MODERN BRITISH HISTORY, 1688-PRESENT (BRITISH HISTORY
II)
HIS 236-01, Fall 2006
MWF 1:15-2:05, ARH 318
Elizabeth Prevost
Mears 210, x4958
Office hours: M
By many
accounts,
Course Requirements
Contribution
to class discussions
Class
time provides our main opportunity to investigate the complexities of African
history in dialogue with one another.
Therefore, I really do evaluate class participation; if you do not
participate regularly, you will receive a lower grade. For each discussion session, you may earn
three potential points: one for being there, two for voicing an opinion, and
three for engaging meaningfully in the discussion in a way that draws upon the reading. Panel and workshop preparation (see below)
will also be factored into this grade.
You should use the prompts noted on the syllabus to direct your reading
and prepare for discussion. Please
contact me if a medical or pe
Panel
Presentations
Each
of you will be responsible for helping to lead the class in a discussion of a
historical problem. Panels will consist
of two or three participants, each of whom should present for no more than five
minutes. Topics are noted below and on a
separate handout. I strongly encourage
you to meet with me as a group before your presentation. On panel days, those of you who are not
doing a presentation should write a brief paragraph that addresses the question
and bring it to class.
Three
short papers, due 9/16, 10/6, 11/3
These
essays will require you to engage critically with a specific historical issue
or problem by analyzing a set of primary documents and secondary
scholarship. I will post the topics on
Pioneer Web about two weeks before each deadline. You need not be confined to these prompts,
however, so just talk to me ahead of time if you would like to explore an
alternative paper topic.
Final
(take-home) exam, due Dec 14
The
exam will be in essay format and, like the papers, and will require you to draw
upon both primary and secondary source material to construct an argument. However, the topic for this essay will be
more synthetic and will encompass a larger chronological span and
thematic/geographical scope. I will
distribute the essay questions one week before the deadline. The final exam will be cumulative.
Late
assignments:
Late papers will receive a deduction of 1/3 of a letter grade per day. Exceptions may be made for legitimate medical
or pe
Disabilities: If you have specific physical, psychiatric or
learning disabilities and require accommodations, please let me know early in
the semester so that your learning needs may be appropriately met. You will need to provide documentation of your
disability to the Associate Dean and Director of Academic Advising, Joyce
Stern, whose office is located in the lower level of the Forum (x3702).
Grading: Evaluation will be determined according to the following
distribution, taking into account consistent improvement throughout the
semester:
Short critical papers 45%
Final exam 25%
Class participation and panel
presentation: 30%
Course
The following required texts
are available for purchase at the bookstore or on reserve at Burling Library. Certain texts are also available online, as
noted. Additional readings will be
available through handouts, E-reserve, or other electronic links (as indicated
below).
Walter L. Arnstein, ed., The Past Speaks: Sources and Problems in British History, Vol. 2: Since
1688 (D. C. Heath)
T. W. Heyck, The Peoples of the
Vol. 3:
1870-Present
Linda Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation 1707-1837
(Yale)
George Orwell, The Road
to
Full
text also available online:
http://www.george-orwell.org/The_Road_to_Wigan_Pier/index.html
Alan Sillitoe, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
(Penguin)
SCHEDULE OF
CLASS MEETINGS AND ASSIGNMENTS
I. Imagining “
Fri, Aug 25:
Introduction
Mon, Aug 28:
1688 and all that
Heyck, Peoples
of the
Arnstein, The
Past Speaks,
Wed, Aug 30:
The Act of
Colley, Britons:
Forging the Nation,
William III, Address
to Parliament on the French Question (1701) http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/D/1701-1725/england/french.htm
Fri, Sept 1:
Empire of Commerce
Arnstein, pp. 62-74
Mon, Sept 4: Radicalism on the periphery
PANEL:
Were the American and Irish revolutions a rejection or ultimate expression of
Britishness? Did observers in
Wed, Sept 6: Radicalism in the metropole
Arnstein, pp. 55-62;
PANEL: To what extent did radical ideology threaten to
undermine the ruling order in
Fri, Sept 8: Reinventing the ruling order
The Madness
of King George (film) – screening TBA
Mon, Sept 11:
Evangelicalism and anti-slavery
Arnstein pp. 87-90
Colley, pp. 350-60
William Roscoe, A general view of the African
slave-trade, demonstrating its injustice and impolicy: with hints towards a
bill for its abolition (
Selections from Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano:
Dedication:
http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/equiano1/equiano1.html
Chap. 10: http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/equiano2/equiano2.html
PANEL: Did the principles and practices of evangelical Christianity constitute an ideology of liberation or social control?
Wed, Sept 13: Gender and popular patriotism
Fri, Sept 15:
What’s in a nation?
J. C. D. Clark, “
Jeremy Black, “Confessional state or elect
nation? Religion and identity in
eighteenth-century
HISTORIOGRAPHY WORKSHOP (see separate handout for instructions)
II. The Transformation of Production and
Social Relations
Mon, Sept. 18: The varieties of liberalism
Paper due
Wed, Sept. 20: “Pre-industrial” society and economy
Fri, Sept 22: Industrialization and its observers
Observations
on the Loss of Woollen Spinning
(1794) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1794woolens.html
William Wordsworth, “The Excursion” (1814) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1814wordsworth.html
Mon, Sept 25:
The Birth of Class?
Selections from Marx/Engels, E. P. Thompson, Harold Perkin,
Dror Wahrman
HISTORIOGRAPHY
WORKSHOP (see separate handout for readings
and instructions)
Wed, Sept. 27: Women in the
Middle and Working Classes
Arnstein, pp. 169-185
Susan Kingsley Kent, “The Sex,” from Sex and Suffrage in
Ann Taylor Gilbert, “Remonstrance” and “My Mother”;
James Luckock, “My Husband,” in Leonore Davidoff and Catherine Hall, Family Fortunes: Men and Women of the
English Middle Class, 1780-1850 (Chicago: 1987),455-461 – handout
“Women miners in the English Coal Pits” (1842) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1842womenminers.html
PANEL: Was
the ideology of separate spheres a product of the industrial revolution?
Fri, Sept 29: No class
III. Politics and Empire in the “Age of Improvement”
Mon, Oct. 2:
Class Politics
Colley, pp. 334-50
The Peterloo
Massacre (1819) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1819peterloo.html
Samuel Bamford, “On the Peterloo Massacre, 1819,” from
Passages in the Life of a Radical
(1893) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1819bamford.html
The People’s
Petition (1838) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1838chartism.html
Caroline Norton, Letters
to the Mob (1848) http://www.indiana.edu/~letrs/vwwp/norton/mob.html#Text
PANEL: Why was there no revolution in
Wed, Oct 4: The Irish Question
Colley, pp. 324-34
Daniel O’Connell, Justice
for
Fri, Oct 6: The Problem of Poverty
Paper due
Mon, Oct 9: A
Liberal Empire?
Catherine Hall, “British Cultural Identities and the
Legacy of Empire,” in David Morley and Kevin Robins, British Cultural Studies (
Selections from
Sir William Bentinck, On Ritual Murder in
John Stuart Mill, On
Colonies and Colonization (1848) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1849jsmill-colonies.html
Elisa Greathed, An
Account of the Opening of the Indian Mutiny at Meerut (1857) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1857greathed.html
PANEL: Was
Wed, Oct 11:
Crisis of faith?
PANEL: To what extent did Victorian public life continue to
be shaped by a Christian worldview?
Fri, Oct 13:
The contested path of “progress”
Heyck (Vol. 3), pp.61-70
HISTORICAL ROLEPLAY: How desirable is democracy?
(see separate handout for instructions)
FALL BREAK
IV. Struggles for Reform and Emancipation
Mon, Oct 23:
Late-Victorian society, economy, and culture
Heyck (Vol. 3),
Wed, Oct 25:
Irish Nationalism and the Home Rule Controversy
Fri, Oct. 27:
The Rise of Labour
Heyck, pp.72-5
Ross McKibbon, “Why was there no Marxism in
Mon, Oct 30:
Socialism, the New Liberalism, and the roots of the welfare state
Heyck, pp.75-82
William Morris, Why
I am a Socialist (1884) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1884morris.html
Sidney Webb, The
Historic Basis of Socialism (1889) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1889webb.html
John Stuart Mill, Liberalism
Evaluated (1876) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1873jsmill.html
Joseph Chamberlain, The Radical Program (1885) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1885chamberlain.html
Earl of Rosebery, The
State of Liberalism (1909) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1908rosebery-liberalism.html
L. T. Hobhouse, Liberalism
(1911) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1911hobhouse.html
W. L. Blease, The
New Liberalism (1913) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1913blease.html
PANEL: Did
Wed, Nov. 1:
Feminism and the Suffrage Movement
Arnstein, pp. 185-90
Anonymous, Reply
to John Stuart Mill on the Subjection of Women (Philadelphia: Lippincott,
1870) pp. 21-45 – E-reserve
Helen Taylor, The
Claim of Englishwomen to the Suffrage Constitutionally Considered (1867) http://www.indiana.edu/~letrs/vwwp/taylor/suffrage.html
Barbara Leigh
Emmeline Pankhurst, “Militant Suffragism” (1913) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1913pankhurst.html
Emmeline Pankhurst, My Own Story (1914)
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1914Pankhurst.html
Fri, Nov. 3:
The Edwardian “false dawn”
Paper due
V. Imperialism, Nationalism, and War
Mon, Nov. 6:
The New Imperialism and the Boer War
John G. Paton, Urging
the Annexation of the South Sea Islands
(1883) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1883hebrides.html
W. S. Blunt, Britain’s
Imperial Destiny (1896-9) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1899blunt.html
J. A. Hobson, Imperialism:
A Study (1902) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1902hobson.html
Joseph Conrad, from Heart of Darkness (1902) http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/conrad.html
Edward Morel, from The
Black Man’s Burden (1903) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1903blackburden.html
PANEL: To what extent did the “new imperialism” depart from
the “reluctant imperialism” of
Wed, Nov. 8: The Great War
Fri, Nov. 10:
Civil War in
Proclamation
of 1916 http://www.ucc.ie/ucc/depts/history/multitext/1916/poblacht.html
Accounts of
Easter Rising Witnesses and Participants
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/easterrising/witnesses/index.shtml
Mon, Nov. 13:
The Great Depression and the “Hungry Thirties”
Orwell, Road to
Wed, Nov. 15:
The European Civil War
Orwell, Part II (ch. 8-13)
and preface
Fri, Nov. 17:
Diplomacy and Appeasement
PANEL: Did appeasement invite or delay the war? Is Chamberlain rightly held responsible for
failing to keep Hitler at bay?
Mon, Nov. 20:
WWII
BBC War Broadcasts (posted on
Pioneer Web)
THANKSGIVING
BREAK
VI. Postwar Society and the Realignment of World Power
Mon, Nov. 27:
The Affluent Society
Sillitoe, Saturday
Night and Sunday Morning
Wed, Nov 29:
The Rise and Fall of Consensus
Arnstein, Ch.18
Fri, Dec. 1:
From Empire to Commonwealth and European Community
Hanif Kureishi, “The Rainbow Sign,” in My Beautiful Laundrette and The Rainbow Sign
(London: Faber and Faber, 1986) – E-reserve
PANEL: How did Britons accommodate the traditional markers
of national identity to the cultural and geopolitical changes of the postwar
period?
Mon, Dec. 4:
Film: Bloody
Sunday (screening TBA)
Wed, Dec. 6:
Thatcherism
Fri, Dec. 8:
Conclusion
Heyck, Ch. 15
Linda Colley, “Britishness in the 21st
Century,” Downing Street Millennium
Lectures (1999) http://www.number10.gov.uk/output/Page3049.asp
Final exam
distributed
Thurs, Dec. 14:
*Final exam
due by
NOTE: Absolutely NO final exams will be accepted after