Topics in History (492-0-20)
Topic
African American History to 1865
Instructors
Leslie Maria Harris
847/491-3153
Harris Hall - Room 340
Meeting Info
Kresge Centennial Hall 4-410: Mon 2:00PM - 4:50PM
Overview of class
African American History is currently centered in several conversations about its production and meaning. This fall course returns to the work of academic historians who have and continue to transform what we know about the history of African Americans and the United States. Open to historians and non-historians, this course will center works that use historical methods to uncover US histories of enslaved and free people of African descent and their experiences and shaping of institutions such as slavery, freedom, the US legal system, structures and ideologies of gender and sexuality, political activism against slavery and for the development of racial equality; and others, between the Revolutionary Era (inclusive of the "American" Revolution but also the revolutions in human equality in the Atlantic World); and the American Civil War.
Students will be expected to read the works to apprehend several levels of knowledge.
A) Historical facts and ideas. What are the important people, places and historical contexts explored by the works under discussion? How do we understand and apprehend specific historical contexts in the past, and how they differ from the present?
B) Discussions and Debates among Historians about historical contexts and ideas. Where have historians agreed and disagreed about interpretations of historical events, people and places? How do the works we're reading argue for a specific view of history that differs from what has gone before, or lead us to ask new questions?
C) Sources, Research, and Argumentation. How do academic historians conduct research and writing? What are the parameters of academic historical research and writing generally, and specifically in terms of African American history?
Learning Objectives
Graduate level understanding of African American history and historiography.
Evaluation Method
Review essays; regular class participation; presentation(s).