MW 10:00-10:50 AM (100 (100 Materials Science & Eng Building) Prof. Behrooz Ghamari <
[email protected] <
[email protected]> > Office Hours: Monday and Wednesday 11:00-12:30 406 Gregory Hall Teaching Assistants: Utathya Chattopadhyaya (
[email protected]) Janine Giordano Drake (
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There is no history, only fictions of varying degrees Voltaire (1694-1778) of plausibility. –– Voltaire
Objectives It might appear rather strange to begin a syllabus for an introductory course c ourse in history with a frontispiece that questions the foundation of the discipline. This Voltarian sentiment has become one of the most important predicaments of the discipline. Curiosity and writing about the past has been a constitutive part of human communities. The past generates generates shared memories and it encourages a sense of belonging to a place or a community. In that sense, more than with the past, history has more to do with the present present and perhaps the future. Where we are, to a large extent, determines our perception of the past. That is why many contemporary scholars believe that historians do not discover history––they make it. What does that that mean? Hopefully we can answer this question question by the end of the semester.
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In its common sense, history conveys knowledge of the past. As human beings, we all relate to history in this simple way through our memory. The way we remember our own past, both things we have had experienced directly as well as things that have happened in our own lifetime without our direct involvement, often is the most persuasive form of historical knowledge. We say this all the time, I know it happened, I was there. This kind of historical knowledge or awareness is difficult to dispute; we seldom accept another version of what has happened in the past if we believe that we have direct knowledge of those events. Another way of conveying the knowledge of the past is to go above and beyond our own recollections and draw an appealing picture of it through documents in archives, oral histories, archeological findings, memoirs, etc. In both cases, the knowledge of the past seems like a straightforward and uncontroversial endeavor: one either knows the past, or knows how to find out the facts about it. That is indeed simple enough. As we shall see in this class, the knowledge of the past is everything but simple and straightforward. Why do I think that the knowledge of the past is a deeply divisive and controversial issue? (I need to confess that turning seemingly simple things in life into complicated puzzles is my job. If there were no controversies and all of us agreed on the reasons and causes and consequences of everything that has happened in history, chances are that I would lose my job. We don’t want that to happen!) Beyond self-serving reasons that justifies the need for historians and socialhistorical studies, there are more important grounds that points us to this direction of not accepting the past at its face value. One fundamental question we ask ourselves is why should we care about history? That is a very important question, and yes, it has a complicated answer. (One possible answer might be that as students you are asked to take these classes as your requirements and, since you are all aspiring young men and women, you need to learn history in order to get an “A” in your class. But let’s not be too cynical about these important issues.) One possible response to this question is we need to know the past in order to learn from it and build a better future. In other words, we don’t want to repeat our past mistakes, thus avoiding their tragic consequences. If we accept this latter reason for the study of history, we need to agree on the causes of historical events. It is easy enough to understand that if one is driving a car and she pushes the brake pedal down, the car will stop (unless there is a malfunction in the car brakes). But when it comes to history, there is hardly any simple answer to questions such as: “what were the causes of the First World War?” A great British historian, E. H. Carr, once told a story about Mr. Jones, who, returning from a party where he had had several drinks and driving a car with defective brakes, knocked down and killed Mr. Robinson at a blind corner. Mr. Robinson was on his way to buy cigarettes. What was the cause of the accident? Mr. Jones’ state of semi-intoxication, the defects in his brakes, the poor visibility at the corner, or Mr. Robinson’s addiction to cigarettes? Can historians ever hope to make sense of events like the Cold War or the French Revolution if the simplest everyday event is so fraught with perplexities?
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One of goals of this class is to add to these perplexities by showing that for many centuries, the world has been increasingly becoming an interconnected whole. Connections between human communities and the ways through which these communities affect one another adds to the complexity of history because in this scheme nothing in the world happens without some relation with global networks and flows of power, people, commodities, and capital. At the end of this class, I hope that we would be able to see how anything that happens in the remotest parts of the world, particularly in our own time, is not merely the result of interaction between those who are physically present there. To further add to the complexity of historical change, we need also to think about ecological and all other non-human elements in shaping the transformations of the world. The climate and the introduction of new goods, commodities, foodstuff, technologies, germs and diseases invariably play a significant part in how we got to where we are today. My purpose in introducing all these topics here is to draw your attention to a very important point: namely, the present is not an inevitable outcome of the past. History does not have an internal logic of its own. It does not unfold towards a predetermined, desired end. The more we understand history as contested realms of social life, the easier to recognize how the variety of interdependent global actors (human and non-human) interact and compete with one another to shape their communities and societies. COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND EVALUATION Required Readings: Robert Tignor et al. World Together, Worlds Apart: A History of Modern World from the Mongol Empire to the Present. (Vol. Two, 3rd Edition) Norton, 2011.
Naomi Klein, No Logo, Picador: New York, 2002. HIST 100 on the library E-Reserve site: https://reserves.library.illinois.edu/ares/ Attendance is required for this class. Please be respectful to all of us who try our best to be on time and do not disrupt the flow of the class by arriving late. That said, being late is better than not being there at all. If you are late please come in quietly. More than six unjustified absences from the class will result in a failing grade. Participation in both lectures and sections are also rewarded in your final grade. Please read each week’s material before class so you can contribute to discussions and raise questions about the parts of the readings you find interesting, unclear, or problematic. First Project: Look into your closet and check the labels of things you own, shirts, pants, backpack, sneakers, etc., and see which countries they are made in. Print out a map of the globe from the Internet and locate those countries on that map. Bring that one-page to class by the end of the first week.
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Final Project: Your final project is based on your first assignments. You need to choose three items which you own and examine the global chains that have brought those items to you. For example if you are having sweet nice grapes in the middle of the semester, you know that that grape is not grown any where in this country (grape is a summer fruit). So, you need to find out where that grape comes from and what needs to be in place in order to bring it to your table in Urbana-Champaign. We will discuss your final project later in the semester. Grading Two in-class Exams 100 points each 4 in class quizzes 15 points each 4 online quizzes 10 points each Final Project (Due by Dec. 12 before 5:00 pm) Section Participation Overall
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points 200 60 40 100 100 500
percentage 40% 12% 8% 20% 20% 100%
Plagiarism: (Please Read Carefully) We have a zero tolerance of plagiarism. Not knowing what constitutes plagiarism cannot be used as an excuse for violating the trust between a professor and a student. We define plagiarism as representing the words or ideas of another as one’s own. Submitting papers not written by the student is only the most blatant form of plagiarism. Plagiarism also includes, but is not limited to: copying another student’s work in exams, papers, or other exercises; inappropriate collaboration with another student; and verbatim copying, close paraphrasing, pasting in, or recombining published materials, including materials from the internet, without appropriate citation. For further consultation see: http://www.history.illinois.edu/courses/plagiarism/
CLASS SCHEDULE PART I: HISTORY INSIDE OUT (Week 1) Aug. 26-28 Introduction and the logistics of the class. We shall begin our class with a short discussion on historical methods. This, of course, is not a topic that can be addressed in a short lecture with a few pages of reading. But since I would like to draw your attention to the controversies of writing history and based on what authority one can speak of the past, let us open the this topic and continue it throughout the course.
Reading: “Truth and Objectivity,” from Appleby, Hunt, & Jacob, Telling the Truth about History, Norton, 1994: 241-70. (on e-reserve) •
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(Week 2) Sep. 4 We will continue our discussion on how to approach history without privileging contemporary relations of power. By that I mean a discussion on a very common belief in the notion that European civilization ––“The West”–– has had some unique historical advantage, some special quality of race or color or environment or mind or spirit, which gives this human community a permanent superiority over all other communities, at all times in history and down to present.
Readings: (On Compass) “History Inside Out,” from J. M. Blaut, The Colonizer’s Model of the World, Guilford, 1993: 1-49. “World History and a World Outlook,” from Edmund Burke, III, ed., Rethinking World History, Cambridge, 1993: 35-43. •
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Quiz No. 1, Wednesday, Sep. 11 PART II: BEFORE THE EUROPEAN HEGEMONY (Week 3) Sep. 9-11 We shall focus on three major world historical events during the long thirteenth century: Conquest, Trade, and Travel. During this period, from mid-1200s to mid-1400s, many new empires and sultanates emerged in Africa and Asia. Some of these new large political entities came into being through conquest and others expanded via trade. Conquest and how it brought disparate peoples together is one of the main features of this period. We shall particularly focus on Central Asian warriors who played a crucial role in altering the thirteenth-century world. We shall examine how the Turkish warriors and the Mongols who conquered much of Eurasia created new cultural and technological exchanges and furthered contact between different worlds.
Trade was a major factor in bringing the Afro-Eurasian worlds into closer contact. We shall emphasize goods being exchanged, how goods were transported, and how commercial transactions between merchants were arranged. During this period, trade circuits, in land and particularly in Indian Ocean, allowed for the diffusion of ideas, such as the spread of Islam into Southeast Asia, and technology, such as the increased use of gunpowder in areas outside China. Two major world travelers, Ibn Battuta and Marco Polo, offer distinct views of these worlds. We shall travel along with them via the trade routes and “major attractions” of the period. Looking at and emphasizing the scope of trade and different means of bringing the world together has important theoretical implications. The big myth of “Western Civilization” is that it has been on a incessant progressive path and in its way it had brought many other civilizations (or “uncivilized” people) into the 5
mainstream of history (what ever that might mean). In this week’s reading, we shall examine how the world would appear if we look at history not from the changes that had shaped European experience. Readings: Chapter 10, pp. 363-409, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart. (Compass): Janet Abu Lughod, “The World System in the Thirteenth Century,” from American Historical Association, Essays on Global and Comparative History, 1994. •
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(Week 4) Sep. 16-18 One of most important worldwide events in the period that preceded European hegemony was the ravishment of the Black Death. With the growth of trade and wars of conquest, the plague started in China and Central Asia, and afflicted much of Afro-Eurasia from early 1330s to late 1350s. According to some estimates, in a span of thirty to forty years, the fourteen-century plague killed close to 25% of the population from China to England.
This week we would like to think about the economic, social, and political consequences of the plague. How different regions coped with it and what kind of social institutions emerged as the result of its outbreak. We shall focus on three major responses to restore political order and economic stability during this time: Islamic Dynasties; Ming China; Western Christendom. Readings: Chapter 11, pp. 412-447, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart. Robert Finlay, “The Pilgrim Art: The culture of Porcelain in World History,” Journal of World History, Vol. 9, No. 2 (Fall 1998) pp. 141-188. (EReserve) • •
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Online Quiz 1, Available Sep. 18-23
PART III: THE ATLANTIC WORLD & THE EMERGENCE OF EUROPEAN COLONIALISM (Week 5) Sep. 23-25 One of the main ideas that we pursue in this class is to show the continuity and interconnections between earlier trends that brought the world together with the emergence of Europe as a colonizing world power. Of course there were major differences between the way commerce and trade developed and how these activities were integrated into the everyday lives of people in Afro-Eurasia on the one hand and Euro-Atlantic on the other. We shall discuss these differences in class.
This week, we shall explore the early impact of the European maritime revolution starting in the fifteenth century. Specifically, we shall trace the early 6
development and consequences of the creation of an Atlantic Ocean system that joined Western Europe, the Americas, and Africa commercially and the entry of Europeans into the already thriving Indian Ocean system. Reading: Chapter 12, pp. 448-482, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart. •
Quiz No. 2, October 2 (Week 6) Sep. 30-October 2 From 1600-1750 world trade both expanded and became more highly integrated. An ever-wider amount and type of goods were exchanged across the globe. None was more important than New World silver, which gave Europeans a commodity that they could exchange for Asian products. These ever-tightening circuits of trade had diverse effects on different regions and their relations with each other. In the Americas, Europeans consolidated their hold over larger portions of territory, but new colonial powers entered the fray. Increasingly, sugar and other agricultural commodities grew in importance in the Americas, necessitating the importation of more and more African slaves. The expansive Atlantic slave trade further shaped political developments in Africa below the Saharan desert. The wealth from the Atlantic Ocean system further strengthened certain European nations’ commercial and military strength. In Asia, increased wealth resulting from rising global commerce served to undermine several dynasties’ strength, leading to either collapse or severe weakening of power. By examining the significance of sugar in the political economy of the so called “new world,” we shall scrutinize how the production, distribution and consumption of a commodity can fundamentally transform the basic bonds and institutions of different communities.
Reading: Chapter 13, pp. 483-524, Worlds Together, World Apart. •
(Week 7) Oct. 7-9 As much as the history of the world is shaped by flows of people, trade, and conquest, non-human elements and the interaction of human societies with them, goods, and commodities have also influenced this history in so many ways. The commodification of foodstuffs (sugar, coffee, potato), agricultural goods (cotton), and the appropriation of ecological elements (wind, stars, rivers) have much to do with the emergence of the modern world as we know it. This week, we take a little break from human-human interaction to pay some attention to how human societies interacted with their environment and how these interaction led to irreversible transformations of the world.
Readings: Alfred Crosby, “Winds,”& “Within Reach, Beyond Grasp,” pp.104-144, from Ecological Imperialism, Cambridge, 2004. Sidney Mintz “Food, Sociality, and Sugar,” pp. 3-18 in, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History, Penguin Book, 1985. •
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Exam No. 1, Wednesday October 16 (Week 8) Oct. 14-16 During the period between 1600-1780, not only in the realm of military power, but also economically and culturally, Europe gradually emerged as a world dominating power. New wealth created by increased transregional trade (slave trade and the plundering of minerals and precious metals and other natural resources) turned the world into a more interdependent system. European powers benefited the most from this newly generated wealth. They developed new technologies which in turn augmented their military superiority over other regions of the world, most importantly over East Asia and West Asian Muslim empires. The new situation in Europe also reinforced a chauvinistic position among the elite. Because of their growing dominance, many of their philosophers went so far as to develop what they considered objective universal principles applicable to all societies. Europe did not enjoy the fruits of its emerging power evenly. The poor and most women were relegated to the sidelines. In the Americas and Oceania, indigenous populations came under increased European cultural subjugation. From 1750 to 1850, on the one hand, European societies went through long periods of civil wars and revolutions and, on the other hand, they established their dominance over other world powers and began a long period of colonization of the non-European world.
Readings: Chapter 15, pp. 561-598, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart Donald Wright, from The World and a Very Small Place in Africa, Part III, “The Colonial Period,” M. E. Sharpe, 2004, pp. 123-156. (e-Reserve) • •
Online Quiz 2, Available Oct. 23-28 (Week 9) Oct. 21-23 The long nineteenth century, beginning mid-1700s to early 1900s, shaped the foundations of relations of power of the contemporary world. A new global order emerged based on ideas of the French and American Revolutions (most importantly the right of self-determination), laissez-faire capitalism, the nationstate, new technologies, and industrial organizations. In contrast to what appears to us as a preordained path of progress, this period witnessed the clash of various ideas and movements for different future possibilities. In various areas and among diverse peoples, alternative movements periodically surfaced to challenge this future. These rebellions, whether they emanated from political radicals, charismatic prophets, peasants, or anti-imperialist insurgents, developed countervisions to industrial, and increasingly monopoly, capitalism. In many ways, the conflict over a desired future was the distinguishing feature of world history during this period.
Readings: Chapter 16, pp. 599-630, World Together, Worlds Apart. •
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Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto. Chapters I and II. Download: http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communistmanifesto/ Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani, “Materialists in India,” & “Answer to Renan,” pp. 175-187, from Nikki Keddie, ed., An Islamic Response to Imperialism, UC Press, 1968. (E-Reserve) •
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Online Quiz 3, Available Oct. 30-Nov. 4 (Week 10) Oct. 28-30 The worldwide consequences of this period, also known as the period of nation and empire building, were unprecedented in human history. Triumphant European capitalism inaugurated an era of everlasting uncertainty and uninterrupted disturbance of social conditions, even in the remotest parts of the world. During this period, as Karl Marx aptly observed, “All fixed, fast-frozen relations, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”
Imperial expansion and nation-state building changed the map of the world. In Europe, the Americas, and Japan, exponents of the nation-state claimed that the world should be divided up into groups who shared a common past, culture, territory, and traditions. Many traditions and common pasts were invented during this period around the world. Through this process, some existing countries such as Japan and the United States became new actors on the global stage. In Europe, the new countries of German and Italy appeared and within one generation established themselves as the modern reincarnations of ancient civilizations. The overseas expansion of European powers, the United States, and Japan along with the growth of new technologies and methods of communication and transportation further knitted the world’s regional economies into a larger superstructure. They also facilitated the largest reshuffling of people and resources the world had ever seen. Readings: Chapter 17, pp. 631-668. Worlds Together, Worlds Apart. Benedict Anderson, “Introduction,” pp. 11-16, “Patriotism and Racism,” (Chapter 8) pp. 129-140, from Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism , Verso, 1991. (e-Reserve) • •
Quiz No. 3, November 6 PART IV: FROM PROMISES TO PLIGHTS (Week 11) Nov. 4-6 The advent of global capitalism, with its technological advancements and reliance on scientific knowledge brought the promise of better life and “pursuit of happiness.” The colonization of Asia, Africa, and South America often was
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justified (some still use this justification) that the only way that the rest of the world could enjoy the same kind of prosperity and the perceived happiness as Europeans was to join the March of History through colonial interventions. As one Muslim reformist of the late 19th century once remarked, “[the British] drew their swords to cut the throats of the Muslims, while weeping for them and crying: ‘We kill you only out of compassion and pity for you, and seeking to improve you and make your life more comfortable.’” But the two world wars that began in 1914 and 1939, respectively, left unprecedented devastations throughout the world. More importantly, these wars shed doubts on the promises of happiness and prosperity and made the emulation of Europe an undesirable path for the future of the colonized. Readings: Chapter 18, pp. 669-706. World Together, Worlds Apart. •
(Week 12) Nov. 11-13 Not only was the twentieth century marked by two world wars, it saw the rise of revolutionary movements, national liberation movements of the colonized nations, civil rights and liberties movements for the marginalized and the oppressed. The growing wealth accumulated in the hands of a few and the constitution of a world order (in which colonial relations were institutionalized and sustained by what came to be known as the “first world”) met with resistance from many quarters of the world. The Russian Revolution of 1917, and a series of national liberation movements from India, China, and Vietnam in Asia to the Congo, Ghana, and Algeria swept the world with demands for independence, dignity, and wellbeing. This week, we shall focus on national liberation movements in Asia and Africa and will try to understand what the people of these regions fought for, and what they could achieve. Many leaders of these movements promoted self-reliance and attempted to created an independent system that was not at the mercy of global flows of capital and investment. Here we see the problems of a world together and a world apart very clearly.
Readings: Chapter 20, pp. 745-784. World Together, Worlds Apart. Optional Films: The Battle of Algiers & Lumumba (on reserve at the library) • •
Exam No. 2, Wednesday Nov. 20 (Week 13) Nov. 18-20 We shall continue our discussion on how globalization processes have created zones of exclusion and inclusion. Often globalization is understood as a unidirectional (from the West to the Rest) process of transformation of the world economy and culture. This week we shall examine how globalization has turned the world into what one scholar has called a “risk society.” This risk ranges from environmental consequences of the new world order to the heightened problems of health, security, and dignity.
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Readings: Chapter 21, pp. 785-822. World Together, Worlds Apart. •
Online Quiz 4, Available Nov. 18-20 (Week 14-15) Dec. 2-4 & Dec. 9-11 We shall continue our theme of globalization with a closer look at different ways through which these processes are challenged by different social and political movements. As we discussed early on in the class, we should not understand history as an inevitable outcome of events and relationships. Indeed, as one observer commented, “the best way to predict the future is to create it.” We need to keep that in mind that globalization effects people in various ways, while at the same time various groups of people shape the circumstances of globalization.
Quiz No. 4, Dec. 9 Readings: Naomi Klein, 2002, No Logo, Picador: New York. “A Web of Brands,” pp. xv-xxiii, “New Branded World,” (Chapter One) pp. 2-26, “A Tale of Three Logos: The Swoosh, the Shell, and the Arches,” (Chapter 16) pp. 365-96. “Bad Mood Rising,” (Chapter 14) pp. 325-343, “Local Foreign Policy,” (Chapter 17) pp. 397-419. Video: The Hidden Face of Globalization , a look at the condition of garment workers in Bangladesh. This documentary shows how the law protects labels, the trademark, and the logo, but not the human being who makes them. •
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Bill Weinberg, “Zapatista and the globalization of resistance,” YES! Magazine, Spring 2004. Available at http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=735 Christopher Chase-Dunn & Barry Gills, “Understanding Waves of Globalization and Resistance in the Capitalist World (-) System: Social Movements and Critical Global(ization) Studies,” 2003, available at http://www.irows.ucr.edu/papers/irows12/irows12.htm Video: Zapatista, 1998, Big Noise Productions. The video shows the historical roots of the emergence of the Zapatista movement in Chiapas and explores the lessons we may learn from this global movement for justice. •
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Final research papers due: Monday December 16 before 5PM in my mail box @ the main office of the History Department, 309 Gregory Hall.
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