- HIST 358G-201 The Jews of Modern Europe: History and Culture
Instructor: Lisa D Silverman (silverld@uwm.edu)
Meets: No Meeting Pattern
This course examines the experiences of the Jews in Europe from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present from the perspective of cultural history via lectures, films, and readings from primary and secondary sources. Central themes of the course include challenges to traditional religious and social structures by communities and individuals, as well as the varied responses by Jews and others to these challenges. Assignments for graduate students include quizzes, discussion group posts, and a substantial research paper on a related topic of your choice. No prior background in Jewish history or religion is expected. - HIST 372G-001 Topics in Global History: Water and Environment in the Nuclear Age
Instructor: Nan Kim (ynkp@uwm.edu)
Meets: TR 2:30pm-3:45pm
As AI continues to drive the ongoing expansion of power demand by data centers, proponents of nuclear energy hail it as an answer to the dilemma of addressing increased energy needs alongside the imperative to curb greenhouse-gas emissions. Critics of nuclear energy, however, raise ongoing concerns about proliferation risks, the lack of scalable solutions for radioactive waste disposal, the opportunity cost of diverting resources from renewables, the social and environmental impact of uranium mining, and the vulnerability of reactors to military conflicts and natural disasters. A key issue is that almost all currently operating nuclear plants rely heavily on water for cooling to function properly. The necessary proximity of nuclear reactors to water sources affects coastal and river ecosystems, while exposing nuclear energy facilities to tsunami, storm surge, and other extreme-weather phenomena that are recurring with greater frequency and intensity. Also, despite histories of radioactive waste dumping at sea, the 21st century has brought renewed awareness of the crucial role of the ocean in supporting human society - including its capacity as an essential carbon-sink as well as the basis of the marine food chain and global water cycle. In the age of the Anthropocene, how have the risks, possibilities, and consequences of nuclear technology since 1945 transformed the human relationship with water as a natural resource necessary to sustain life? This course builds upon classic publications and recent research to critically evaluate this complex issue and related debates regarding energy transition, while exploring the nexus between nuclear history, environmental history, and STS (science and technology studies). - HIST 404G-002 Topics in American History: Food as a Historical Artifact
Instructor: Arijit H Sen (sena@uwm.edu)
Meets: W 1pm-3:40pm
Historians have always faced challenges in writing histories of people whose voices are unrecorded, individuals who left few written records, and communities whose stories have been erased or ignored in the archives. This course examines foodways as an archive from which we can begin to construct new histories. Foodways is a term that refers to the cultural, social, and economic practices related to the production and consumption of food. It encompasses the study of what people eat, why they eat it, and often involves the intersection of food with culture, traditions, and history. Food speaks to us in profound ways; it evokes memories, reflects human relationships, conveys histories, upholds cultural traditions, and symbolizes life itself. Food results from dedicated labor—someone grows it, distributes it, and prepares it. It communicates not only nourishment and love but can also signify hunger and disease. Access to food, or the lack thereof, can reveal much about politics, power dynamics, food justice, and food deserts. Throughout the semester, we will explore and experiment with ways to study foodways as a means to construct narratives of the past and heritage of people whose experiences and contributions are not fully documented in mainstream historical accounts. While much of the course readings will focus on African American foodways, our goal is to learn from this experience and deliberate on what historical counter-methods could look like. By examining foodways, we hope to deepen our understanding of our collective culture and traditions and envision new narratives of our past. - HIST 409G-201 Causes of the Civil War, 1828-1861
Instructor: Lex Renda (renlex@uwm.edu)
Meets: No Meeting Pattern
All historians see the conflict over racial slavery as the fundamental cause of the Civil War. They often disagree with each other, however, over why and how slavery caused such divisions in American society, and they also distinguish the causes of the conflict over slavery from the reasons why that conflict resulted in a civil war, for it is not always the case that a conflict produces a war. Disagreements existed over slavery long before 1861 (when the Civil War started), and the federal union of states surviving for as long as it did with as divisive an issue as slavery is in some ways a more remarkable fact than the eventual breakdown of that union in 1861. And so, the questions we ask as historians are 1) in what ways did the institution of slavery divide Americans and how and why did the sources of those divisions change over time?, and 2) why was the political system able to confine such divisions to peaceful channels for so many years, and yet fail to confine it to such channels in the final analysis? This course, taught online, will provide you with different points of view on the answers to these questions, and in the process, enable you to come to your own conclusions. - HIST 463G-001 History of the American City
Instructor: Amanda I Seligman (seligman@uwm.edu)
Meets: TR 10am-11:15am - HIST 800-001 Colloquium on U.S. History: Property Ownership and Capitalism in U.S. History
Instructor: Marcus A Allen (allen393@uwm.edu)
Meets: M 7pm-9:40pm
This course is an examination of housing discrimination and capitalism in American history. Some questions that that will we explore include: What are the origins of redlining? How did suburbanization actually work? What social structures, political agencies, governmental legislation, and personal ideologies were important in the creation of the urban environment in the 20th century? - HIST 841-001 Colloquium on Modern Studies: Science, Historical Futures, & Digital Publics
Instructor: Nan Kim (ynkp@uwm.edu)
Meets: W 4pm-6:40pm
Futures have histories. Whether they be predictions of technological utopias or dystopias, worldviews that challenge human-centered perspectives, or urgent calls for social and political transformations for the sake of climate action - such ideas about futurity emerge from their respective conjunctures of historical circumstances. In an age of ecological crisis and technoscientific transformation, they also challenge traditional ways of thinking about time, agency, and what it means to be human. This seminar explores a series of key moments in Science and Technology Studies as a study of intellectual history with public-facing implications. We will pay special attention to the “posthuman turn” since the late 20th century while exploring public controversies over science and technology, as well as recent transformations that have taken place among museums of science and natural history. The course considers how contested visions of what is to come - mediated through public debates, museum exhibitions, and digital platforms – bear further implications via broader movements and activist work inspired by or responding to the deployments of scientific knowledge. How does historical thinking change when we consider non-human actors and non-human timescales? How might attention to objects and materiality help to ground our understanding of contested futures? How can the consideration of different knowledge systems – including perspectives from indigenous studies, critical media studies, and environmental history – enrich our approaches to understanding the relationship between past, present, and future? NB: This class may be taken in lieu of DAC 700 to fulfill the Core Seminar in Digital Cultures requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Digital Cultures (GCDC). Students interested in the seminar and/or the GCDC are asked to contact the instructor: - HIST 940-002 Seminar on Global History: African Roots of American Cultures
Instructor: Rebecca Shumway (shumwayr@uwm.edu)
Meets: T 4pm-6:40pm
In this writing seminar, students will learn about and research the history of the transatlantic slave trade, which brought millions of African people to the Americas between the fifteenth and nineteenth centuries. Our focus will be on the cultures of western Africa and the ways in which those cultures were carried to, and recreated in, the societies of North and South America and the Caribbean. During the first several weeks of the course we will engage with the scholarly literature on this subject, while students develop their own plan for a research paper. The ultimate aim of the class is to design, research, and write a piece of scholarly work that addresses students' own interests in this field. Assignments will include reading reflection papers, source analysis papers, revision exercises, and peer workshops.