HIST 171 World History, 1500-Present

Overview of Course

This course offers a comparative study of world history from 1500 to the present, with an emphasis on the complex forces that shaped the modern world, including how empires expanded and collapsed, how states were built and contested, and how people across the globe responded to changing systems of power, knowledge, and belief. The Scientific Revolution, Age of Exploration, Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution, Colonization and Decolonization, World War I and World War II, and the globalization of the Cold War will all be examined, with a particular focus on how the impact of these events can still be seen in the countries we will visit through our own cross-cultural encounters with world societies. A major focus will be on reading and analyzing primary sources—ranging from novels, travel accounts, memoirs, and government documents to letters, artifacts, songs, and films. In keeping with the mission of Semester at Sea, there will be much emphasize on comparing histories and experiences from each country, and in finding the traces of the history we have studied in everyday life in the places we visit.

Learning outcomes include understanding major themes, events, and chronology of world history from 1500-present, employing historical thinking and concepts like context, changes or continuities over time, causation, and human agency vs. structural limits. Students will also investigate textual and artifactual primary sources and different secondary source interpretations of history and analyze multiple perspectives to create written and oral narratives, analyses, and syntheses of modern global history.