1. Classes.
    1. This online enhanced syllabus is updated throughout the semester and I invite you to use it. Any revisions to the syllabus or this schedule will be limited, will be for pedagogical reasons (changes in due dates, readings), and will be announced in class in advance and posted on the web. (Anyone with a documented disability should let me know by the second week of class so that we can make appropriate accommodations.) Ask me for clarifications. I will talk about history virtually anytime.
  2. Quizzes
    1. Quizzes (10%) will be three-to-four brief in-class identifications of terminology. The lowest quiz grade will be dropped. I reserve the right to include a final exam if performance in the quizzes is not satisfactory. The goal is a shared, learned terminology to aid discussion.
  3. Quote Response Essays.
    1. For response essays* (typed double-spaced; 450 words minimum, 600 words maximum) respond to a quote provided by using the readings assigned for that week (guest facilitators will sometimes provide you with a question on which you should focus your answer). Each quote response essay should: (1) discuss and position at least two historians in relation to the quote; (2) express a point of view (that is position yourself) in relation to the quote and the readings assigned, and use at least one piece of evidence to back your position (often this will be a primary source quote, statistic, or piece of evidence referred to within one of the assigned readings); (3) suggest the type of evidence (for example, letters, memoirs, government reports, newspapers, pamphlets, engravings, paintings, furniture, tree rings–you get the idea; the list is lengthy) that might be investigated to substantiate your position further. Bring your response to class for discussion. I will grade all response essays, but no late papers will be counted as your three assigned responses. Again, the aim is a rich, informed discussion.
  4. Historiographical Critical Review.
    1. The long paper (12-18 pp.) will be a critical review of the historiography on one problem or period presented during the semester (or a related field, as approved by me). The course is organized by schools of thought and is very loosely chronological. Your historiographical review essay, however, should be bounded in time and space (the historiography of European–Native American interaction the colonial and antebellum periods, say). Within this historiography you should find a variety of approaches (for example, a Marxist approach, a gendered approach, an Atlantic world approach, a microhistory, etc.). Your historiographical reivew should be modeled on those in Historical Journal (available in Booth, JSTOR, etc.), although those in HJ focus on recent books and yours probably will analyze articles and books over the past fifty years or more. You will be advised in preparing a bibliography for this paper both by myself and another professor in the department with the relevant specialty (as well as your own searches in Historical Abstracts, America History and Life, RHS online Bibliography of British and Irish History, Booth stacks, etc.). Essays, which will be graded by me, should be typed, double-spaced, and use Chicago Manual of Style/Turabian form of referencing (see online citation guide).
  5. Participation.
    1. Grading is based on participation (30%), three quote response essays* (30%), quizzes (10%), and a historiographical review essay (30%). Reading is extensive and intensive. Take notes. I expect your informed contribution to discussion each week. From week 3 forward, at least two of you per week will be assigned an extra article (and/or excerpt from a historian) upon which you will make a 5-minute presentation (either chosen or assigned). One weeks in which you have such a presentation (or have written a response essay), I expect participation corresponding with your “expert status.” But I expect participation from everyone every week. Such participation, your presentations, and any in-class writing asked for will comprise nearly one-third of your final grade.

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      last modified on August 27, 2009