HIST 617: Topics in the American Civil War Era

HIST 617-001: Civil War and Reconstruction
(Fall 2023)

07:20 PM to 10:00 PM M

East Building 134

Section Information for Fall 2023

The American experiment in self-government was scarcely eighty years old when the Civil War threatened to tear the country permanently in two. The massive cataclysm lasted four years, cost 750,000 lives, and freed some four million enslaved Blacks. It redefined the very political, social, and economic fabric of the country in ways that still reverberate today. It also sparked a remarkable deluge of historical scholarship. Discussion of the war—its causes, its course, and its meaning—remain central to the ongoing conversation about American history, both inside the academy and in the wider world. This seminar provides an introduction to the vast historiography of the American Civil War: its roots in the eighteenth century; the centrality of race, white supremacy, and chattel slavery; the political attempts to resolve tensions in the first half of the nineteenth century; the military, social, and cultural results of southern secession; and the long and contentious memory of the war.

 

 

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Course Information from the University Catalog

Credits: 3

Joint project of instructor and students into various aspects of common topic in Civil War era, with emphasis on historiography and historical method. May not be repeated for credit.
Specialized Designation: Topic Varies
Registration Restrictions:

Enrollment limited to students with a class of Advanced to Candidacy, Graduate, Junior Plus, Non-Degree or Senior Plus.

Enrollment is limited to Graduate, Non-Degree or Undergraduate level students.

Students in a Non-Degree Undergraduate degree may not enroll.

Schedule Type: Lecture
Grading:
This course is graded on the Graduate Regular scale.

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