pedagogical, professional, and ethical issues of importance to historians. We will examine the many identities of historians and the relationship between training in history and career pathways. Students will explore the history of the historical profession, approaches to teaching history, ethical issues in history as well as the diverse pathways available to those with training in history. Each student will complete an e-portfolio of materials to help them navigate life in and after graduate school. Required of all first year PhD students. Open to all other students as an elective.

 

HIST 442: Women and Gender History USA
Dr. Michelle Nickerson
Thursdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

The course explores the literature on women and gender in US history with attention to theoretical issues, a broad chronological scope, and cultural diversity.  Students will demonstrate their ability to analyze a body of historical literature on women and gender in US history while honing their skills in writing and oral presentation.

 

HIST 479: Public History Media
Dr. Christopher Cantwell
Thursdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

An introduction to the field of digital humanities and public media. Through a series of assignments and in-class labs centered around common Digital Humanities tools and platforms, the class will explore current and historical conversations in digital humanities and new media and address theoretical and practical problems involved in digital humanities-based methods and methodology. The final product of each assignment will be a collaborative digital public humanities project.

 

HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin
Mondays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

This course explores the field of public history with special emphasis on the theoretical and methodological challenges faced when preserving or presenting history outside of a formal classroom environment.  Also under consideration will be the professional and ethical responsibilities of the historian both inside and outside of the university setting.  Students will be able to understand the theoretical and methodological issues of importance to the field of public history, reflect upon ethical issues involved in the collection, curation, and presentation of history, and participate in applied projects drawing upon public history methodologies and presentation modes.

 

HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
Instructor TBA
Tuesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

This course will give students a basic understanding of oral history by asking several questions of the discipline, including: What exactly is oral history and what sets it apart from other historical research methodologies?  What are the ethical issues involved in undertaking oral history?  How does one conduct, record, and archive an interview?  What steps are necessary in constructing an oral history project?  What are the merits of the various products that can be derived from oral history in both texts and multimedia?  In addition to reading oral historical texts and theory, students will conduct at least two interviews and participate in an ongoing oral history project. Students will learn how to develop, conduct, and evaluate an oral history interview and prepare oral history interviews for archival disposition.

 

HIST 510: Research Seminar
Dr. Tanya Stabler Miller
Tuesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

Research seminar using primary sources in cultural, social, technological, intellectual, and institutional history.  Topics vary according to the interest of the instructor. Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival material to develop an original article-length research paper.

 

 

Spring 2023 Course List

HIST 410: Gathering Places: Religion and Community in the Modern City
HIST 450: Nineteenth Century America
HIST 464: Transnational Urban History
HIST 481: Management of Historical Resources
HIST 487: Management of History Museums
HIST 558: American Cultural History

Spring 2023 Course Descriptions

HIST 410: Gathering Places:  Religion and Community in the Modern City
Dr. Christopher Cantwell
Tuesdays 6:00-8:30 pm
Mundelein Center, Room 617

How has religion shape the American city? How do cities shape American religions? In this hands-on research seminar, we will explore these questions by contributing to a new digital public history project. Students will learn methods in archival research, oral history, ethnography, and digital humanities, and then put these skills to use by partnering with a local religious community in order to document its history and ongoing activities. Students not only will gain an understanding of the urban dimensions of American religious history, but also will contribute to an emerging piece of digital scholarship.

 

HIST 450: Nineteenth Century America
Dr. Timothy Gilfoyle
Wednesdays 2:45-5:15 pm
Crown Center, Room 528

Modern, industrial America was born in the nineteenth century. The United States experienced its most remarkable changes between the presidencies of Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt. American cities and per capita levels of immigration increased at their greatest rates ever. The most sophisticated form of coercive labor in world history became a dominant institution. A new feminine ideal flourished. The factory was born, and industry replaced agriculture as the nation’s dominant economic force. The public school, the Mormons, the prison, the department store and "Wall Street" were created. The United States completed its final continental boundaries. Political officials left imprints which still define American politics and culture: James Madison, Andrew Jackson, John C. Calhoun, Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. An American literary renaissance produced canonical writers like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, Emily Dickinson, Henry David Thoreau, Edith Wharton, and Walt Whitman. And the century witnessed the most devastating war in U.S. history. This colloquium provides a historiographical introduction to some of the major questions and issues of nineteenth-century America. More broadly, since many contemporary American institutions and social problems originated during these years, this course will enable students to better comprehend the history and culture of their own time.

 

HIST 464: Transnational Urban History
Dr. D. Bradford Hunt
Thursdays 6:00-8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 530

Using transnational and global lenses, this course explores the history of the social, cultural, political, and economic development of urban space and the people that inhabit it.  While cities have a long history (indeed, over many millennia), this course will focus eclectically on the last five centuries and will explore numerous themes:  how ideas about urbanism and reform have spread (or not spread) across the globe; how power is distributed within cities over time; how urbanism has influenced culture; and how we might think specifically about “urban history” as opposed to “the history of what happened in cities.” 

 

HIST 481: Management of Historical Resources
Dr. Theodore Karamanski
Wednesdays 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Crown Center, Room 530

This class is an introduction to historic preservation. The class will review the way public historians work to protect the material culture of the built environment on a local, state, and national level. The class will consist of lectures on aspects of historic preservation, the discussion of weekly readings, and the execution of a preservation project. The project will be to prepare a National Register of Historic Places nomination on a single property or historic district.

 

HIST 487: Management of History Museums
Bethany Fleming
Monday 2:30 pm - 5:00 pm
Information Commons, Room 105

This course introduces graduate students to issues involved in the management of history museums while considering many questions about the role and function of museums in American society. What does it mean to say that museums serve the public? How can museums become more diverse, equitable, accessible, and inclusive institutions? How do museums tell stories and who gets to decide what stories to tell? How and why do museums collect, care for, and display some objects and not others? Why do people visit museums, what do they experience there, and what do those visits mean to them? What does “success” look like and how does one measure it? What financial, administrative, and ethical issues do museums face? How can museums critically address today’s complex political, cultural, and social realities?

 

HIST 558: American Cultural History
Dr. Elliott Gorn
Monday 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Dumbach Hall, Room 124

A research seminar focused on primary sources in American social and cultural history.  The goal by the end of the semester is for each student to write an original article-length research paper.  Students should, from the first week of class and in consultation with the professor, have a paper topic in mind.  During the first few weeks, we will do some common reading, and focus on how historians have defined social and cultural history.  Meanwhile, students will fine-tune their paper topics, identify primary sources, and evaluate the historiographical context of their subject.  The goal is for each student, by the end of the semester, to have written a draft of a high-quality essay, potentially publishable in a respected history journal.

Research seminar using primary sources in American cultural, social, technological, intellectual, and institutional history. Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper.


 

 

Fall 2022 Course List

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
HIST 461: 20th Century US History
HIST 479: Public History Media
HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
HIST 561: Seminar: Women and Gender

 

Fall 2022 Course Descriptions

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Dr. D. Bradford Hunt
Wednesdays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 530

This course examines the history of twentieth- and twenty first-century historical writing, emphasizing the changing interpretive paradigms, the innovative methodologies, and the social values of historians that have shaped the discipline.    

 

HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
Dr. Elizabeth Shermer
Mondays 2:45 pm – 5:15 pm
Dumbach Hall, Room 124

This course explores pedagogical, professional, and ethical issues of importance to historians. We will examine the many identities of historians and the relationship between training in history and career pathways. Students will explore the history of the historical profession, approaches to teaching history, ethical issues in history as well as the diverse pathways available to those with training in history. Each student will complete a pedagogical activity, a career exploration report, and a professionalizing project.   Required of all first year PhD students. Open to all other students as an elective.

 

HIST 461: 20th Century US History
Dr. Michelle Nickerson
Tuesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 142

Reading and discussion seminar, students will read monographs and articles in 20th century U.S. history, including social, cultural, intellectual, and other approaches.  Final assignment will be a long historiographic paper.

 

HIST 479: Public History Media
Dr. Christopher Cantwell
Thursdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Information Commons, Room 215

An introduction to the field of digital humanities and public media. Through a series of assignments and in-class labs centered around common Digital Humanities tools and platforms, the class will explore current and historical conversations in digital humanities and new media and address theoretical and practical problems involved in digital humanities-based methods and methodology. The final product of each assignment will be a collaborative digital public humanities project.

 

HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin
Mondays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Cuneo Hall, Room 318

This course explores the field of public history with special emphasis on the theoretical and methodological challenges faced when preserving or presenting history outside of a formal classroom environment.  Also under consideration will be the professional and ethical responsibilities of the historian both inside and outside of the university setting.  Students will be able to understand the theoretical and methodological issues of importance to the field of public history, reflect upon ethical issues involved in the collection, curation, and presentation of history, and participate in applied projects drawing upon public history methodologies and presentation modes.

 

HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
Dr. Meagan Mc Chesney
Tuesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 210

This course will give students a basic understanding of oral history by asking several questions of the discipline, including: What exactly is oral history and what sets it apart from other historical research methodologies?  What are the ethical issues involved in undertaking oral history?  How does one conduct, record, and archive an interview?  What steps are necessary in constructing an oral history project?  What are the merits of the various products that can be derived from oral history in both texts and multimedia?  In addition to reading oral historical texts and theory, students will conduct at least two interviews and participate in an ongoing oral history project. 

 

HIST 561: Seminar: Women and Gender
Dr. Elizabeth Fraterrigo
Thursdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Dumbach Hall, Room 124

This seminar focuses on the use of gender as a category of analysis in history and is particularly appropriate for those who have taken courses in Women's and Gender History or Women's Studies. Students will produce a research paper; they may choose any topic relevant to issues of gender or women for any time period or society, as long as adequate primary sources are available.

 

 

Spring 2022 Course List

  • HIST 441: Women and Gender in European History
  • HIST 482: Archives and Records Management
  • HIST 487: Management of History Museums
  • HIST 558: American Cultural History
  • HIST 558: American Cultural Hisotry

Spring 2022 Course Descriptions

HIST 441: Women and Gender in European History
Dr. Alice Weinreb
Thursdays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 530

This course provides an introduction to the major themes and scholarship in women’s and gender history. We will examine a variety of debates about and methodological approaches to the historical construction of gender, ranging from histories of the body and sexuality to analyses of culture, politics, and the economy. We will explore how gender identities were produced and contested at specific historical moments and in different locations, with a focus on nineteenth and twentieth century Europe. 

 

HIST 482: Archives and Records Management
Emily Reiher
Wednesdays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Mundelein Center, Room 303

This course introduces basic archival theory and methodology. Particular emphasis will be placed on ethics, best practices, and the relationship of archives to allied fields.

 

HIST 487: Management of History Museums
Dr. Elizabeth Fraterrigo
Tuesdays 2:30 pm - 5:00 pm
Crown Center, Room 142

This course introduces graduate students to issues involved in the management of history museums while considering many questions about the role and function of museums in American society. What does it mean to say that museums serve the public? How can museums become more diverse, equitable, accessible, and inclusive institutions? How do museums tell stories and who gets to decide what stories to tell? How and why do museums collect, care for, and display some objects and not others? Why do people visit museums, what do they experience there, and what do those visits mean to them? What does “success” look like and how does one measure it? What financial, administrative, and ethical issues do museums face? How can museums critically address today’s complex political, cultural, and social realities?

 

HIST 558: American Cultural History
Dr. Elizabeth Tandy Shermer
Mondays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Mundelein Center, Room 617

Research seminar using primary sources in American cultural, social, technological, intellectual and institutional history.  Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper.

 

HIST 558: American Cultural History
Dr. Michelle Nickerson
Tuesdays, 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Dumbach Hall, Room 124

Research seminar using primary sources in American cultural, social, technological, intellectual and institutional history.  Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper.

 

Fall 2021 Course List

  • HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
  • HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
  • HIST 410: Race, Violence, and Memory in US History
  • HIST 450: 19th Century America
  • HIST 479: Public History Media
  • HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
  • HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice

Fall 2021 Course Descriptions

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Dr. Suzanne Kaufmann
Tuesdays 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 528

This course examines the history of twentieth-century historical writing, emphasizing the changing interpretive paradigms, the innovative methodologies, and the social values of historians that have shaped the discipline.

 

HIST 403: Professional Lives of Historians
Dr. D. Bradford Hunt
Wednesdays 2:50 pm - 5:00 pm
Crown Center, Room 528

This course explores pedagogical, professional, and ethical issues of importance to historians. We will examine the many identities of historians and the relationship between training in history and career pathways. Students will explore the history of the historical profession, approaches to teaching history, ethical issues in history as well as the diverse pathways available to those with training in history. Each student will complete a pedagogical activity, a career exploration report, and a professionalizing project.   Required of all first year PhD students. Open to all other students as an elective.

 

HIST 410: Race, Violence, and Memory in US History
Dr. Benjamin Johnson
Tuesdays 3:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 528

A reconsideration of the way ways in which fraught chapters of the U.S. past are remembered is underway, with recent waves of protests resulting in the removal of scores of Confederate statues and memorials.  This class considers the ways in which Americans have remembered and forgotten the violence that has played such important roles in our history.  The readings will thus focus not only on important scholarly works on racial violence, but also on the connections between historical inquiry and contemporary social justice movements.

 

HIST 450: 19th Century America
Dr. Theodore Karamanski
Thursdays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Location: Information Commons, Room 230

Through weekly readings and discussion this course will review the historiography of the most important topics in nineteenth century American history, including market expansion cultural history and social development, settler colonialism and Indigenous resistance, the myths and realities of national expansion, slavery, the Civil War and reconstruction, and the rise of the American gun culture.  Student's performance will be evaluated based on class participation and the completion of a historiographic or research-based essay. This course is essential for graduate comprehensive examination preparation in American history.

 

HIST 479 – Public History Media
Dr. Elizabeth Hopwood
Wednesdays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Location: Information Commons, Room 215

An introduction to the field of digital humanities and public media. Through a series of assignments and in-class labs centered around common Digital Humanities tools and platforms, the class will explore current and historical conversations in digital humanities and new media and address theoretical and practical problems involved in digital humanities-based methods and methodology. The final product of each assignment will be a collaborative digital public humanities project.

 

HIST 480 – Public History: Method and Theory
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin
Mondays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Location: Cuneo Hall, Room 318

This course explores the field of public history with special emphasis on the theoretical and methodological challenges faced when preserving or presenting history outside of a formal classroom environment.  Also under consideration will be the professional and ethical responsibilities of the historian both inside and outside of the university setting.  Students will be able to understand the theoretical and methodological issues of importance to the field of public history, reflect upon ethical issues involved in the collection, curation, and presentation of history, and participate in applied projects drawing upon public history methodologies and presentation modes.

 

HIST 483 – Oral History: Method and Practice
Dr. Meagan McChesney
Thursdays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Location: Dumbach Hall, Room 124

This course will give students a basic understanding of oral history by asking several questions of the discipline, including: What exactly is oral history and what sets it apart from other historical research methodologies?  What are the ethical issues involved in undertaking oral history?  How does one conduct, record, and archive an interview?  What steps are necessary in constructing an oral history project?  What are the merits of the various products that can be derived from oral history in both texts and multimedia?  In addition to reading oral historical texts and theory, students will conduct at least two interviews and participate in an ongoing oral history project. 

 

Spring 2021 Course List

  • HIST 442: Women's and Gender History: USA
  • HIST 460: Urban America
  • HIST 481: Management of Historical Resources
  • HIST 487: Management of History Museums
  • HIST 510: Research Seminar

Spring 2021 Course Descriptions

HIST 442: Women's and Gender History: USA
Dr. Michelle Nickerson
Saturdays 10:00 am - 12:30 pm

This course explores the literature on women and gender in United States history with attention to theoretical issues, historiography, and cultural diversity.  Organized chronologically and topically, the course will introduce graduate students to current methods and major themes in the field.  Starting from the colonial period and ending with the present day, class discussions will focus on the tools of analysis and source materials used by historians.  We will trace the emergence of gender history out of women’s history and talk about how both fields have shaped U.S. historiography overall.  Themes will include: the racialized system of sexual relations and violence that undergirded the Jim Crow system of segregation, the gendered dimensions of the carceral state, and the development of feminist consciousness in the United States.

 

HIST 460: Urban America
Dr. Timothy Gilfoyle
Wednesdays 4:15 pm - 6:45 pm

The "United States was born in the country and has moved to the city." Richard Hofstadter, The Age of Reform (1955), 23. This course examines the evolution of the United States from a rural and small-town society to an urban and suburban nation. Cities, and especially Chicago, have long offered some of the best laboratories for the study of American history, social structure, economic development and cultural change. Certain problems and themes recur throughout the course of American urban and cultural history which will be focal points of this seminar: the interaction of private commerce with cultural change; the rise of distinctive working and middle classes; the segregation of public and private space; the formation of new and distinctive urban subcultures organized by gender, work, race, religion, ethnicity, and sexuality; problems of health and housing resulting from congestion; and blatant social divisions between the rich and poor, the native-born and immigrant, and blacks and whites. This colloquium will thus provide a historiographical introduction to the major questions and issues in the culture and social life of American cities.

 

HIST 481: Management of Historical Resources
Dr. Theodore Karamanski
Thursdays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm

This class is an introduction to historic preservation. The class will review the way public historians work to protect the material culture of the built environment on a local, state, and national level. The class will consist of lectures on aspects of historic preservation, the discussion of weekly readings, and the execution of a preservation project. The project will be to prepare a National Register of Historic Places nomination on a single property or historic district.

 

HIST 487: Management of History Museums
Dr. Elizabeth Fraterrigo
Tuesdays 4:30 pm - 7:00 pm

This course introduces graduate students to issues involved in the management of history museums while considering many questions about the role and function of museums in American society. What does it mean to say that museums serve the public? How can museums become more diverse, equitable, accessible, and inclusive institutions? How do museums tell stories and who gets to decide what stories to tell? How and why do museums collect, care for, and display some objects and not others? Why do people visit museums, what do they experience there, and what do those visits mean to them? What does “success” look like and how does one measure it? What financial, administrative, and ethical issues do museums face? How can museums critically address today’s complex political, cultural, and social realities?

 

HIST 510: Research Seminar
Dr. Alice Weinreb
Mondays 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm

Research seminar using primary sources in cultural, social, technological, intellectual and institutional history.  Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper. 

 

Fall 2020 Course List

  • HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
  • HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
  • HIST 410: Professional Lives
  • HIST 461: 20th Century U.S. History
  • HIST 479: Public History Media
  • HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
  • HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
  • HIST 558: Studies in American Cultural History

Fall 2020 Course Descriptions

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Dr. Edin Hajdarpasic
Wednesday 4:15 pm - 6:45 pm

This course examines the history of twentieth-century historical writing, emphasizing the changing interpretive paradigms, the innovative methodologies, and the social values of historians that have shaped the discipline.

 

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Dr. D. Bradford Hunt
Wednesday 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm

This course examines the history of twentieth-century historical writing, emphasizing the changing interpretive paradigms, the innovative methodologies, and the social values of historians that have shaped the discipline.

 

HIST 410: Professional Lives
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin
Tuesday 3:00 pm - 5:30 pm

This course explores pedagogical, professional, and ethical issues of importance to historians. We will examine the many identities of historians and the relationship between training in history and career pathways. Required of all second year and first year PhD students. Open to all other students as an elective. Each student will complete a professionalizing project.

 

HIST 461: 20th Century U.S. History
Dr. Elliott Gorn
Thursday 4:15 pm - 6:45 pm

Reading and discussion seminar, students will read monographs and articles in 20th century U.S. history, including social, cultural, intellectual, and other approaches.  Final assignment will be a long historiographic paper.

 

HIST 479: Public History Media
Dr. Elizabeth Hopwood
Thursday 7:00 pm - 9:20 pm

An introduction to the field of digital humanities and public media. Through a series of assignments and in-class labs centered around common Digital Humanities tools and platforms, the class will explore current and historical conversations in digital humanities and new media and address theoretical and practical problems involved in digital humanities-based methods and methodology. The final product of each assignment will be a collaborative digital public humanities project.

 

HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
Dr. Particia Mooney-Melvin
Monday 6:00 pm - 8:20 pm

This course explores the field of public history with special emphasis on the theoretical and methodological challenges faced when preserving or presenting history outside of a formal classroom environment.  Also under consideration will be the professional and ethical responsibilities of the historian both inside and outside of the university setting.  Students will be able to understand the theoretical and methodological issues of importance to the field of public history, reflect upon ethical issues involved in the collection, curation, and presentation of history, and participate in applied projects drawing upon public history methodologies and presentation modes.

 

HIST 483: Oral History: Method and Practice
Dr. Meagan McChesney
Tuesday, 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm

This course will give students a basic understanding of oral history by asking several questions of the discipline, including: What exactly is oral history and what sets it apart from other historical research methodologies?  What are the ethical issues involved in undertaking oral history?  How does one conduct, record, and archive an interview?  What steps are necessary in constructing an oral history project?  What are the merits of the various products that can be derived from oral history in both texts and multimedia?  In addition to reading oral historical texts and theory, students will conduct at least two interviews and participate in an ongoing oral history project.

 

HIST 558: Studies in American Cultural History
Dr. Elizabeth Fraterrigo
Tuesday, 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm

Research seminar using primary sources in American cultural, social, technological, intellectual and institutional history.  Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper.

 

Spring 2020 Course List

  • HIST 410: Writing Public History
  • HIST 450: 19th Century America
  • HIST 464: Transnational Urban History
  • HIST 482: Archives and Record Management
  • HIST 558: Studies in American Cultural History

Spring 2020 Course Descriptions

HIST 410: Writing Public History
Tuesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Mundelein Center, Room 515

Dr. Elliott Gorn

One of the most important forms of public history begins with old fashioned words on the page.  Focusing on the U.S., we will explore writing as a form of public history.  What is the relationship between academic history writing and writing for the public?  How do we assess the work of non-academic historians?  Of journalists?  Who gets to be called a historian?  We will read a range of historical narratives.
 

HIST 450: 19th Century America
Wednesdays 2:00 pm - 4:30 pm
Crown Center, Room 528

Dr. Timothy Gilfoyle

Modern, industrial America was born in the nineteenth century.  The United States experienced its most remarkable changes between the presidencies of Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt. American cities and per capita levels of immigration increased at their greatest rates ever. The most sophisticated form of coercive labor in world history became a dominant institution. A new feminine ideal flourished. The factory was born and industry replaced agriculture as the nation’s dominant economic force. The public school, the Mormons, the prison, the department store and "Wall Street" were created. The United States completed its final continental boundaries. Political officials left imprints which still define American politics and culture: James Madison, Andrew Jackson, John C. Calhoun, Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. An American literary renaissance produced canonical writers like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, Emily Dickinson, Henry David Thoreau, Edith Wharton and Walt Whitman. And the century witnessed the most devastating war in U.S. history. This colloquium provides a historiographical introduction to some of the major questions and issues of nineteenth-century America. More broadly, since many contemporary American institutions and social problems originated during these years, this course will enable students to better comprehend the history and culture of their own time.
 

HIST 464: Transnational Urban History
Mondays 4:15 pm – 6:45 pm
Cuneo Hall, Room 212

Dr. Edin Hajdarpasic

This class exposes students to the history of cities across a broad spectrum of time and place.  The level of analysis is both more global and more local than traditional narratives of the nation state.
 

HIST 482: Archives and Record Management
Wednesdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Information Commons, Room 215
(registration requires instructor consent)
Kathy Young

The purpose of this course is to introduce and understand core concepts and methods of the archives profession. Students are introduced to issues and principles in archives and gain insight into the practical application of these principles.
 

HIST 558: Studies in American Cultural History
Thursdays 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Dumbach Hall, Room 124

Dr. Michelle Nickerson

Research seminar using primary sources in American cultural, social, technological, intellectual and institutional history.  Students will learn how to locate and analyze archival materials to develop an original article-length research paper.
 
 

Fall 2019 Course List

  • HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
  • HIST 410:  Professional Lives of Historians
  • HIST 459: Environmental History
  • HIST 461: 20th Century America
  • HIST 479: Public History Media
  • HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
  • HIST 483: Oral History:  Method and Practice

Fall 2019 Course Descriptions

HIST 400: 20th Century Approaches to History
Wednesday 4:15 pm -6:45 pm
(registration requires instructor consent)
Dr. Edin Hajdarpasic

The course focuses on twentieth-century historical writing, emphasizing changing interpretive paradigms and innovative methodologies, and will introduce students to the range of topics and influences that now shape the discipline.

 

HIST 410:  Professional Lives of Historians
Tuesday 3:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin

This course explores pedagogical, professional, and ethical issues of importance to historians. We will examine the many identities of historians and the relationship between training in history and career pathways. Required of all second year and first year PhD students. Open to all other students as an elective. The course begins in the fall and ends in the spring semester. The fifteen weeks of the course will be spread over two semesters. Each student will complete a professionalizing project.
 

HIST 459:  Environmental History
Thursday 4:15 pm - 6:45 pm
Dr. Theodore Karamanski

Environmental history expands the customary framework of historical inquiry, incorporating such actors as animals, diseases, and climate alongside more familiar human institutions and creations. While the majority of the books will address North American environmental history, we will also read selected works exploring the subject from a transnational perspective. This class will be based on weekly discussions of classic and cutting-edge environmental history books. Students will be evaluated on the basis of their participation in discussion and on a research or historiographic essay due at the end of the term.
 

HIST 461: 20th Century America
Tuesday 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Dr. Michelle Nickerson

Reading and discussion seminar, students will read monographs and articles in recent US history, including social, cultural, intellectual, and other approaches.  Final assignment will be a long historiographic paper.
 

HIST 479: Public History Media
Thursday 7:00 pm - 9:30 pm
(registration requires instructor consent)
Dr. Elizabeth Hopwood

An introduction to the use of digital humanities and public media. Through a series of assignments, the class will explore current conversations in digital humanities and new media, and address practical problems involved in digital humanities-based methods and methodology toward the preparation of various media projects, such as exhibits, podcasts, public conferences, video documentaries, web-based media, and community-level outreach projects. For the purposes of this course, the class will constitute itself as a historical consultant company and work as a group. The final product of each assignment will be a full-blown proposal appropriate for each type of media project.
 

HIST 480: Public History: Method and Theory
Monday 6:00 pm - 8:30 pm
(registration requires instructor consent)
Dr. Patricia Mooney-Melvin

This course explores the field of public history with special emphasis on the theoretical and methodological challenges faced when preserving or presenting history outside of a formal classroom environment.  Also under consideration will be the professional and ethical responsibilities of the historian both inside and outside of the university setting.  Students will be able to understand the theoretical and methodological issues of importance to the field of public history, reflect upon ethical issues involved in the collection, curation, and presentation of history, and participate in applied projects drawing upon public history methodologies and presentation modes.
 

HIST 483: Oral History:  Method and Practice
Tuesday 6:00 pm -  8:30 pm
(registration requires instructor consent)
Dr. Meagan McChesney

This course will give students a basic understanding of oral history by asking several questions of the discipline, including: What exactly is oral history and what sets it apart from other historical research methodologies?  What are the ethical issues involved in undertaking oral history?  How does one conduct, record, and archive an interview?  What steps are necessary in constructing an oral history project?  What are the merits of the various products that can be derived from oral history in both texts and multimedia?  In addition to reading oral historical texts and theory, students will conduct at least two interviews and participate in an ongoing oral history project.

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PDFs of Course Descriptions by Semester