14.731 Economic History (MIT)
This course offers a comprehensive survey of world economic history, designed to introduce economics graduate students to the subject matter and methodology of economic history. Topics are chosen to show a wide variety of historical experience and illuminate the process of industrialization. A final term paper is due at the end of the course.
21H.416J Medieval Economic History in Comparative Perspective (MIT)
This course will survey the conditions of material life and the changing social and economic relations in medieval Europe with reference to the comparative context of contemporary Islamic, Chinese, and central Asian experiences. The subject covers the emergence and decline of feudal institutions, the transformation of peasant agriculture, living standards and the course of epidemic disease, and the ebb and flow of long-distance trade across the Eurasian system. Particular emphasis will be placed
STS.310 History of Science (MIT)
This seminar explores recent historiographical approaches within the history of science. Students will read a wide variety of studies covering topics from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries, from the physical sciences to natural history and medicine. Emphasis will be placed on: deciphering different theoretical approaches; the pros and cons of different research questions, subjects, and sources of evidence; and what makes for good and interesting history of science.
24.201 Topics in the History of Philosophy: Kant (MIT)
In this course we shall study the Critique of Pure Reason with special focus on questions about idealism, about our ignorance of things in themselves, and about what, if anything, idealism has to do with this kind of ignorance. Along the way we shall consider Kant's distinctive account of space, matter, and force, all of which had a significant role to play in his own philosophy, and in the historical evolution of field theory. In the last part of the course we shall look at an alternative, and
CMS.876 History of Media and Technology: Sound, the Minority Report -- Radical Music of the Past 100
This course looks at the history of avant-garde and electronic music from the early twentieth century to the present. The class is organized as a theory and production seminar for which students may either produce audio/multimedia projects or a research paper. It engages music scholarship, cultural criticism, studio production, and multi-media development, such as recent software, sound design for film and games, and sound installation. Sound as a media tool for communication and sound as a form
Topics in Pre-Modern Japanese History
This book emphasizes a succession of topics rather than strict adherence to the flow of time. The chapters move from earlier periods of time to later periods of time, but their content and organization gives top priority to coverage of topics. While the "mainstream" narrative of politics and institutions is present in these pages, the emphasis is on social and cultural history wherever possible.
Topics in Pre-Modern Chinese History
A goal of this book and the course as a whole is to encourage broad, integrative thinking about history and human affairs. Readers are encouraged to compare Chinese history with the histories of other parts of the world and with contemporary problems and issues. Readers are also encouraged to think about the process of history making (i.e., writing) itself.
Topics in Medieval Japanese History
This book differs from many other textbooks in that it contains relatively less political, institutional and military history and relatively more social and cultural history than is typically the case. Within the cultural history of medieval Japan, Buddhism is of the utmost importance. This book therefore contains an introduction to the origin and major teachings of Buddhism. Subsequent chapters expand on this introduction in the context of Japanese history.
STS.340J Introduction to the History of Technology (MIT)
This course is an introduction to the consideration of technology as the outcome of particular technical, historical, cultural, and political efforts, especially in the United States during the 19th and 20th centuries. Topics include industrialization of production and consumption, development of engineering professions, the emergence of management and its role in shaping technological forms, the technological construction of gender roles, and the relationship between humans and machines.
Topics in Modern East Asian History
The overall purpose of this textbook is to survey the major events of modern Chinese and Japanese history. Sometimes this survey takes the form of an old-fashioned, straightforward narrative. Whenever possible, however, the author seeks to examine history through topics that rarely receive much attention in standard textbooks. Furthermore, many of the topics discussed in subsequent chapters shed light on matters of broad significance to the study of human affairs.
Topics in Japanese Cultural History
The book began in 1992 as a hastily-compiled set of visual aids for an introductory course in East Asia at Eastern Washington University. Over the course of eight major revisions at EWU, it gradually developed into its present form: a series of graphically-rich, privately-produced textbooks.
STS.038 Energy and Environment in American History: 1705-2005 (MIT)
A survey of how America has become the world's largest consumer of energy. Explores American history from the perspective of energy and its relationship to politics, diplomacy, the economy, science and technology, labor, culture, and the environment. Topics include muscle and water power in early America, coal and the Industrial Revolution, electrification, energy consumption in the home, oil and U.S. foreign policy, automobiles and suburbanization, nuclear power, OPEC and the 70's energy crisis
21H.522 Japan in the Age of the Samurai: History and Film (MIT)
This course covers medieval Japanese society and culture from the twelfth to the nineteenth centuries, when political power rested largely in the hands of feudal warriors. Topics include religion (especially Zen Buddhism); changing concepts of "the way of the warrior;" women under feudalism; popular culture; and protest and rebellion. Presentations include weekly feature films. Assigned readings include many literary writings in translation.
21H.221 The Places of Migration in United States History (MIT)
This course examines the history of the United States as a "nation of immigrants" within a broader global context. It considers migration from the mid-19th century to the present through case studies of such places as New York's Lower East Side, South Texas, Florida, and San Francisco's Chinatown. It also examines the role of memory, media, and popular culture in shaping ideas about migration. The course includes optional field trip to New York City.
21H.914 Jewish History from Biblical to Modern Times (MIT)
This course explores how our views of Jewish history have been formed and how this history can explain the survival of the Jews as an ethnic/religious group into the present day. Special attention is given to the partial and fragmentary nature of our information about the past, and the difficulties inherent in decoding statements about the past that were written with a religious agenda in mind. It also considers complex events in Jewish history -- from early history as portrayed in the Bible to
21L.011 The Film Experience (MIT)
This course is an introduction to narrative film, emphasizing the unique properties of the movie house and the motion picture camera, the historical evolution of the film medium, and the intrinsic artistic qualities of individual films. The primary focus is on American cinema, but secondary attention is paid to works drawn from other great national traditions, such as France, Italy, and Japan. The syllabus includes such directors as Griffith, Keaton, Chaplin, Renoir, Ford, Hitchcock, Altman, De
STS.036 Technology and Nature in American History (MIT)
This course considers how the visual and material world of "nature" has been reshaped by industrial practices, ideologies, and institutions, particularly in nineteenth- and twentieth-century America. Topics include land-use patterns; the changing shape of cities and farms; the redesign of water systems; the construction of roads, dams, bridges, irrigation systems; the creation of national parks; ideas about wilderness; and the role of nature in an industrial world. From small farms to suburbia,
14.731 Economic History (MIT)
This course is a survey of world economic history, and it introduces economics students to the subject matter and methodology of economic history. It is designed to expand the range of empirical settings in students' research by drawing upon historical material and long-run data. Topics are chosen to show a wide variety of historical experience and illuminate the process of industrialization. The emphasis will be on questions related to labor markets and economic growth.
4.696 A Global History of Architecture Writing Seminar (MIT)
This course will study the question of Global Architecture from the point of view of producing a set of lectures on that subject. The course will be run in the form of a writing seminar, except that students will be asked to prepare for the final class an hour-long lecture for an undergraduate survey course. During the semester, students will study the debates about where to locate "the global" and do some comparative analysis of various textbooks. The topic of the final lecture will be worked o
STS.330J History and Anthropology of Medicine and Biology (MIT)
This course explores recent historical and anthropological approaches to the study of life, in both medicine and biology. After grounding our conversation in accounts of natural history and medicine that predate the rise of biology as a discipline, we explore modes of theorizing historical and contemporary bioscience. Drawing on the work of historian William Coleman, we examine the forms, functions, and transformations of biological and medical objects of study. Along the way we treat the histor
