History
Jessica Elfenbein, Chair
The Department of History offers the Bachelor of Arts degree with a major in History and an 18-credit minor. The major offers undergraduates a high degree of flexibility in choosing their pathway through the major. Upper division (300 and 400-level) classes have roughly the same expectations and rigor; these numbers denote geography, not intensity. Our 400-level classes explore the Americas while the 300-level classes investigate other parts of the globe. Undergraduate majors are required to take a gateway course (HIST 300), a senior capstone seminar (HIST 497/498), and a handful of electives that ensure broad exposure to different time periods and geographic areas.
Beyond these requirements, students can choose among electives that interest them or decide to declare an area of focus within the major that investigates global connections (e.g., War and International Relations), focuses on one region (e.g., Latin America), or explores a theme historically (e.g., Media and Digital History). To graduate with Distinction in History, students must maintain a high grade-point average, complete additional credit hours, and undertake supplementary research and writing on a senior project that earns the mark of "distinction." Students who are studying to be secondary social science teachers may complete the BA in History and the Masters of Teaching (MT) program in just over five years.
The Department has one of the country's oldest and most esteemed graduate public history programs. At the undergraduate level, students may choose from an array of courses in public history, some of which include an internship in a museum, archive, or public institution. We also offer an undergraduate area of focus in public history.
Courses
The rise and development of European civilization from its Mediterranean origins through the Renaissance and Reformation.
Carolina Core: GHS
European development and expansion from the mid-17th century to the present.
Carolina Core: GHS
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Political, cultural, and economic forces that have conditioned the development of institutions and ideas in South Asia.
Carolina Core: GHS
An analysis which treats the major cultural elements of traditional Islamic civilization and then concentrates upon the reactions of the Arabs, Turks, and Iranians to the problems of adjusting to the modern world.
Carolina Core: GHS
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The evolution of social, political, and cultural patterns in East Asia, with emphasis on the development of philosophical, religious, and political institutions and their relationship to literary and artistic forms in China and Japan.
Carolina Core: GHS
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
An examination of several traditional sub-Saharan African societies and of their political and economic transformation in the modern, colonial, and post-independence periods.
Carolina Core: GHS
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The political, social, religious, economic, military, and intellectual development of Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and adjoining areas from the origins of civilization until the seventh century A.D.
The development of science and technology and their roles in world civilizations from antiquity to the present.
Carolina Core: GHS, VSR
A discussion of the political, cultural, and economic forces which have conditioned the development of institutions and ideas in Spanish and Portuguese America.
Carolina Core: GHS
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Comparative examination of conquest, colonization, and human captivity in the history, cultural values, and social ethics of European, African, and Indigenous civilizations in the Americas, 1441-1888.
Carolina Core: GHS, VSR
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy
A general survey of the United States from the era of discovery to 1865, emphasizing major political, economic, social, and intellectual developments.
Carolina Core: GHS
A general survey of the United States from 1865 to the present, emphasizing major political, economic, social, and intellectual developments. Honors sections are available for students in the honors program.
Carolina Core: GHS
Introduction to Declaration of independence, Constitution, Federalist Papers, Bill of Rights, landmark Supreme Court cases and constitutional amendments; exploration of these texts’ historical context and debates about their meaning.
The history and development of an American region, “the West,” through the narratives of its diverse people and the effects of its complex geography.
Introduction to the field of public history. Explores the challenges of portraying history in museums, parks, and other public history venues.
Carolina Core: GHS
A survey of the beliefs and practices associated with the demonic and the Devil from c 500 B.C.E. to the 20th century.
Cross-listed course: RELG 206
The nature of historical evidence, the formulation of historical questions, the process of historical research, and the construction of historical arguments using primary sources and secondary materials.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
The formation of ancient Near Eastern cultures, the ultimate synthesis of these cultures and the resulting establishment of the Near East as an historical entity.
The origins and development of Greek civilization in its political, economic, social, and cultural aspects with special attention being given to the early and late classical periods and the Hellenistic Age.
The origins of Rome and shaping of its republican government, the spread of Roman rule in Italy and across the Mediterranean, the establishment of the principate and formation of one diverse imperial society and culture.
Political, social and religious transformation of the Mediterranean world, 2nd to the 8th century., including the rise of Christianity, the decline of Roman power, and the rise of Islam.
Representations of antiquity in cinema, television, and other contemporary media, with emphasis on Hollywood’s reception of Greek and Roman history.
Cross-listed course: CLAS 305
Topics include the formation of monarchies, the rise of Christianity, learning and universities, knighthood and social orders, and heresy and crusades.
Explores the concerns and importance of families in pre-modern Europe. Topics include household furnishings and management, social classes, gender roles, family law, marriages, business, children, feuds, and sexuality.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Practices of, reactions against, and ideas surrounding magic and witchcraft during the late Middle Ages and the time of Europe's "Great Witch Craze".
Social, cultural, and artistic movements in Italy and northern Europe from the Black Death (c. 1350) to religious reforms and revolutions (c. 1520).
Religious, social, and political reforms from the rise of local religious protests (c. 1450) to the crisis of the 17th century. The rise of Protestantism and reactions in Catholicism.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
A survey of European political, economic, and intellectual development from the age of Louis XIV to the eve of the French Revolution.
The changes in France and Europe during the revolutionary decade, the rise of Napoleon, and the establishment of French hegemony over the Continent.
Intellectual and cultural history of the Enlightenment with particular attention to its relationship with the colonial world and its challenges to eighteenth-century states. Readings focused on primary sources.
History in video games; comparison of selected games with historical scholarship, to assess the validity of the games’ presentations of historical developments and the value of games to the understanding of history.
Political, social, economic, and intellectual developments from 1815-1900, which brought European culture to its zenith and contributed to Europe's global domination.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The Great War, revolution, and reconstruction; the rise of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes and the coming of World War II.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The Second World War and its origins; the Cold War; European recovery; a divided continent and Europe in the Global Era.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
A survey of the political, social, economic, and cultural development of the British Isles from pre-history to the Restoration of 1660.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
A survey of the political, social, economic, and cultural development of the British Isles since 1660.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Examination of the British Empire, tracing various historical themes as regions of world fell under British control, with particular attention to Ireland, India, and sub-Saharan Africa (especially South Africa) in the 17th Century-20th Century.
Exploration of varied forms of servitude in the ancient and medieval Mediterranean; examination of human bondage in the Hebrew Bible, ancient Greece, Roman society, late antique religious teachings, and medieval Christian and Islamic societies; study of ancient slavery in modern political debates, historians’ writings, and television and film.
The political, religious, and military developments within the Eastern Empire including its influence on Western and Slavonic Europe and Islam.
The political and military developments within the Eastern Empire from the invasion of the Seljuk Turks to its final destruction by the Ottoman Turks.
Holy war and realpolitik in Mediterranean East-West relations from the 10th through the 15th centuries with emphasis on the role of the crusades in the cultural formation, development, and international relations of East and West.
The political, economic, and social developments in Great Britain and Ireland during the Victorian Age.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The political, economic, and social developments in Great Britain and Ireland during the 20th century.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
The social, cultural, economic, and political life of Black people in the United States to 1865.
Cross-listed course: AFAM 331
The social, cultural, economic, and political life of Black people in the United States since 1865.
Cross-listed course: AFAM 332
A political and social history from the Bourbon Restoration to the present.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The earliest life on the steppe, the Kievan State, the foundations of Moscow, and the Russian empire to the reign of Nicholas I.
The decline of Imperial Russia, the Revolution of 1917, Lenin, Stalin, and the Soviet Union since Stalin.
Imperial and Soviet foreign and military policies in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Political, economic, social, and cultural development of the USSR from the 1917 Bolshevik revolution until the end of Stalin’s rule.
A survey of German history including political, cultural, social, and economic developments from unification in 1871 to the present.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
An introductory survey of the civilization of the Slavic peoples. The historical traditions and culture of the peoples that occupy much of the Eurasian continent.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Nineteenth-century eastern European states and peoples; the political and social forces leading to World War I.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Survey of states in East-central and Southeastern Europe. Problems of national identity, modernization, and small state politics. Impact of WWII, the Cold war, the fall of communism, and the return to pluralism.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The impact of modern civilization upon the Middle East, including the history of the Arab, Turkish, Iranian, and Israeli segments of the Middle East during the 19th and 20th centuries.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
A survey of French North Africa (Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia) and Libya under colonial rule. The creation, development, and triumph of the nationalist movements, with particular attention to Algeria and its revolution.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Political, social, and economic history of the Middle East and North Africa in the years since World War II.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
Exploration of how and why Africa is often represented as helpless, the colonial origins of common patterns of development and humanitarianism, and other possible models for these processes.
Social, cultural, economic, and political developments, focusing on internally and externally generated changes.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Commercial and religious revolutions of the 19th century, imposition and ending of formal colonial rule, and post-colonial issues.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Independent readings and written papers on appropriate topics.
Surveys modern development of East Asia from 1800 to the present.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
Political, economic, social, and intellectual transformations of late imperial China from the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) through the last empire of China, the Qing dynasty (1644-1911).
Introduction to the major social, economic, and political changes in China from the Communist Revolution in 1949 to the present.
The growth of the ancient state and the evolution of the samurai class and its political authority.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The development of modern Japan: political evolution, industrial growth, social change, war, defeat, and occupation.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Global and comparative environmental-historical investigation of the ecological, socioeconomic, and cultural significance of wilderness protection, nature conservation, national parks, and nature tourism; field excursions required.
East Africans’ contributions to an Indian ocean World that transcends single nation-states (stretching from Mozambique and Somalia to the Middle east, India and China) from the deep past to the present, including sections on “piracy,” Islam, slavery, race, and gender.
Development of anticolonial thought and political movements in British India from the early nineteenth century onwards. Focuses on Mohandas K. Gandhi, his critics, and Gandhi’s continuing global legacy.
History of "capitalist" economic behavior and culture in various premodern societies: the Ancient Middle East, Classical Greece, the Roman Empire, early Islamic society, medieval Christian and Islamic states, the Mongol period and the era of global expansionism; evaluation of competing theories about premodern economic life and the meaning of "capitalism"
A history of capitalism and its evolving definitions in Europe from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century, including its role in agriculture, mechanical industry, international trade, and colonialism and domination.
The evolution of airpower from the early 20th Century through the early 21st Century. The emphasis is on the development of various theories about the application of aerial force, and how operations in time of war have confirmed or challenged these theories from a multinational perspective.
The evolution of sea power through the development of steam navies around the globe, 1860 CE - 2020 CE.
A comparative examination of the origins and development of nationalism and its impact on the modern world.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
German and Italian political movements; emphasis on the role of leadership, propaganda, and ideology. Fascist movements in France, Rumania, Hungary, and Great Britain.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Thematic examination of the nature and impact of total war on European society; emphasis on socio-economic, cultural, and military aspects.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Capitalism in the Western world; the rise of modern corporate enterprise in Europe and America since 1850.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Social and cultural impact of urbanization in Europe since 1789 through a comparison of major cities such as London, Paris, Vienna, and Berlin.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Survey of women in European history from the eighteenth to the twenty-first century. Focus on women’s citizenship beginning with Enlightenment idea of rights through developments in modern feminism.
Cross-listed course: WGST 379
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
Introduction to Nazi Germany’s systematic mass-murder of Europe’s Jews and other minorities during World War II. Examination of forces that led to the Holocaust, including scientific racism, Nazi policy implementation, and dynamics of annihilation during war.
Cross-listed course: JSTU 492
Modern history through the lens of the Nobel Peace Prize. Limitations of the Nobel as encouragement to peace.
A survey of the history of premodern medicine. How Western cultures of the past approached health and illness; anatomy; nutrition; sexuality; disease and plague; mental and emotional health; and more. From ancient Greece, through medieval and early modern Islamic, Jewish, and Christian approaches to medicine and the body.
Critical epochs in the spread of Christianity. Consideration of the great crises that shaped the structure and form of Christianity during the last 20 centuries: the Hellenistic world; the medieval syntheses; the breakup of Western Christian unity; the transition to worldwide mission activity in the industrial age.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
The religious, political, social and economic institutions and intellectual and scholarly traditions developed by Muslim societies throughout Afro-Eurasia from late antiquity to the present.
Cross-listed course: RELG 354
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy, GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
Representative messianic movements, millenarian visionaries and apocalyptic imaginings in the Islamic world from the 7th century to the present, with attention to related developments in the Jewish and Christian traditions over the last two millennia.
Cross-listed course: RELG 368
Historical investigation of kabbalah, a philosophical system and mystical current common to Judaism, Islam and Christianity, from the medieval period to the present; focus on its formative role in early modern Western cosmology and science, and its ecological implications today.
Occultism as a link between science and religion and its central role in Western intellectual and cultural history; the historical development of the science-magic-religion continuum in the Islamo-Christian world from late antiquity to present.
Cross-listed course: RELG 362
History of engineering practices, professions, and sciences, as well as development of engineered artifacts from the Middle Ages to the present.
The history of the computer; how it acquired various forms through the 20th century; how information, as defined by computers, had shaped the world over the past century.
The history of physics, chemistry, geology, and related sciences since the Scientific Revolution.
The study of the life from antiquity to the present. Investigates the origins of modern biology and medicine and how life has shaped scientific, political, and economic thought.
Evolution of the automobile from a conceptual idea through the present-day. Emphasis on analysis of the automobile's impact on culture, economics, the environment, politics, science and technology, and society.
A survey of biopolitical, social, economic, and cultural aspects of epidemic diseases throughout world history.
A history of tactics, strategy, weapons, and logistics from 500 B.C. to A.D. 1400.
A history of tactics, strategy, weapons, and logistics from A.D. 1400 to the present.
An interdisciplinary examination of sustainability around the world from social, environmental, technological, and economic perspectives from early times to the present.
Contract approved by instructor, advisor, and department chair is required for undergraduate students.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Survey of the urban history of the United States from the 19th Century through today.
The founding of the English colonies, their developing maturity, the events leading to the Revolution, and the creation of a new nation.
The new republic and the developing democratic spirit in politics and culture.
The three cultures of East, South, and West; their interactions and the events leading to the Civil War.
The political, military, and social history of the War and the reorganization which followed.
A survey of recent United States history with emphasis on the economic, social, and literary developments from 1877 to 1917.
The United States and a World at War, 1917-1945.
A survey of the political, economic, social, and cultural developments in the period after World War II.
A study of South Carolina origins and developments.
A survey of recent South Carolina history with emphasis on social and institutional development.
A survey of Canadian development from colony to modern nation.
Historical exploration of the daily lives and personal stories of Americans through biographies and ethnographies.
Experiences of Native people in North America from the period before European colonization through the 21st Century.
The establishment and consolidation of the Spanish and Portuguese empires in the Western hemisphere; interaction of Indians, Africans, and Iberians, and the formation of social, economic, and political traditions in Latin America; political independence.
Cross-listed course: LASP 341
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy
Traditional society in the area and problems arising from social, economic, and political changes since independence; comparative studies of national responses to these problems.
Cross-listed course: LASP 342
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
The evolution of social groups and changes in economic patterns in Latin America from pre-Columbian times to the present.
Cross-listed course: LASP 441
Mexico from the pre-conquest period to the present, with an emphasis on modern Mexico.
Cross-listed course: LASP 442
The roles race and slavery played in shaping Colonial Caribbean History from the pre-Columbian Civilizations to the end of the 19th century.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy
The customs, mores, attitudes, and living conditions of men and women of the 17th and 18th centuries. Emphasis on the common people of the American colonies.
The causes of the Revolution; the events of the period and their implications.
Development of Southern society and of the forces that made the South a distinctive section of the United States.
Reconstruction, the Bourbon era, agrarian revolt, industrial revolution, racial problems, and the changes resulting from the impact of two world wars and the New Deal (1865-1946).
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy
The causes, events, and results of the Civil War.
The events and results of the attempt to reorder the American nation after the Civil War.
Issues of immigration, assimilation and nativism in the United States, 1840 to 1930.
HIST 447 examines the full sweep of American history through the lens of empire, covering especially the linkages between U.S. foreign policy and American domestic culture.
Interaction of cultural values, economic interests, public policy, and technology with the physical environment over time.
A history of the contributions of the popular aspects of American culture and their interactions with American institutions.
Exploration of LGBTQ history and communities in America from the Colonial Era to the present, using lenses of gender and sexuality to understand historical events.
Cross-listed course: WGST 450
The development of the art and science of medicine as practiced in the United States from colonial times to Medicare. Emphasis on the social history of American medicine.
The development of science in America from colonial times to the present. Special attention will be given to defining those factors, scientific, economic, and social, which have raised American science to its commanding position in the 20th century.
The historical development of technologies and technological systems in the American context.
Examination of the origins of Jim Crown and the multi-faceted struggle against it, and other forms of racial inequality, in the American South and the rest of the US since the early 20th century.
Cross-listed course: AFAM 335
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy, GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
The transfer and adaptation of European ideas to a new environment and the development of new patterns.
The maturation and extension of a national culture.
Intellectual and cultural developments characteristic of the Southern region from colonial times to the recent past.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Diversity and Social Advocacy
This course critically examines the continuities and discontinuities between Jim Crow and our current historical and political moment.
Cross-listed course: AFAM 463
The social, political, and economic roles and changing status of women in America.
Cross-listed course: WGST 464
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Professional and Civic Engagement Leadership Experiences
A historical survey of American foreign policy and foreign relations. First semester: to World War I. Second semester: World War I to the present.
A historical survey of American foreign policy and foreign relations. First semester: to World War I. Second semester: World War I to the present.
Transformation of war and of the institutions for waging war from the American Revolution to the present.
Cross-listed course: ARMY 406
A study of the constitutional development of the United States from the creation of the Articles of Confederation to the Civil War. It deals primarily with problems of governmental organization, judicial interpretation, and sectional politics.
An analysis of the growth of constitutional power from 1860 to the present, giving special attention to the constitutional problems of the Civil War period, the increasing role of the judiciary in national affairs, and the general extension of constitutional authority in the 20th century.
Examination of experiences of Jews in the United States from Colonial Period to late 20th century, especially Jewish immigration, political behavior, social mobility, religious affiliation, group identity formation, and meaning of Anti-Semitism in American and global contexts.
Cross-listed course: JSTU 471
Overview of historic preservation as the practice of protecting and conserving places that tell stories about the past.
Introduction to Digital History that examines ways to engage and adapt the discipline of history to technological trends and explores new approaches and interpretive techniques.
Examination of material culture (objects and artifacts a society produces) as primary sources for historical research; how these sources are transformed when digitized; and the nature of born-digital resources.
Methodology, application and usage, historic and current literature, identification and examination of available resources.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Professional practice in museums, archives, preservation organizations, and other agencies involved in historical research, advocacy, and preservation of historical resources and history programming for public audiences.
Experiential Learning: Experiential Learning Opportunity
Reading and research on selected historical subjects. Open only to juniors and seniors with permission of the instructor.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Community Service, GLD: Research
Reading and research on selected historical subjects. Open only to juniors and seniors with permission of the instructor.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Reading and research on selected historical subjects. Open only to juniors and seniors with permission of the instructor.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Principles of historical research and writing as applied to the seminar topic. Open to history majors or by special permission of instructor.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Principles of historical research and writing as applied to the seminar topic. Open to history majors or by special permission of instructor.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Principles of historical research and writing. A senior year thesis related to one of the advanced courses in the major program.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Research
Political, cultural, and economic ties which have linked the Middle East to the United States. Middle Eastern views of these relationships and their impact on modern Middle Eastern history.
Graduation with Leadership Distinction: GLD: Global Learning
Reading and research on selected historical topics. Course content varies and will be announced in the schedule of classes by title.
South Carolina since colonization.
Changes in the Southern region since 1940.
On-site introduction to historic preservation including research, interpretation, management, and economics of preservation. Offered only in Charleston during summer term.