Fall 2020 Graduate Course Offerings

Aside from the courses listed in more detail below, these U/G courses are offered as electives (please contact prof before registering):

  • HIST 346, Poland and Its Neighbors, 1914-1945, Prof Pease (pease@uwm.edu)
  • HIST 372, Topics in Global History: History of Democratic Socialism,
  • Prof Mueller (bsm@uwm.edu)
  • HIST 386, Africans in World History: Communities, Cultures, and Ideas, Prof Shumway (shumwayr@uwm.edu)
  • HIST 409, Causes of the Civil War, 1828-1861, online, Prof Renda (renlex@uwm.edu): Syllabus
  • HIST 450, Growth of Metropolitan Milwaukee, Prof Seligman (seligman@uwm.edu)
  • HIST 453, History of Religion in American Life Since 1870, Prof Cantwell (cantwelc@uwm.edu)
  • HIST 595, The Quantitative Analysis of Historical Data, Prof Renda (renlex@uwm.edu): Syllabus

 

Aside from the courses listed in more detail below, these courses fulfill certain requirements for the MA and PhD degrees in History:

 

800 and 900-level Topics Courses

Hist 840  Colloquium in Global History: The House in History
Prof. Martha Carlin (carlin@uwm.edu)
Tuesday, 4-6:40pm (HLT 341)
Syllabus

What is a house? How is a house different from a home? Houses are not only physical structures, they can also be centers and symbols of social and civic identity, economic activity, family and clan, rank and status, gendered space, sacred space, tradition and innovation, inclusion and exclusion. Houses both shape and reflect the lives of their occupants, embodying past and present; necessities and choices; hopes, expectations, and compromises. What can houses tell us about their broader societies? This course will investigate the global history of the house from earliest times to the present.

 

History 850 Colloquium on European History: Jews and Gentiles in Polish and East European History
Prof. Neal Pease (pease@uwm.edu)
Online:  W 7:00-9:40 pm
Syllabus

The great majority of the world’s Jews can trace their ancestral origins to eastern and central Europe. This colloquium will examine the history of Jews in the lands historically associated with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth—roughly, contemporary Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine—that were the heart of Jewish life and civilization for many centuries until the catastrophe of the Second World War. It is commonly, and truly, said that one cannot understand the Jews without Poland, and you cannot understand Poland without the Jews. Special attention will be given to the complex and fateful interrelationship of Jews with non-Jews in the region. Students will consider and discuss a series of selected case studies, from the beginnings of Jewish settlement in east Europe in the medieval era, to the Holocaust and after; and research, write, and turn in a semester paper on a topic of their choice.  Use of sources in foreign languages is not required, but is encouraged.

 

HIST 900 (Seminar in US History): Mixed Race in the US
Prof. Greg Carter (cartergt@uwm.edu)
Online:  Monday, 4-6:40pm
Syllabus

Mixed race is one tool for understanding how reconfigurations of race go hand in hand with the creation and dissolution of racial terms. I follow Michael Omi and Howard Winant in defining race as “a concept which signifies and symbolizes social conflicts and interests by referring to different types of human bodies.” This definition resists pinpointing what those signifiers and symbols are, but it does acknowledge that real people are the objects of signification. Their assertion that race is “a social construction which alters over the course of time due to historical and social pressures” expresses how the meanings of race change, depending on the time and place, and these endless possibilities affirm the vagary about exactly what race is.

Because it is often at the fluctuating intersection of race, gender, and class, mixed race is the starting point for this Seminar on United States History. The required readings address racial mixture in different ways, demonstrating the interplay of analytic lenses that this theme accompanies. However, the readings serve the ultimate aim of the class: to design, research, and write a significant piece of scholarly work of your own choosing. Through reading reflection papers, source analysis papers, revision exercises, and peer workshops, this class will help you prepare a 15-20 page manuscript ready for submission to peer review publications.

 

History/Urban Studies 971: Seminar on the History of American Urban Problems
Prof. Amanda I. Seligman (seligman@uwm.edu)
Class Meets:  Thursdays, 4-6:40pm (AUP 170)

The purpose of this class is to teach graduate students how to understand historical research about American cities by doing it themselves. Students achieve this goal through extensive archival research and writing a 5000-word research paper in several discrete, scaffolded stages. By reading and discussing several examples of historical scholarship, students will prepare to write research papers and present their findings to others in the class. Urban Studies students enrolled in this course should plan to present their papers at the USP Student Forum in the spring of 2021.

Assignments:
A total of nine written and orally-presented research-based assignments are due throughout the semester. They include assignments that build toward the final project and that present the analysis for different audiences. Because the course is so research intensive, the reading assignments are shorter than in other graduate seminars. Assigned readings included articles posted to the course Canvas page and books by historians. They include:

  • Kahrl, Andrew W. Free the Beaches (Required)
  • Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta, Race for Profit (Required)
  • Hernández, Kelly Lytle, City of Inmates (Required)
  • Brundage, Anthony, Going to the Sources (Recommended)

A syllabus from previous iterations of the course is available for the asking. Please email Amanda Seligman if you would like to see it.