This course provides a basic history of American social, economic, and political development from the colonial period through the Civil War. It examines the colonial heritages of Spanish and British America; the American Revolution and its impact; the establishment and growth of the new nation; and the Civil War, its background, character, and impact. Readings include writings of the period by J. Winthrop, T. Paine, T. Jefferson, J. Madison, W. H. Garrison, G. Fitzhugh, H. B. Stowe, and A. Lincoln.

The ĺÎĺ_ĺĚĄ_American Renaissance,ĺÎĺ_ĺĚĺÎĺ a period of tremendous literary activity that took place in America between the 1830s and 1860s represents the cultivation of a distinctively American literature. The student will begin this course by looking at what it was in American culture and society that led to the dramatic outburst of literary creativity in this era. The student will then explore some of the periodĺÎĺ_ĺĚĺ_s most famous works, attempting to define the emerging American identity represented in this literature. Upon successful completion of this course, the student will be able to: discriminate among the key economic, technological, social, and cultural transformations underpinning the American Renaissance; define the transformations in American Protestantism exemplified by the second Great Awakening and transcendentalism; list the key tenets of transcendentalism and relate them to romanticism more broadly and to social and cultural developments in the antebellum United States; analyze EmersonĺÎĺ_ĺĚĺ_s place in defining transcendentalism and his key differences from other transcendentalists; analyze competing conceptualizations of poetry and its construction and purpose, with particular attention to Poe, Emerson, and Whitman; define the formal innovations of Dickinson and their relationship to her central themes; describe the emergence of the short story as a form, with reference to specific stories by Hawthorne and Poe; distinguish among forms of the novel, with reference to specific works by Hawthorne, Thompson, and Fern; analyze the ways that writers such as Melville, Brownson, Davis, and Thoreau saw industrialization and capitalism as a threat to U. S. society; develop the relationship between ThoreauĺÎĺ_ĺĚĺ_s interest in nature and his political commitments and compare and contrast his thinking with Emerson and other transcendentalists; analyze the different ways that sentimentalism constrained and empowered women writers to critique gender conventions, with reference to specific works by writers such as Fern, Alcott, and Stowe; define the ways that the slavery question influenced major texts and major controversies over literature during this period. This free course may be completed online at any time. (English Literature 405)

This is a brief lesson designed to introduce students to the lives and contributions of Sarah and Angelina Grimke, two remarkable sisters, who played a pivotal role in the Abolitionist and  Suffrage Movements in South Carolina and the United States. 

Democratic candidate James Buchanan, as a buck deer, crosses the finish line of a racecourse ahead of competitors Millard Fillmore and John C. Fremont. Spectators cheer in the stands behind. Fillmore appears as an emaciated horse, fallen on the course. Next, Fremont follows close on the heels of Buchanan. Fremont stands astride two horses: one with the head of New York "Tribune" editor Horace Greeley and the other the "wooly nag" of abolitionism. The latter here more closely resembles a filly than a nag. Greeley: "Monte why didn't you lean more on the wooly horse--you gave me all your weight--never mind we've beat the grey Filly [i.e., Fillmore] next time we'ill head off that hard old Buck." Fremont: "Get out--hang you and the Wooly Horse--I could beat that broken down silver grey "Filly" and the old Buck too--had I gone on my own hook." Fillmore: "Oh! Oh! why did'nt I stay in sweet Italy with my friend King Bomba and the lazy Neapolitans--Then I should not have been blowen up like a Bag of wind in this Chase." Buchanan: "Never mind Gentn. I could not "help" beating you, the American Nation wished it so--I will send you all to Ostend--and I promise you that I will have no Tailors in my white House. [As a youth Fillmore had been apprenticed to a tailor.] Mercy on me! to think that this Glorious People should be almost Pierced to Death [a reference to unpopular Democratic incumbent Franklin Pierce] by War and making Free States in this land of Liberty by a set of Fashion inventores 'I'll none of it.'"|Probably drawn by John L. Magee.|Published by John Childs, 84 So. 3rd St. Phila.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1856-18.

A DPLA primary Source Set about John Brown that has been imported onto OER Commons.Content Warnings: Old John Brow: A song for Every Southern Man contains slurs, outdated and offensive language is utilized in several other of the primary sources as wellOriginal primary source set created by Nancy Schurr, Chattanooga State Community College, TennesseeImported into OER Commons by Andrew CharltonJones as part of his capstone for his University of Washington MLIS Degree 

A test of bringing DPLA primary Source Set onto OER Commons. Still in progress!

No longer considered ‘side’ issues within eighteenth and nineteenth-century studies, slavery, ‘race’, abolition and emancipation are now understood to occupy a central place, not only within the period’s history, but within its literature, philosophy and the concerns of canonical and less well-known writers. The course moves forward to the present day to consider how slavery persists as a central concern within world literature.

This course explores the issue of human trafficking for forced labour and sexual slavery, focusing on its representation in recent scholarly accounts and advocacy as well as in other media. Ethnographic and fictional readings along with media analysis help to develop a contextualized and comparative understanding of the phenomena in both past and present contexts. It examines the wide range of factors and agents that enable these practices, such as technology, cultural practices, social and economic conditions, and the role of governments and international organizations. The course also discusses the analytical, moral and methodological questions of researching, writing, and representing trafficking and slavery.

Full course on American History with an emphasis on abolitionist leaders in the Boston area.