BA History

The course will offer students an overview of American history and culture in the Civil War era (roughly 1850-1868) while also allowing for more specialised work (through a research essay) in particular aspects of that period. The course expressly encourages the critical use of primary source materials (through seminar discussion and in the unseen examination). 

•  To allow students to explore major themes in American history and culture in the Civil War era (roughly 1850-1877)
   
• To investigate the impact of Civil War upon different social groups and upon the wider social, economic, and political development of the United States
   
• To evaluate the changing dynamics of race, gender, and class relations in the United States during the exigencies of war
   
• To acquaint students with a wide variety of primary sources appropriate to the study of the period
   
• To introduce students to some of the most important scholarly debates in the field.

2 lecture hours + 1 hour seminar      

Syllabus, reading lists delivered via Canvas

Students may conduct original research in the JRUL’s e-newspaper holdings and other relevant databases.

• On completion of the course successful students should be able to demonstrate:

• An understanding of the main developments and themes in American history and culture during the Civil War era

• An understanding of the differing effects of the war’s impact on different social groups in American society

• Basic familiarity with some of the important scholarly debates relating to the Civil War era
   
• The ability to analyse in depth a range of primary sources and place them in historical context

• A capacity to find, use and critically evaluate a variety of primary and secondary source materials relevant for interpreting American history and culture during the Civil War era
   
• An ability to write a properly researched, coherent research paper with a sustained argument and respect for scholarly conventions on some aspect of the Civil War era

• Development of research and writing skills
   
• Development of verbal skills in oral presentation and debate in seminars
   
• Cultivation of critical faculties in evaluating evidence and arguments
   
• Group work in seminars

Historiographical Review 

Written feedback on essays; the opportunity to discuss assessment tasks; additional one-to-one feedback (during the consultation hour or by making an appointment)

The core text will be Michael Perman and Amy Murrell Taylor, eds., Major Problems in the Civil War and Reconstruction (2010, third edition).

Ira Berlin, Freedom’s Soldiers: The Black Military Experience in the Civil War

Catherine Clinton and Nina Silber, eds., Divided Houses: Gender and the Civil War

Robert Cook, Civil War America: Making a Nation, 1848-1877

Eric Foner, Forever Free: The Story of Emancipation and Reconstruction

William Freehling, The South versus the South: How Anti-Confederate Southerners Shaped the Course of the Civil War

Susan-Mary Grant & Brian Holden Reid, eds, The American Civil War: Explorations and Reconsiderations

James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom

James McPherson and William Cooper, eds., Writing the Civil War: The Quest to Understand

Peter Parish, The American Civil War