Montgomery College, Rockville Campus

History and Political Science Department

Syllabus

 

 

Course Information                  Instructor Information:

History of Europe, 1600 to date      Dr. T. Elkin Taylor

HS161 (Section 20041)                Phone: 301-229-9270

HS161HM (Section 21974)              E-mail: prof_etaylor@verizon.net

Fall 2008                           Office: Humanities, Suite 270

TTh 12:30 – 1:45 p.m.               Off. hours: TTh 11:15 - 12:15

Classroom: TC 233                    Off. Phone: 240-567-5178

 

Text: Jackson Spielvogel, Western Civilization, Vol. II. 6th ed.

 

Other Required Reading: (1) One book from list on pp. 4-8; (2) Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front; (3) Elie Wiesel, Night.

 

 

General Course Information:

 

Description. A survey of the most important political, economic, social, intellectual and cultural currents in Europe from the late 16th century to the present. 

 

Aims and Objectives. The course aims to help students develop (1) an understanding of how European civilization developed and (2) an ability to express that understanding in the written and spoken word.

 

Class Requirements and Grading Standards:

 

I. There will be two exams, each consisting of a longer essay and several "mini-essays."  Exam questions will be derived from lectures, discussions and the textbooks.  The course is divided into two exam periods.  The final exam will not include material covered in the first exam period.

 

II. Lectures often cover material not in the texts. Take good lecture notes.  You should complete assigned readings before class.  There will be unannounced pop quizzes, at the beginning of class, covering textbook assignments for the day.  If you miss a quiz for any reason but an excused absence, you will receive a zero for that quiz (no make-ups). The lowest pop quiz grade will be dropped; each of the others will account for 2% of your final grade.    

 

III. You must write two analytical book reports: (a) the first, on a book you choose from the attached list, and (b) the last, on All Quiet on the Western Front and Night.  In the latter case review both books, making comparisons if you wish.  Each of your two book reports should be typewritten, about three double-spaced pages long; no cover or binder, please.  They should not only describe the books‘ content but also include some analysis.  They will be graded on the quality of writing and organization as well as relevance and thoughtfulness.  Some students may be asked to report orally on their reports.  Plagiarism (passing off the work of others as your own) or any other form of cheating, will result in an F for the course.

 

IV. You will be graded on class attendance and participation.  Ask questions and say what you think in class. If a class absence is unavoidable let me know, in advance if possible. An unexcused absence from a scheduled discussion session results in the student receiving a zero for that activity. 

 

I strongly encourage students to talk to me personally during my office hours or at any mutually convenient time.  I also encourage calling me at my home phone number or e-mailing me.

 

Reports, exams and participation are given numerical grades and weighted as follows:

 

First book report, on a book from the attached list (due Oct. 9)   20%

Midterm exam (Oct. 21)                                        20%

Report on Night and All Quiet on the Western Front (Nov. 25)  20%

Final exam (Dec. 16)                                          20%

Attendance, participation & pop quizzes (lowest dropped)      20% 

 

Students with an average of 90-100 receive an A, 80-89 B, 70-79 C, 60-69 D, below 60 F.

 

Late Work and Makeup Policy.  It is important to do all work on time.  Exams taken on schedule allow students to choose from among alternative questions; they also include an extra-credit question.  Exams taken late offer neither of these benefits.  Final exams must be taken on schedule. There is a penalty of one letter grade per week for late book reports.  E.g., an A paper which is due on a Tuesday and is turned in the following Tuesday becomes a B paper.

 

Students in the Honors Course (HS161HM) will, in addition to fulfilling all other course requirements, meet with me on three or four occasions to discuss a book on the interpretation of history, on which they must also write a paper.

 

 

    

- Elkin Taylor

 

    

 

 

 

 

Lecture Schedule and Reading Assignments

 

 

                                            Textbook Assignments

Sept. 4   Introduction; 16th century

      9   Imperialism                      Introduction, 346-78

     11   The 17th century                  379-409

16   17th century absolutism            410-32

18   Constitutional government          432-47

     23   The Scientific Revolution         448-72

     25   The Enlightenment                 438-40, 473-501

30   Politics in the 18th century       502-17

Oct.  2   18th century economy & society      517-31

      7   Revolution in America and France    532-52

      9   Napoleon & the Congress of Vienna   552-561, 589-98 1ST REPORT DUE

14   The Industrial Revolution I        562-88

16   The Industrial Revolution II      638-41, 651-73

21   MIDTERM EXAM

23   19th century ideology; Marxism         592-93, 598-602, 613-19 638-50

     28   Europe, 1830-1914 (I)              603-38

30   Europe, 1830-1914 (II)             673-92

Nov.  4   The New Imperialism               692-716

      6   World War I; Versailles Treaty      717-49

     11   Revolution in Russia, 1917-39       736-42, 769-71

     13   Depression; Fascism and Nazism      750-81

     18   World War II                      782-808

20   The Cold War                      808-21

     25   Decolonization                     821-37   2ND REPORT DUE

  26-30   THANKSGIVING BREAK

Dec.  2   European revival and integration    837-67

 4   The USSR/Russia, 1945-1985         828-31, 850-53

      9   Collapse of the Soviet Union       853-60

     11  Retrospective on Europe, 1600-2008  867-85

16   FINAL EXAM (12:30 – 2:30 p.m.)                 

         

      

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HS161 - List for First Book Report

 

 

Read one of the books on this list.  Call numbers are given for those known to be in the Montgomery College libraries.  Most are in the Rockville MC library.  A few must be ordered from Tacoma Park or Germantown for next-day delivery. 

 

 

GENERAL

 

William H. McNeill.  The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Force and Society since A.D. 1000.  405 pp.  U37.M38 1982

 

Jared Diamond. Guns, Germs and Steel. [Why did Europeans come to dominate the world?] 480 pp.  HM206.D48 1997

 

Amy Chua.  Day of Empire: How Hyperpowers Rise to Global Dominance – and Why They Fall.  2008

 

William J. Bernstein.  A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World. 2008ow H

 

 

David S. Landes.  The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present.  1969.  566 pp. HC240.L26

 

David S. Landes.  Revolution in Time: Clocks and the Making of the Modern World.  1983.  482 pp.  TS542.L24 2000

 

David S. Landes.  The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some are so Rich and Some so Poor.  1998.  650 pp.  HC240.Z9W45 1998

 

Robert L. Heilbroner.  The Worldly Philosophers: The Lives, Times and Ideas of the Great Economic Thinkers.  365 pp.  HB76.H4

 

Bonnie G. Smith.  Changing Lives: Women in European History since 1700.  560 pp.  HQ1588.S64 1989

 

Paul M. Kennedy.  The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers.  677 pp.  D210.K46 1988

 

Crane Brinton.  The Anatomy of Revolution.  [English, American, French and Russian Revolutions] 310 pp.  JC491.B7 1967

 

F. H. Hinsley.  Power and the Pursuit of Peace: Theory and Practice in the History of Relations Between States.  1963 416 pp.  JX1944.H5

 

Mark L. Haas.  The Ideological Origins of Great Power Politics, 1789-1989.

 

John H. Elliott.  Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and Spain in America, 1492-1830.  546 pp.  E18.82.E44 2006

 

 

EARLY MODERN PERIOD

 

R.H. Bainton.  Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther.   336 pp.  BR325.B26 1995

 

J. M. Kittelson.  Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career.  334 pp.  BR325.K455 1986

 

William J. Bouwsma.  John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait.  310 pp.  BX9418.B715 1988

 

Keith Thomas.  Religion and the Decline of Magic. 761 pp.  BR377.T48 1971B

 

A. G. Dickens.  The English Reformation.  374 pp.  BR375.D5

 

Timothy Brook.  Vermeer’s Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World. 272 p. CB401.B76 2008 [Anecdotal study of early globalization]

 

Carlo Cipolla.  An Economic History of World Population.  125 pp.  HC54.C5

 

Herbert Butterfield.  The Origins of Modern Science, 1300-1800.  242 pp.  Q125.B97 1957A

 

Hugh F. Kearney.  Science and Change, 1500-1700.  255 pp.  Q125.K42

 

James Gleick.  Isaac Newton.  272 pp.  QC16.N7G55 2003 or 2004

 

Carlo Cipolla.  Guns, Sails and Empires: Technological Innovations and the Early Phases of European Expansion.  192 pp.  UF545.E9C5 1985

 

Michael W. Flinn.  The European Demographic System, 1500-1800.  175 pp.  HB3581.F54

 

Peter Laslett.  The World We Have Lost.  [English social history]  280 pp.  DA320.L3

 

Neil Hanson.  The Confident Hope of a Miracle: The True History of the Spanish Armada.  489 pp.  DA360.H34 2005

 

Garrett Mattingly.  The Armada.  443 pp.  [English-Spanish power struggle; great read]  DA360.M3

 

Garrett Mattingly.  Renaissance Diplomacy.  323 pp. JX1644.M3 1970

 

Peter Burke.  The Italian Renaissance: Culture and Society in Italy.  287 pp.  DG445.B85 1987

 

Isabel De Madariaga.  Catherine the Great: A Short History.  240 pp.  DK171.D44 1990

 

Elizabeth Jenkins.  Elizabeth the Great.  384 pp.  DA355.J4

 

Peter Gaunt.  Oliver Cromwell.  263 pp.  DA426.G38 1997

 

John H. Elliott.  Imperial Spain, 1469-1716.  411 pp.  DP171.E4

 

W. H. Lewis.  The Splendid Century: Life in the France of Louis XIV.  306 pp.  DC128.L4 1978

 

Maurice Ashley. Louis XIV and the Greatness of France. 190 pp. DC125.A8 1946

 

Harold G. Nicolson.  The Age of Reason.  424 pp.  CB411.N5

 

James Buchan.  The Authentic Adam Smith: His Life and Ideas.  198 pp.  HB103.S6B83 2006

 

Norman Hampson.  A Cultural History of the Enlightenment. 304 pp.  CB411.H38

 

J. B. Owen.  The Eighteenth Century.  [Britain] 365 pp.  DA480.O9

 

 

1789 TO 1900

 

George L. Mosse.  Culture of Western Europe: The 19th and 20th Centuries.  410 pp.  CB415.M62

 

Kenneth Clark.  The Romantic Rebellion: Romantic vs. Classic Art.  366 pp.  N6465.R6C55

 

Crane Brinton.  A Decade of Revolution, 1789-1799.  330 pp.  D6.R5, Vol. 11

 

Christopher Hibbert.  The Days of the French Revolution.  351 pp.  DC161.H5 1999

 

Felix Markham.  Napoleon.  183 pp.  DC201.M18

 

Pieter Geyl.  Napoleon, For and Against.  477 pp.  DC203.8.G42

 

Harold G. Nicolson.  The Congress of Vienna.  312 pp. 

DC249.N5 1946A

 

Eric J. Hobsbawm.  The Age of Revolution, 1789-1848.  356 pp.  D299.H6 1999

 

Eric J. Hobsbawm.  The Age of Capital, 1848-1875. 354 pp.  D358.H56 1975b

 

Eric J. Hobsbawm.  The Age of Empire, 1875-1914.  404 pp.  D359.7.H63 1987

 

David Newsome.  The Victorian World Picture.  310 pp.  DA550.N49 1997

 

Foucault, Michel.  Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison.  333 pp.  HV8666.6813

 

Edmund Morris.  Beethoven: The Universal Composer. 243 pp. ML410.B4M696 2005

 

Barbara Tuchman.  528 pp.  The Proud Tower.  [Turn of the 20th century]  D398.T8  READ ANY SIX CHAPTERS

 

 

1900 TO DATE

 

Hew Strachan.  The First World War.  364 pp.  D521.S86 2004

 

David Stevenson.  Cataclysm: The First World War as Political Tragedy. 564 pp.  DD521.S83 2004

 

John Ellis.  The Social History of the Machine Gun. 192 pp. UF620.A2E38 1986

 

Margaret Macmillan.  Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World.  570 pp. D644.M32 2002

 

Stephen J. Lee. The European Dictatorships, 1918-1945. 343 p.  D723.L43 1987

 

George Kennan.  The Fateful Alliance: France, Russia and the Coming of the First World War.  300 pp.  DS511.K34 1984

 

Robert K. Massie.  Nicholas and Alexandra. [The last czar and czarina. 500 pp. but an easy read]  DK258.M3

 

Sheila Fitzpatrick. The Russian Revolution, 1917-1932. 199 p. DK265.F48 2001

 

Edmund Wilson.  To the Finland Station.  [Classic study of the Russian Revolution] 507 pp.  HX36.W5 2003

 

Alan Moorehead.  The Russian Revolution.  301 pp.  DK265.M79

 

George Kennan.  Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin. 411 pp. D633.K38

 

R. J. Sontag.  A Broken World, 1919-1939.  415 pp.  D6.R5, Vol. 19

 

Robert O. Paxton.  The Anatomy of Fascism.  321 pp.  JC481.P39 2004

 

Antony Beevor.  The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939.  2006 edition.

 

Geoffrey Best.  Churchill: A Study in Greatness. 370 pp. DA5566.9.C5B48 2001

 

Jackson J. Spielvogel.  Hitler and Nazi Germany: A History.  5th ed. 327 pp. DD247 .H5 S648 2004

 

Volker R. Berghahn.  Europe in the Era of Two World Wars: From Militarism and Genocide to Civil Society, 1900-1950.

 

Paul M. Kennedy.  Parliament of Man: The Past, Present, and Future of the United Nations.  2007

 

John Lewis Gaddis.  The Cold War: A New History.  333 pp.  D843.G22 2005 [MC Takoma Park library has 2007 edition]

 

Charles Gati.  Failed Illusions: Moscow, Washington, Budapest, and the 1956 Hungarian Revolt.  264 pp.  DB957.G36 2006

 

Victor Sebestyen.  Twelve Days: The Story of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. 340 pp.  DB957.5 .C49 S43 2006