This seminar is an introduction to some dimension of the history of a nation, region, people, culture, institution, or historical phenomenon selected by the respective instructor. Students will come to understand, and develop an appreciation for: the origins and evolution of the people, cultures, and/or political, economic, and/or social institutions of a particular region(s) of the world. They may explore how human encounters shaped individual and collective identities and the political, economic, and social orders of the region/nation/communities under study. Instructors prioritize critical reading, engaged participation, and focused writing assignments.

The economist John M. Keynes expected that by the year 2030 we would work 15 hours a week. Far from that, many workers in the US put in more than 40 hours a week and work time reduction hasn’t been on the agenda for decades. This seminar looks at the history of work time and its complement, free time. We will explore how the industrial revolution has changed the nature of work and work time and how subsequent struggles have led to the establishment of a 10-hour and 8-hour workday in the second half of the 19th and early 20th century. We will also see how the US came close to the introduction of a 30-hour week during the Great Depression and how repeated work time reductions increased free time in the postwar decades in Europe. However, some of the free time was actually used for (unpaid) domestic work, mainly carried out by women. With the arrival of neoliberalism in the 1980s, work time reductions came to a halt in most countries and in the US work hours even started to increase. Finally, we will also have a look at possible futures of work and leisure in the 21st century.

Repeat Rules

Requirements class fulfills