U.S. History from Civil-Present

Download Syllabus: The United States from the Colonial Era to the Civil War Era

Course Description:

This course is a survey of United States history from 1865 to the present era. It highlights a range of people, movements, ideologies and events, which shaped U.S. society and the U.S. presence in the world over this long historical period. Major themes will include Reconstruction and Jim Crow, U.S. Empire in the Caribbean and Latin America, World War I, The Great Depression, World War II, the Cold War, U.S. Interventions in East Asia, the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements, the Feminist Movements, the Gay Rights Movement, Movements for Immigrant Justice, The War on “Terror”, and Contemporary Social Movements. In exploring these events, we will attempt to answer the central questions concerning U.S. history after the Civil War. Who has benefited and who suffered from U.S. Empire? How did groups without political, social and economic power challenge the structures that shape U.S. society? Furthermore, we will examine how history has become a battlefield between those who want things to stay the same, and those who seek a more just society. Students will be engaged in using critical thinking skills to analyze primary documents and secondary source materials.

 Prerequisites

 No prerequisites for this course

 Learning Outcomes

Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:

  • Identify and discuss the importance of struggles for equal social, political and economic rights, the increasing engagement of the U.S. in the world, the development of the U.S. economy, the expanding scope and power of the federal government, and shifting attitudes and policies regarding diversity in U.S. history since the Civil War.
  • Identify and apply the key historical concepts of change-over-time, cause-and-effect, agency, historical empathy, and continuity and discontinuity, and recognize how these concepts are employed in the historical method.
  • Explain how conceptions of freedom, equality, and opportunity changed from the Civil War to the present.
  • Analyze and interpret primary sources with attention to audience, authorship and context.
  • Evaluate the ways in which historians have conflicting interpretations of the past.
  • Recognize how and why U.S. history has been taught differently to different generations and communities.
  • Produce a paper with a clear thesis and appropriate citations based on strong evidence drawn from historical sources.

Course Resources

Course Textbook

The American Yawp: A Massively Collaborative Open U.S. History (Stanford University Press, Last Updated January 2022)

Primary Resources

Ho Chi Minh to Secretary of State Robert Lansing (1919)

The American Yawp Reader: A Documentary Companion to the American Yawp (Stanford University Press, Last Updated January 2022)

Soviet Publication of Secret Treaties (1917)

Voices from the Heart of Gotham: The Undergraduate Oral History Collection at Guttman Community College

Additional Materials

Corbett, P. Scott, Volker Janssen, John M. Lund, Todd Pfannestiel, Sylvie Waskiewicz, Paul Vickery, U.S. History,(OpenStax, Last Updated 2021)

Finesurrey, Samuel Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society (OER Commons, Last Updated 2022)

_________, “Conducting Interviews,” in Ethnographies of Work, edited by Alia R. Tyler-Mullings, Mary Gotta, Ryan Coughlan, (Manifold, 2019).

Friedman, Max Paul “The Good Neighbor Policy” Oxford Research Encyclopedias: Latin American History(2018)

Holloway, Kali “American History Is Getting Whitewashed, Again” The Nation (October 2, 2020)

Norouzi, Ebrahim, “The Dulles Brothers,” The Mossadegh Project (2010)

Shaffer, Robert “The Abraham Lincoln Brigade and the Spanish Civil War in U.S. History Textbooks,” The Volunteer (2021)

Course Assignments and Grading

A+ 4.0 97-100%
A 4.0 93-96.9%
A- 3.7 90-92.9%
B+ 3.3 87-89.9%
B 3.0 83-86.9%
B- 2.7 80-82.9%
C+ 2.3 77-79.9%
C 2.0 73-76.9%
C- 1.7 70-72.9%
D+ 1.3 67-69.9%
D (passing) 1.0 60-66.9%
F 0 0-59.9%
NC* Not calculated 0-59.9%

Weekly Assignments (30 Percent): Every week there will be a set of graded assignments on the readings due Sunday at midnight. You will submit your notes on the assigned materials and write a paragraph response to each discussion question.

Oral History Project (20 Percent): You and each of your peers will interview an elder from your family or community about how they were taught the events we’ll be covering in this course. You and your classmates will create the questions, choose your interviewees, conduct the interviews, collect photos, and consent forms, before creating a transcript of the interview.

Final Paper (20 Percent): You will submit a final paper where you look at how a certain event from the class of your choosing has been taught overtime. Using your own interview and those of your peers, as well as old textbooks and primary source, you will analyze how and why an event was explained differently in the past when compared to how we approached the historic event, theme and movement this semester.

Final Exam (20 Percent): The final exam will consist of short answers and a single essay.

Participation (10 Percent): You are expected to participate in class discussion.

Course Schedule

Week Topic Assignment Due
1 Class One: Reconstruction & Jim Crow

 

Class Two: The West

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Fifteen (Reconstruction)
    Chapter Seventeen (Sections I-VI: Introduction, Post-Civil War Westward Migration, The Indian Wars and Federal Peace Policies, Beyond the Plains & Western Economic Expansion: Railroads and Cattle, The Allotment Era and Resistance in the Native West)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Mississippi Black Codes (1865)”, “Jourdon Anderson Writes his Former Enslaver (1865)” Chapter 15
    “Chief Joseph on Indian Affairs (1877, 1879)”, “Turning Hawk and American Horse on the Wounded Knee Massacre (1890/1891)”, “Laura C. Kellogg on Indian Education (1913)” & “Helen Hunt Jackson on a Century of Dishonor (1881)” Chapter 16
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
2 Class Three: A New Phase in U.S. Empire

 

Class Four: Immigrant Labor and Industrialization
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Sixteen (Capital and Labor)
    Chapter Nineteen (American Empire)
  2. Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society:
    “An Overseas Empire” & “Dollar Diplomacy in Haiti”
  3. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Lucy Parsons on Women and Revolutionary Socialism (1905)”, “Dispatch from a Mississippi Colored Farmers Alliance (1889)” “Lawrence Textile Strike (1912)” & “Henry George, Progress and Poverty (1879)” Chapter 16
    “Rudyard Kipling, The White Man’s Burden (1899)”, “Mark Twain, The War Prayer (1904-05)”, & Chinese Immigrants Confront Anti-Chinese Prejudice (1885, 1903)” Chapter 19
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
3 Class Five:  World War One: A New Brand of Warfare

 

Class Seven:  World War One – International Impact

 

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-One (World War One & Its Aftermath)
  2. The American Yawp Reader
    “Manuel Quezon calls for Filipino Independence (1919)” Chapter 21
  3. “Ho Chi Minh to Secretary of State Robert Lansing(1919)”
  4. “Soviet Publication of Secret Treaties (1917)”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
4 Class Six:  World War One – U.S. Movements for — and against — Racial, Gender, Immigrant and Economic Justice

 

 

Class Eight: New Urban Realities — The Great Migration, Immigration and New Ways of Work

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Eighteen (Life in Industrial America)
    Chapter Twenty (The Progressive Era)
    Chapter Twenty-Two (Section VI, VII & IX: “The New Negro”, Culture War & Rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives (1890)” Chapter 18
    “Eugene Debs, How I Became a Socialist (1902)”, “Alice Stone Blackwell, Answering Objections to Women’s Suffrage (1917)” & “College Day on the Picket Line (1917)” Chapter 20
    “The Sedition Act of 1918”, “Emma Goldman on Patriotism (1917)” & “W.E.B. DuBois Returning Soldiers (1919)” Chapter 21
    “Explanation of the Objects of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (1921)” & “Hiram Evans on The Klan’s Fight for Americanism (1926)” Chapter 22
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
5 Class Nine: The Great Depression – Domestically

 

Class Ten: The Great Depression – U.S. Empire

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Three (The Great Depression)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Bonus Army Routed,” Chapter 23
  3. Latin American History:
    “The Good Neighbor Policy”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
6 Class Eleven: Americans in Spain and Ethiopia and the Lead Up to World War II

 

Class Twelve: World War II

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Three (World War II)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Charles A. Lindbergh, America First (1941),” “Aiko Herzig-Yoshinaga on Japanese Internment (1942/1944),” Chapter 23
  3. The Volunteer:
    “The Abraham Lincoln Brigade and the Spanish Civil War in U.S. History Textbooks”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
7 Class Thirteen: World War II Births a Bipolar World with No Room for Dissent in the U.S.

 

Class Fourteen: Introduction to Oral History Project – “Ways of Remembering America’s Foundation”

 

 

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Five (Sections I-IV: Introduction, Political, Economic and Military Dimensions, The Arms Buildup, the Space Race, and Technological Advancements & The Cold War Red Scare, McCarthyism, and Liberal Anti-Communism)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Joseph McCarthy on Communism (1950)” & “Paul Robeson’s Appearance Before the House Un-American Activities Committee (1956)” Chapter 25
  3. Ethnographies of Work:
    “Conducting Interviews”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
8 Class Fifteen:  The Foundation and Deployment of the CIA in Europe, Iran, Guatemala and Chile

 

Class Sixteen:  The Limits of U.S. Empire – Cuba, Korea and Vietnam

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Five (Section V: Decolonization and the Global Reach of the ‘American Century’)
    Chapter Twenty-Seven ( Section II V: Kennedy and Cuba & The Origins of the Vietnam War)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Declaration of Independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945),” Chapter 23
    “George M. Garcia, Vietnam Veteran, Oral History (2012/1969),” Chapter 28
  3. Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society:
    “The Overthrow of Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz”
  4. The Mossadegh Project:
    “The Dulles Brothers,”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response

3)
9 Class Seventeen: Finalizing Oral History Project – “Ways of Remembering America’s Foundation”

 

Class Eighteen:  The Civil Rights Movement and Massive Resistance

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Six (Section II-IV: The Rise of the Suburbs, Race and Education, Civil Rights in an Affluent Society)
    Chapter Twenty-Seven (Section III, IV & VII: The Civil Rights Movement Continues, Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society & Beyond Civil Rights)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “A. Philip Randolph and Franklin Roosevelt on Racial Discrimination in the Defense Industry (1941)” Chapter Twenty-Three
    “Fanny Lou Hamer: Testimony at the Democratic National Convention (1964),” Chapter Twenty-Eight
  3. Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society:
    The Harlem 9
  4. The Nation:
    “American History Is Getting Whitewashed, Again”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response

3)     Oral History Questions and Edits Due

 
10 Class Nineteen: Black Power and the War on Drugs

 

Class Twenty: 1960s, 70s & 80s Movements for Social Justice and Against War.

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Twenty-Six (Section V: Gender and Culture in the Affluent Society)
    Chapter Twenty-Seven (Section VI: Culture and Activism)
    Chapter Twenty-Eight (Section II, IV, VI & VII: The Strain of Vietnam, The Crisis of 1968, Deindustrialization and the Rise of the Sunbelt & The Politics of Love Sex and Gender)
    Chapter Twenty-Nine (Section IX: The Culture Wars of the 1980s)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Migrant Farmers and Immigrant Labor (1952)” & “Rosa Parks on Life in Montgomery, Alabama (1956-1958),” Chapter 27
    “Women’s Liberation March (1970),” “Statement by John Kerry of Vietnam Veterans Against the War (1971)” & “Native Americans Occupy Alcatraz (1969)” Chapter 28
    “Jesse Jackson on the Rainbow Coalition (1984)” Chapter 29
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response

3)     Oral History Projects Due

 

 
11 Class Twenty-One: The Long War on “Terror”

 

Class Twenty-Two: Contemporary Movements for Social Justice

 
  1. The American Yawp:
    Chapter Thirty (The Recent Past)
  2. The American Yawp Reader:
    “Chelsea Manning Petitions for a Pardon (2013),” Chapter 30
  3. Case Studies in the History of U.S. Empire and Society:
    “The War on Terror”
 1)     Reading Notes

2)     Discussion Response
12 Class Twenty-Three: Final Review 1)     Final Paper Due

 
  Last day of Class
  Final Exams
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.