This course is an introduction to European history from around 1500 to the present. The central questions that it addresses are how and why Europe—a small, relatively poor, and politically fragmented place—became the motor of globalization and a world civilization in its own right. Put differently, how did "western" become an adjective that, for better and often for worse, stands in place of "modern".

This introductory course is a lower-division survey of European history from the Renaissance to the present (1500-1800). The central theme of the course will be the varied and intersecting attempts of European peoples to invent and transform the parameters of individual and collective identity from the beginning of the modern period to its postmodern aftermath. Using a wide range of sources—from learned treatises in political theory, religion and philosophy to documents of peasant revolt, war poetry, novels, and private memoirs—we will study the landmark events in the social, political, and intellectual histories of Europe: global expansion, the Renaissance and Reformations, the emergence of nation states, the Enlightenment, slavery, the European revolutions, industrialization, socialism, feminism, imperialism, the World Wars and the reconfiguration of Europe at end of the twentieth century. There are no prerequisites for this course.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills