HIST 257 The Making of America, 1607-1877
The United States we know today was forged through centuries of hard-fought struggles. This course provides an overview of American History in the first 270 years. It surveys early contests between indigenous peoples and European empires, colonists' rebellion in the American Revolution, and political conundrums in the early United States. It also explains divisive economic transformations and immigration patterns, conflicts during westward expansion, women's and African Americans' demands for inclusion, reform efforts to overcome social ills, new religious awakenings, and struggles over slavery and the country's economic future. The course concludes with the accelerating centrifugal forces that brought the Civil War, and how Americans began rebuilding the fractured nation into a new society. Two lectures and one discussion per week; textbook and original historical documents. This course counts as a foundational course in History or Political Theory within the liberal arts core requirements.