MA Seminar: American Social History 4219-ZS118-AM
The instructor is most interested in topics in American social history from 1940 to the present, particularly how the themes of race, class, and gender have shaped the development of American society and culture. Additionally, similar topics from earlier in American history will be welcome, as well as topics in religion, the American South, and popular culture.
Type of course
Master's seminars
Course coordinators
Learning outcomes
Knowledge
By the end of this course, students
1. will develop an in depth knowledge of a particular topic in American social history.
2. will understand how that topic fits into the general history of the United States.
3. will learn how other historians have addressed their topic.
Skills
By the end of this course, students
1. will develop skills in conducting independent historical research, analyzing primary sources, and evaluating the work of other scholars.
2. will improve their ability to synthesize the information gained from their research.
3. will become adept in communicating the results of their investigation in clear, concise English prose.
Competences
By the end of this course, students
1. will appreciate the nature of the scholarly enterprise
2. be able to critically evaluate the argument and use of evidence both in their own work and in the work of other historians.
Assessment criteria
Each semester the student is expected to produce a draft of a chapter of the thesis. This chapter will be evaluated on both a technical level (grammar, writing style, conformity of notes to Chicago Manual of Style) and in terms of content (use and analysis of evidence, argument). The final grade for the thesis will be based on the originality of the thesis's contribution to scholarly knowledge, the extent to which the thesis relies on primary sources for evidence, the corrections and improvements the student has made from the drafts of the chapters, and the coherence of the argument from chapter to chapter. For the last semester, the student will not receive a grade until the student has turned in a complete draft of the thesis, including an introduction, conclusion, bibliography, and revised versions of all chapters and it has passed the plagiarism test.
Bibliography
General Surveys and Readers
Chafe, The Unfinished Journey
Boyer, Promises to Keep
Chafe and Sitkoff, A History of Our Time
Sitkoff, Perspectives on Modern America
Research and Writing
Barzun and Graf, The Modern Researcher
Fischer, Historians' Fallacies
Turabian, A Manual for Research
Strunk and White, The Elements of Style
World War II
Polenberg, War and Society
Berube, Coming Out Under Fire
Hartman, The Homefron and Beyond
The Political Context: The Cold War
Whitfield, The Culture of the Cold War
Gaddis, The Cold War
Corber, Homosexuality and Cold War America
Kaledin, Mothers and More
May, Homeward Bound
Civil Rights
Chalmers, And the Crooked Places Made Straight
Branch, Parting the Waters
Carson, In Struggle
Goldfield, Black, White and Southern
Dittmer, Local People
The Eyes on the Prize Civil Rights Reader
Student Movement
Unger, The Movement
Matsuow, The Unraveling of America
Herring, America's Longest War
Rorabaugh, Berkeley at War
Miller, Hippies and American Values
Women's Liberation
Evans, Personal Politics
DeHart, "Feminism and the Dynamics of Social Change"
Wandersee, On the Move
Ferree and Hess, Controversy and Coalition
Gay Liberation
D'Emilio, Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities
Duberman, Stonewall
Adam, The Rise of Gay and Lesbian Movement
"Selma and Stonewall"
Conservative Reaction and the Religious Right
Tygiel, Ronald Reagan and the Triumph American Conservatism
Berman, America's Right Turn
Hunter, Culture Wars
Balmer, Thy Kingdom Come
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: