HIST 391

Note: The course number 391 is used by multiple courses. Please scroll down to the appropriate description.

Travel and Politics in Eastern Europe

Chad Bryant

The theme uniting this course is travel and the movement of peoples to, from, and within Eastern Europe from the eighteenth century to the present. Our first set of questions asks what the study of travel and mobility can teach us about Eastern Europe. How have “Western” travellers helped to create and maintain enduring characteristics of the region? How did increased mobility from 1848 to 1948 transform the Eastern Europe’s economies, societies, and cultures? Our second set of questions deals more generally with the experience of travel. Why do people travel? Is it to learn about other cultures, to meet new people, to exchange ideas? Or is it to confirm beliefs already held, to learn more about ourselves, or our own cultures? Has travel, and tourism, promoted understanding among cultures or accentuated their respective differences? What might perceptive tourists, emigrés, and exiles tell us about Eastern Europe, Europe, or perhaps our own culture, at various moments in history?

Our common readings will include a mix of primary and secondary sources, which we will read and discuss during the first half the semester. In the first few weeks short lectures will provide background information on the region’s history and the readings. Your main task, however, will be to write a 20- to 25-page research paper, based on primary resources, that sets out to address a question of your own design. As the course progresses, we will discuss strategies for creating a research question, researching your topic, constructing an argument, and finally organizing and writing the paper.

Medieval Europe & the Crusading Experience

Brett Whalen

This Undergraduate Seminar in History will introduce students to the crusades in their medieval context from the First Crusade (1095) until the Second Council of Lyon (1274). The crusading movement will be considered as part of the broader phenomenon of European expansion. Among other topics, the course will explore Western Christian attitudes toward crusading as an act of violence, piety and penance, along with the institutional developments that made crusading possible. It will also examine the reaction of Eastern Christians, Jews and Muslims to the crusading movement. The course will also introduce students to the basic methods and skills employed by historians. Working in collaboration with the instructor and their peers, students will produce a work of original scholarship on a topic of their own choosing. The final research paper will be based on the students' own reading of primary sources, but should also incorporate some of the leading scholarship in the field of crusade studies.