Department Policy on In-Person Attendance
All Spring 2024 History courses will be taught in-person. By signing up for an class,  you have agreed to attend and participate in the class in-person. You should not expect to be able to attend class remotely or to access class recordings. Exceptions to this policy may be granted at the instructor’s discretion. If you are unwilling or unable to commit to attending and participating in person over the duration of the semester, you should seek alternative options for all-remote or online courses. (For assistance with finding alternative classes, please contact your advisor and/or the History Advisor, Hayes Moore, hayes.moore@colorado.edu.)

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Expanded course descriptions

HIST 1113-001: Introduction to British History, to 1660 – Paul Hammer

Topics include: the British Isles in the "Dark Ages"; Anglo-Saxons and Vikings; the Norman Conquest; medieval kingship; the Black Death; the Wars of the Roses; Henry VIII and his six wives; why Elizabeth I became the Virgin Queen; the Tudors and Ireland; Mary Queen of Scots; the Stuart monarchs and "Britain"; parliament, constitutional crisis and the civil wars of the 1640s; the abolition of the monarchy and the British republic; and the Restoration of 1660. 

HIST 1438-001: Introduction to Korean History – Sungyun Lim

This course surveys the history of Korea from the ancient period to the early twenty-first century. Topics will include transnational political and cultural origins of Korea, transformation of gender relations, and effects of wars and colonial experience. Special attention given to the transnational character of historical developments in Korea, as well as historical debates involving neighboring countries in East Asia.

HIST 1528-001: Introduction to South Asian History since 1757 – Sanjay Gautam

This course introduces the history of modern South Asia from 1757 to the present. Examines themes such as the nature of British colonial state formation in South Asia, social transformation under British rule, modes of anticolonial resistance movements, particularly Mahatma Gandhi's nonviolent civil disobedience movement, Muslim nationalism and the formation of Pakistan, and current political conflicts involving India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.

HIST 1800-001: Introduction to Global History/ Maritime Asia, 1500-1800 – Sanjay Gautam

This course focuses on maritime Asia, particularly the Indian Ocean, between 1500 and 1800. The course starts with the discovery of the sea route from Europe to Asia leading to the arrival of the Portuguese sailor, Vasco da Gama, in India in 1498 that changed the course of world history. It then moves to investigate the long struggle between Portugal, England/ Britain, France, and the Netherlands for maritime supremacy in the Indian Ocean and Asia. The course ends with an exploration into the East India Company’s colonization of India in the 18th century and how it laid the foundations for the British and European domination of the South and East China Seas. 

HIST 1830-001: Global History of Holocaust and Genocide – Thomas Pegelow Kaplan

This course will examine the interplay of history, religion, politics, culture, and psychology to try to understand why the great philosopher Isaiah Berlin called the 20th century, "the most terrible century in Western History." Our focus will be on the Holocaust as the event that defined the concept of genocide, but we will locate this event that come to define the 20th century within concepts such as racism, imperialism, violence, and the dehumanization of individuals in the modern world. Topics covered include Native American and Indigenous genocide; HIV/AIDS; sexual violence; and the question of "just war."

HIST 2015-001: Themes in Early American History: The Age of Revolutions – Andrew Detch

This course takes an expansive chronological view of the so-called "Age of Revolutions" and addresses the ways that several different revolutionary movements altered societies and cultures throughout the Americas. From 1688 until the 1820s, revolutions swept through the Atlantic world. Peoples of the Americas participated in those revolutions and inspired further revolutions. Early American peoples therefore saw their lives irrevocably altered by the political, social, and cultural changes that came in the wake of revolutionary movements. Even the very concept of "revolution" changed during the era. This class provides overviews of major revolutionary movements, explores the evolution of the concept of "revolution," and charts the influence of revolutionary movements on the peoples of early America. Students will read the works of leading historians, engage with sources left by revolutionaries, and engage with the perspectives of common people whose quotidian lives took place against a backdrop of monumental change.

HIST 2100-001: Revolution in History: Russia and the Soviet Union – John Hatch

The Russian Revolution of 1917 brought Lenin's Bolshevik Party of Marxist revolutionaries into power and gave birth to the Soviet Union. While Marx envisioned that the victory of socialism would occur first in an advanced industrial society, Russia's economy at the time of the revolution was still largely agrarian. Why then, did the socialist revolution happen there? To get at this question, this course will examine the long and short term causes of the revolution, looking at the history of Russian revolutionary thought, the emergence of the revolutionary movement in the century prior to the 1917, Lenin's impact on that movement, the largely unsuccessful efforts by various Tsars to fend off revolutionary challenges, and the relationship between war and revolution. How did Lenin and the Bolsheviks manage to navigate the revolutionary crisis and emerge victorious in the struggle for power that ensued after the overthrow of the last tsar, Nicholas II, in February 1917?

HIST 2110-001: History of Early Modern Societies: English & French Revolutions – David Paradis

In the first half of the course, we will explore how the English unwittingly slipped into a revolution during the 1640s and how their ideas affected later revolutions in the US and France.  In the second half of the course, students will engage in a live action role playing game focused on the French Revolution c. 1790.

HIST 2326-001: Issues in the History of U.S. Society and Culture​:  American Identities - WWII Era – Natalie Mendoza Gutierrez

This course focuses on the WWII home front to explore how US society has defined "American"--in terms of identity as well as the ideals and priorities of the era. We will examine the tension between wartime democratic rhetoric and the various forms of discrimination African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Japanese Americans--among others--experienced by considering events such as the Double Victory campaign, the so-called Zoot Suit Riots, and Japanese American internment. In particular, we will consider the government's role in hindering or promoting a sense of belonging in American society, and how the war shaped citizens' rising expectations of the nation.

HIST 3020-001: Historical Thinking & Writing – Vilja Hulden

In this class, students will practice the skills of historical research and analysis through designing and executing a research project related to the American experience of the Vietnam War and the controversies surrounding it.  Students will learn about different kinds of historical sources (oral histories, foreign policy documents, newspapers, and more) and learn to navigate historiographical debates about the Vietnam War. Class discussions will focus on the nature of historical analysis and reasoning in general and with regard to the Vietnam War in particular.

HIST 3020-002: Historical Thinking & Writing – Myles Osborne

The Mau Mau: This course is focused on the Mau Mau war of the 1950s. Perhaps the most significant anticolonial war in Africa, the Mau Mau episode pitted guerrilla warriors operating from bases in the forests of central Kenya against the British colonial government and its "loyalist" allies. This course uses Mau Mau as the lens through which we learn about historical method, writing, citation, and organizing a research paper.

HIST 3416-001: Seminar in American Society and Thought – Natalie Mendoza Gutierrez

Social Movements in the United States:  This seminar focuses on the history of social movements in the 20th century United States to explore how people have attempted to make democracy work for all members of American society. We will focus on four moments-- women's suffrage, the "long" African American struggle, the Chicano movement, and gay liberation-- which allow us to consider how social identities like gender, race, class, and sexuality influenced the ideas and strategies driving these movements. Students will use our class discussions on these movements as an entry point for identifying a specific topic they would like to research further. Our course will also include workshops aimed at supporting students in their research, the result of which will be a primary source-based capstone project (typically a research paper, but other format options will be available).

HIST 3800-001: Seminar in Global History – William Wei

World War II through Film: This seminar will focus on World War II, the most destructive military conflict in human history. The course is designed to deepen our understanding of this momentous event through an analysis of cinematic (filmic) narratives. Besides evaluating films dealing with different aspects of WWII, students will compare a few of them to the books on which they are based. As a culminating learning experience, students will write an original paper evaluating select films about the war. 

HIST 4103-001: England from the Viking Age to the Tudors​ – David Paradis

Inspired by the culture of retribution so visibly on display in Game of Thrones, we will examine the culture of feuding and interfamilial vengeance that infused the life of Scandinavian warriors and English aristocrats in the centuries leading up to and including the Wars of the Roses.

HIST 4133-001: England in the Age of the Tudors, 1485-1603​ – Paul Hammer

Topics include: the aftermath of the Wars of the Roses; Henry VIII's 'Great Matter' and his six wives; Reformation and Counter-Reformation; the courtships of Elizabeth I; how Elizabeth became the Virgin Queen; Mary Queen of Scots and the perils of a queen marrying badly; the Tudors and Ireland; English pirates of the Caribbean; the Gran Armada and the long war against Spain; and the conspiracy that marked the end of England's most famous royal dynasty. 

HIST 4223-001: The French Revolution and Napoleon – Matthew Gerber

This course traces the origins, course, and consequences of the most important modern revolution, the French Revolution of 1789. While seeking to explain how a liberal movement for progressive change soon degenerated into the factional bloodbath of the Terror, we will also examine the revolution's global impact and how three decades or revolutionary warfare led to the rise and fall of Napoleon Bonaparte.

HIST 4329-001: Islam in the Modern World: Revivalism, Modernism, and Fundamentalism, 1800-2001 – John Willis

HAMAS, Hizbullah, ISIS, Iran--where do their ideas come from and how do they relate to the modern Islamic intellectual tradition?  This class will chart the development of Islamic thought from the nineteenth century to the present.  Its primary purpose is to understand how scholars used forms of Islamic reasoning to confront the new understandings of politics, society, and gender in an age of empire.  We will do so largely on the basis of texts written by Muslim intellectuals themselves (in translation) with attention to the historical context in which they appeared.

HIST 4339-001: Borderlands of the British Empire – Lucy Chester

Presenting the borderlands of the British Empire as central rather than peripheral, this course examines their development through imperial expansion, consolidation, and decolonization. Themes include domination, resistance, and negotiation in areas such as Afghanistan, India, and the Palestine Mandate, with a focus on the 19th and 20th centuries. Students will acquire skills in comparative history and develop a better understanding of the roots of contemporary conflict.

HIST 4359-001: The Global History of Modern Arabia – John Willis

The countries of the Arabian Peninsula have often been discussed in a cliched language of ancient tribes, austere religions, extravagant oil wealth, and hypermodern urban development.  This class will explore these issues by inserting Arabia into the framework of global history and its processes:  global imperialism, the expansion of capitalism, modern forms of development, and new forms of political association and activism.  More importantly, we will consider the subjective experience of these immense changes in the region itself by a close examination and discussion of a series of modern novels from the countries of the Arabian Peninsula.

HIST 4511-001: Europe in the Dark Ages (400-1000 A.D.) – Todd Upton

In this course we'll survey the growth of Europe with attention to the following: transformation of ancient Greco-Roman world into the medieval civilizations of Western Europe, Islam, and Byzantium; theological, historiographical, and literary developments during the period, with particular attention to the rise of Christianity; the Merovingian and Carolingian worlds; the breakup of the Carolingian kingdom; start of nation-states of France and Germany; England during Anglo-Saxon and start of the Norman periods; "feudal society," "manorialism," economic developments; and, finally, transformations in religion, politics, culture, and socio-economic conditions in western Europe that led to 11th C. reformation of the Church & expansion of European presence in the eastern Mediterranean with the First Crusade.

HIST 4640-001: Women, Gender and War – Julia Ogden

This course explores the many, varied and challenging dynamics of the relationship(s) between women and war. Focusing on Latin America, a region that has experienced intermittent periods of extreme violence since European colonization (and before), it explores what war is and why it happens, why women have traditionally been ignored in literature on war, how they contribute to war efforts, how war impacts their lives, and how they reinforce, challenge or redefine gender roles in wartime activities.

HIST 4733-001: The Russian Revolution and the Soviet Regime – John Hatch

From the Tsars through the Commissars to the Oligarchs, Russia has been ruled by authoritarian elites. What accounts for this enduring tradition? This course will examine the causes of the Bolshevik Revolution and the consequences of the subsequent Communist "experiment". It will do so with an eye to gaining a better understanding of where Russia has been and where it might be going.

HIST 4800-001: Special Topics in Global History: History of Childhood – Julia Ogden

The course offers a comparative examination of "childhood," as a socially constructed category, in the Americas (Canada, the US, and Latin America). It highlights key moments of change in cultural perceptions of childhood, and it illuminates continuities in the lived experiences of children from pre-Columbian times to the present. It also uses childhood as a lens to understand broader historical processes such as colonization, the Enlightenment, the advent of "modernity," the formation of modern nation-states, and select contemporary social, cultural, economic, and political issues. 

HIST 4803-880: Special Topics in European History: World War II: Europe in Crisis (HONORS) - David Ciarlo

The Second World War resulted in the death of more than sixty million people and reshaped the course of history.  While many Americans are familiar with the United States' role in the war, it was a European crisis led to the war's outbreak, and Europe remained the primary field of destruction.  This course will use primary and secondary sources to explore various aspects of the European dimensions of the war, including its origins, its political and military developments, and especially, its impact in social and cultural life.  We will also read a number of first-hand accounts by civilians, soldiers, and survivors, allowing us a ground-up view of the war.  Along the way, we will engage with different modes of historical analysis, providing a glimpse into the different ways that historians approach history.

Open to incoming honors-qualified transfer students with Sophomore standing or higher, and continuing students with a GPA of 3.3 and Sophomore standing or higher. Transfer students should see https://www.colorado.edu/honors/admission for program information.

Continuing students do not need to apply to the Honors Program, eligibility is determined automatically.  If you have a major in A&S and a GPA of 3.3 or higher, your student record will automatically allow you to participate in honors and sign up for a class. Students do not need to be enrolled full time; part-time students are also eligible to enroll.  There is no extra cost to take an honors version of a course.