History - AEP/ESP (HISTN-UH)

Global Histories provides students with a broad understanding of the development of the modern world. The course introduces students to the origins and evolution of civilization and human thought and traces how the world became increasingly integrated and connected - economically, politically, militarily and socially, and what that means for how the world works today. The course begins by asking what we might mean by 'global history,' and then considers global phenomena including empire, slavery, colonialism and revolution, through primary and secondary sources. We will explore how and where that past interacts with the present. In the course an emphasis is placed on understanding different historical contexts and points of view through the use of primary sources, and on identifying and evaluating moments of cross-cultural interaction within world history. Through this course, students should develop a greater awareness of the global processes that have shaped the world in which we live.

The history of falconry is not a hunting story. It's a story of human imagination of self, society, and the natural world. Approaching falconry as a "social fact" and as an example of what specialists refer to as "intangible heritage," this course asks what human engagements with these birds of prey, across time and culture, reveal about relationships between humans and nature - relationships of ethics and respect, but also of desire and domination. How might a close examination of falconry help explain the emergence and transformation of social categories such as nobility and poverty, male and female, believer and pagan, citizen and foreigner? How might it require us to confront human fragility - our bodily, intellectual, and spiritual limits, our experiences of joy, love, youth, death, faith, science, and more? Engaging with texts, images, and films, students will ask how humans use non-human species to understand and define ourselves, our civilizations, and our aspirations across a range of ethnic, religious, historical, and geographical differences.