History 551T: Readings in World and Comparative History
Instructor: Gayle K. Brunelle
The Early Modern World, 1400-1700 Homepage
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History 551T: Readings in World and Comparative History BottomInstructor: Gayle K. Brunelle
The Early Modern World, 1400-1700
Gayle
K.
Brunelle
Office: Humanities 710E
Email: gbrunelle@fullerton.edu
Web site:
http://www.faculty.fullerton.edu/gbrunelle
Telephone: (714)278-7045
Fax: (714)278-2101
Fall, 2008
Gentile Bellini, Sultan Mehmet II. 1480. Oil on canvas. 70x52cm. National Gallery, London, UK
Required Reading:
1. Alfred W. Crosby, Ecological Imperialism: The biological expansion of Europe, 900-1900, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986/1996), ISBN: 0-521-45690-8
2. Between the Middle Ages and Modernity: Individual and Community in the Early Modern World, Charles H. Parker and Jerry H. Bentley, eds. (Plymouth and New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007), ISBN: 978-0-7425-5310-1
3. K. N. Chaudhuri, Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean: An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 1750 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), ISBN-10: 0521285429 ISBN-13: 978-0521285421
4. John F. Richards, The Mughal Empire, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), ISBN: 0-521-56603-7.
5. Craig Clunas, Superfluous Things: Material Culture and Social Status in Early Modern China, (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2004), ISBN 0-8248-2820-8
6. John Thornton, Africa and Africans in the making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN: 0-521-62724-9
7. Herbert S. Klein, The Atlantic Slave Trade, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), ISBN: 0-521-46588-5
8. Richard C. Trexler, Sex and Conquest: gendered violence, political order, and the European conquest of the Americas, (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1995), ISBN: 0-8014-8482-0
10. Nabil Matar, Turks, Moors, and Englishmen in the Age of Discovery, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), ISBN: 0-231-11015-4
11. Jonathan D. Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, (New York: Penguin Books, 1985), ISBN: 0-14-008098-8
12. Louise Levathes, When China Ruled the Seas: The Treasure Fleet of the Dragon Throne, 1405-1433, (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), ISBN: 0-19-511207-5.
13. Daniel Goffman, The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe, (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), ISBN: 0-521-45908-7
Recommended Reading: (For students with little or no background on what is often called “The Age of Discovery” or “The Age of Expansion”)
1. J. R. S. Phillips, The medieval expansion of Europe, Second edition, (Oxford: Clarenden Press, 1998), ISBN: 0-19-820740-9
2. J. H. Parry, The Age of Renconnaissance: Discovery, exploration, and settlement, 1450-1650, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1963), ISBN: 0-520-04235-2
3. J. H. Elliott, The Old World and the New, 1492-1650, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), ISBN: 0-521-09621-9
Course Description
This course is a graduate reading class designed to off students the opportunity to explore the important themes and interpretations in a specific topic related to world history. Perhaps even more than other fields of history which tend to be focused on a single country or region, world historians adopt a thematic and comparative approach that permits them to draw comparisons centered among different regions of the world. Rather than following a strictly chronological approach focusing on the development of a single society and culture, world historians are more likely, therefore, to adopt a synchronic perspective that allows them to track interactions among cultures over a given period of time.
In this course, we will explore the most important change going on in the early modern world, the forging in increasing contacts among its various regions, and the first contacts since pre-history between the Western and Eastern hemispheres. These contacts, including the outward thrust of European power for the first time, shaped every aspect of the modern world. We will begin with the already dense networks of commercial and cultural exchange the tied together the Indian Ocean peoples – East Africa, Arabia, India, and Southeast Asia. We will then look at the role of China in Asian and Indian Ocean trade and culture, and grapple with the question of why it was not China rather than Europe that extended its power to Africa and the New World. Next we will look at the expansion of the Islam “dar-al-Islam” in India via the Mughal Empire and then examine the relationship between the great Islamic power of the early modern period, the Ottoman Empire, and Europe. In the final section of the course we will look at the European voyages of the discovery and their consequences, biological, economic, and cultural. Simple geography, the growing power of the Ottoman Empire in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, as well as advanced in European nautical technology, dictated that in the early modern era (1400-1750) dictated that the ties between Europeans and the other peoples of the Atlantic world would be stronger than those between Europe and Asia. The impact of those ties upon Europeans, Africans, and the various native peoples of North, Central, and South America, were likewise more significant. Europe was also forging commercial ties with East Asia and the Indian subcontinent, however, and Europe’s longstanding trade ties with the Islamic world endured despite the political, religious, and cultural hostility that rose and ebbed between them. We conclude the course with a discussion of Europeans have conceptualized the “other” they “discovered” in the early modern centuries.
Course Requirements
This course is essentially a survey of historical literature. The single most important requirement for students will be to read the assigned literature. The class will be run entirely as a seminar, which means that most of the time, we (not “I”) will be discussing the readings. The class will not function, therefore, if students do not read thoughtfully the assigned reading and come to class prepared to discuss them. To ensure that this reading takes place, as well as to foster critical analysis skills, students will be required to prepare each week a brief review (2-3 pages, typed and double spaced, please!)of the book to be discussed that week. These reviews will constitute 60% of the student’s grade for the semester. The other 40% of the grade will come from a take home final exam, due during the regularly schedule final exam period, in which students will discuss broad questions drawn from the themes and interpretations of the literature covered in the class (25%) and three oral presentations (5% each) on the readings for three weeks of the semester of the student’s choosing.
Learning Goals:
1. To introduce students to the main topics, historical problems, themes, debates, and interpretations centering on the topic of expanding European contacts with the non-European world during the early modern era.
2. To hone students’ ability to read and critically analyze historical literature.
3. To improve students’ oral and written communication skills through class discussions and written assignments.
Assessment:
Students will be assessed on their ability to absorb, assess, critique, and communicate the main themes and interpretations found in the assigned reading. To accomplish these goals, students will be required make three brief (5 minutes) oral presentations on the reading for the week, in class three weeks of their choosing during the semester. (Hint: choose weeks when you are writing your book review).
Grading:
10 book review papers = 60%
Oral Presentations = 15%
Take home exam, 10-12 pages = 25%
Weekly Assignments:
Week One/ 8-25: Introduction, discussion of book reviews and expectations in terms of content and writing. Also, discussion of European preconceived notions of the “other” and the world outside of Europe. To what extent were those ideas altered during the initial phase of the “discoveries”? Reading: Handouts excerpted from Anthony Grafton, New Worlds, Ancient Texts: The power of traditions and the shock of discovery.
Week Two: Labor Day – No Class!
Week Three/ 9-8: The idea of early modern history as world history. Reading: Between the Middle Ages and Modernity.
Week Four/ 9-15: K. N. Chaudhuri, Trade and Civilisation in the Indian Ocean: An Economic History from the Rise of Islam to 1750 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), ISBN-10: 0521285429 ISBN-13: 978-0521285421
Week Five/ 9-22: The voyages of Zheng He and the incursion of Chinese power in the Indian Ocean. Reading: Louise Levathes, When China Ruled the Seas: The Treasure Fleet of the Dragon Throne, 1405-1433, (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), ISBN: 0-19-511207-5.
Week Six/ 9-29: Craig Clunas, Superfluous Things: Material Culture and Social Status in Early Modern China, (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2004), ISBN 0-8248-2820-8
Week Seven/ 10-6: Europeans in China and cultural wonder and cultural exchange. Reading: Jonathan D. Spence, The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci, (New York: Penguin Books, 1985), ISBN: 0-14-008098-8
Week Eight/ 10-13: The Ottoman Empire and Europe – how European was the Ottoman Empire, and how Ottoman was early modern Europe? Reading: Daniel Goffman, The Ottoman Empire and Early Modern Europe, (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002), ISBN: 0-521-45908-7
Week Nine/ 10-20: How did Muslims and Europeans interact during the Age of Discovery? To what extent were they competitors? To what extent did they cooperate? Reading: Matar, Turks, Moors, and Englishment in the Age of Discovery.
Week Ten/ 10-27: The Mughal Empire of India. Reading: John F. Richards, The Mughal Empire, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), ISBN: 0-521-56603-7.
Week Eleven/ 11-3: The biological expansion of Europe. What were the consequences, good and bad, for Europe and the rest of the world of the witting and unwitting transportation of European plants, animals, and microbes, to other places, and vice versa. Reading: Crosby, Ecological Imperialism
Week Twelve/ 11-10: What was the role of Africans in the creation of the economy and culture of the early modern Atlantic world? Reading: Thornton, Africa and Africans in the making of the Atlantic World.
Week Thirteen/ 11-17: Why did the Atlantic slave trade develop? What was its impact on its victims, on slavers, and on African and American societies in general? Reading: Klein, The Atlantic slave trade.
Week Fourteen/ 11/24: Fall Recess – No Class!
Week Fifteen/ 12-1: How did differing conceptualizations of gender roles affect the development of the political order during the European conquest of the Americas? Reading: Trexler, Sex and conquest.
Week Sixteen: Final exam due.