World History Since 1900 (2021)

Draft. See course Canvas or syllabus distributed in class for official version.

Syllabus HIST 103 002 – World History Since 1900

Professor: Dr. Benjamin Bryce

Term: Fall and Winter (2021W, 1 and 2)

Time: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 16:00-16:50

Location: Term 1: Klinck 200; Term 2: Buchanan A201

Office Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 15:00-15:45 in person, via Skype, by telephone, and by appointment

Tutorials: There are 9 tutorial sections. Students are to register for one tutorial section. If a section is full, the instructors cannot move students to another section. Tutorials are led by a teaching assistant.

Course Description:

This course surveys several issues, ideas, and events in the world since 1900. It illustrates how the peoples of different continents have interacted and influenced one another. Students will learn about imperialism, decolonization, and the development of the modern system of international relations. Migration, global trade, violence, and political ideologies all receive particular attention. Students are also introduced to the discipline of history, including to historiographic and primary source analyses.

Learning Objectives:

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

  • 1) Describe and debate major topics in world history.
  • 2) Identify and assess historical arguments.
  • 3) Demonstrate a capacity for analyzing and contextualizing historical sources.
  • 4) Using historical research methods to examine global and transnational history.

Course Structure: A lecture on one of the course themes will be given on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Questions during lecture are encouraged. Tutorial sessions will led by teaching assistant and have approximately 18 students. Tutorials are dedicated to a group discussion of the assigned readings. Attending tutorials is a crucial aspect of this course. It is in tutorial that you will work closely with the teaching assistants to develop your critical thinking, reading, and writing skills. Students who do not attend tutorial on a regular basis generally receive low grades on the written assignments and exam.

Required Readings: All readings come from journals and eBooks and can be accessed for free through the UBC library.

Evaluation:

First term:

1) Tutorial participation, 10%

2) Primary document analysis. Due Friday, October 29, 10%

3) December Exam, 20%

Second term:

4) Tutorial participation, 10%

5) Article analysis. Due Friday, February 4, 10%

6) Historiographic research essay. Due Friday, March 25, 20%

7) April exam, 20%

* Note: A detailed grading rubric for the written assignments appears at the end of the syllabus. 

Tutorial participation, terms 1 and 2. Students are expected to attend and participate in all tutorials and in the weekly discussions of the readings. Evaluation will be based on a demonstrated mastery of the readings. Students are required to read an average of 40 pages per week.

To prepare for tutorial, students should read the assigned materials thoroughly and come prepared to state their own views about the work and engage with those of other students. Quality of insight into the readings will be assessed by the tutorial leader according to the student’s depth of analysis into and clear engagement with specific ideas from the text and in response to the questions asked by the tutorial leader. Active engagement in the discussion will be assessed according to the student’s engagement with other students’ ideas, quality of contributions, and general collegiality in the classroom. If actively participating in class discussions is difficult for you, please speak to your tutorial leader. You may also visit the Centre for Accessibility for more assistance.

2) Primary documents analysis. 3-4 pages. Students are required to critically analyze four primary documents related to imperialism, international relations, and the causes of World War I. Students will be given eight sources and they need to choose which four to use. Students will write a thesis-driven scholarly analysis. Students are welcome to discuss their ideas with their tutorial leader in the weeks leading up to the due date. This assignment should be submitted in paper form in tutorial. Students also need to submit a copy of their assignment via TurnItIn.com. This essay requires proper citation following the Chicago Manual of Style, and it should have properly formatted footnotes and a bibliography.  

Due: In tutorial on Friday, October 29, Week 8

For information on how the papers will be graded, see the rubric at end of syllabus.

3) December Exam. Evaluation will be based on the demonstrated mastery of lectures and the assigned secondary readings from term 1. The exam will consist of short and long answer questions as well as essay questions. It will be graded based on the following criteria: accuracy of information: 45%; breadth of information from course content: 35%; coherence of answers/essays: 20%.

This exam will be scheduled by the university during the December exam period.

5) Article analysis. 700-900 words.Students are required to find any article published in a peer-reviewed history journal after 2010 that pertains to the Cold War. After briefly summarizing the article, students are to answer these two questions: What is the author’s main argument? What points and evidence does the author use support this argument? This assignment should be submitted in paper form in tutorial. Students also need to submit a copy of their assignment via TurnItIn.com. This essay requires proper citation following the Chicago Manual of Style, and it should have properly formatted footnotes and a bibliography.  

Due: In tutorial on Friday, February 4, Week 17

6) Historiographic research essay. 7-8 pages. Students are asked to write a historiographic research paper. Students will be given a set of five scholarly articles that speak to a common historiographic discussion and will write a thesis-driven scholarly analysis of the arguments in the readings. Students are welcome to discuss their ideas with their tutorial leader in the weeks leading up to the due date. This assignment should be submitted in paper form in tutorial. Students also need to submit a copy of their assignment via TurnItIn.com. This essay requires proper citation following the Chicago Manual of Style, and it should have properly formatted footnotes and a bibliography.  

Due: In tutorial on Friday, March 25, Week 23.

For information on how the papers will be graded, see the rubric below.

7) April Exam. Evaluation will be based on the demonstrated mastery of lectures and the assigned secondary readings from term 2. The exam will consist of short and long answer questions as well as essay questions. It will be graded based on the following criteria: accuracy of information: 45%; breadth of information from course content: 35%; coherence of answers/essays: 20%.

This exam will be scheduled by the university during the April exam period.

Course Overview:

Week 1: September 7 and 9 – Course introduction

  • Tuesday: Imagine Day. No class
  • Thursday: Course introduction
  • No readings. No tutorial this week

Week 2: September 14 and 16 – The Age of Empire

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Industrialization and Commodities
    • Thursday: The Scramble for Africa
  • Readings:
  • John Darwin. “The Commercial Republic,” Chapter 3. The Empire Project: The Rise and Fall of the British World-System, 1830–1970, 112-143. Cambridge University Press, 2009.
  • Tutorials begin

Week 3: September 21 and 23 – Empire in East Asia

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Meiji Japan
    • Thursday: China, 1895-1914
  • Readings:
  • Christine Kim. “Politics and Pageantry in Protectorate Korea (1905-10): The Imperial Progresses of Sunjong.” The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 68, no. 3 (Aug., 2009): 835-859.

Last day to withdraw from full-year course without financial penalty and without W standing on transcript. September 27.

Week 4: September 28 and 30 – The British Empire and its Discontents

  • Lectures:
  • Readings:
  • Nile Green. “Islam for the Indentured Indian: A Muslim Missionary in Colonial South Africa.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, vol. 71, no. 3 (2008): 529-553.

Week 5: October 5 and 7 – Global Migration

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Emigration from Europe
    • Thursday: Emigration in Asia
  • Readings:
  • José Moya. “A Continent of Immigrants: Postcolonial Shifts in the Western Hemisphere.” Hispanic American Historical Review 86, no. 1 (2006): 1–28.

Week 6: October 12 and 14 – First World War

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Causes of Conflict
    • Thursday: War on the Homefront in Europe
  • Readings:
  • Frederick R. Dickinson. “Toward a Global Perspective of the Great War: Japan and the Foundations of a Twentieth-Century World.” The American Historical Review 119, no. 4 (2014): 1154-1183.

Week 7: October 19 and 21 – 1918 and its Aftermath

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Peace Treaties and Self-Determination
    • Thursday: The Spanish Flu
  • Readings:
    • Erez Manela. “Imagining Woodrow Wilson in Asia: Dreams of East‐West Harmony and the Revolt against Empire in 1919.” The American Historical Review Vol. 111, No. 5 (December 2006): 1327-1351.

Week 8: October 26 and 28 – The Russian Revolution

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Russian Revolution
    • Thursday: Comintern
  • Readings:
  • Joshua Sanborn. “Decolonization,” Chapter 6. Imperial Apocalypse: The Great War and the Destruction of the Russian Empire, 205-238. Oxford University Press, 2014.

Primary document analysis. Due in tutorial on Friday, October 29

Week 9: November 2 and 4 – The Mexican Revolution

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Mexican Revolution
    • Thursday: Populism in Mexico and Latin America
  • Readings:
  • Gabriela Cano. “Unconcealable Realities of Desire: Amelio Robles’s (Transgender) Masculinity in the Mexican Revolution.” In Sex in Revolution: Gender, Politics, and Power in Modern Mexico, edited byMary Kay Vaughan, Gabriela Cano, Jocelyn Olcott, 35-56. Duke University Press, 2007.

Week 10: November 9 and 11

  • No class Tuesday
  • Midterm break starts Wednesday, November 10
  • No tutorials this week

Week 11: November 16 and 18 – The Rise of New Ideologies

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Fascism in Italy and Nazism in Germany
    • Thursday: The Nazi Racial State
  • Readings:
  • Reto Hofmann. “Imperial Links: The Italo-Ethiopian War and Japanese New Order Thinking 1935-1936.” Journal of Contemporary History (April 2015): 215-233.

Week 12: November 23 and 25 – War and Genocide in Europe

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: World War II
    • Thursday: The Holocaust
  • Readings:

Last day to withdraw from full-year course with W standing on transcript. November 26.

Week 13: November 30 and December 2 – War in East Asia

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Second Sino-Japanese War
    • Thursday: The Pacific War
  • Readings:

Week 14: January 11 and 13 – The Cold War

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Start of the Cold War
    • Thursday: The Atomic Age
  • Readings:
  • David C. Engerman. “Ideology and the origins of the Cold War, 1917–1962.” In The Cambridge History of the Cold War, Volume I, Origins, edited by Melvyn P. Leffler and Odd Arne Westad, 20-44. Cambridge University Press, 2010.

  • Lectures:
    • Thursday: The Great Leap Forward
  • Readings:
  • Kimberley Ens Manning and Felix Wemheuer. “Introduction.” Eating Bitterness New Perspectives on China’s Great Leap Forward and Famine, 1-27. UBC Press, 2011.

Week 16: January 25 and 27 – Cold War Flashpoints

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Berlin Airlift and Berlin Wall
    • Thursday: Korean War and Cuban Missile Crisis
  • Readings:
  • Hans-Peter Schwarz. “The Division of Germany, 1945–1949.” In The Cambridge History of the Cold War, Volume I, Origins, edited by Melvyn P. Leffler and Odd Arne Westad, 133-154. Cambridge University Press, 2010.

Week 17: February 1 and 3 – Latin America and the Cold War

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The US Empire and Latin America
    • Thursday: Dictatorship in South America
  • Readings:

Article analysis. Due in tutorial Friday, February 4.

Week 18: February 8 and 10 – The United Nations

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Security Council and the Non-Aligned Movement
    • Thursday: The World Health Organization and Collaboration
  • Readings:
    • MarkBradley. “Decolonization, the Global South, and the Cold War, 1919–1962.” In The Cambridge History of the Cold War, edited by Melvyn P. Leffler and Odd Arne Westad, 464–85. The Cambridge History of the Cold War. Cambridge University Press, 2010. doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521837194.023.

Week 19: February 15 and 17 – The Arab-Israeli Conflict

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The State of Israel
    • Thursday: Pan-Arabism
  • Readings:
    • Louis and A. Shlaim. “Introduction.” In The 1967 Arab-Israeli War: Origins and Consequences, edited by W. Louis and A. Shlaim, 1-21. Cambridge University Press, 2012. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511751431.002
    • Shlaim. “Israel.” In The 1967 Arab-Israeli War: Origins and Consequences, edited by W. Louis & A. Shlaim, 22-55. Cambridge University Press, 2012. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511751431.003

Reading Week: February 22 and 24

 Week 20: March 1 and 3 – Oil, Religion, and Revolution

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Iranian Revolution
    • Thursday: Iran-Iraq War
  • Readings:
    • Gregory Gause. “The Iranian Revolution and the Iran–Iraq War.” Chapter 3. The International Relations of the Persian Gulf, 45-87. Cambridge University Press, 2009. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511818264.004

Week 21: March 8 and 10 – US and Soviet Intervention in the “Third World”

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Vietnam and Afghanistan
    • Thursday: Cuba
  • Readings:
    • Fredrik Logevall. “The Indochina Wars and the Cold War, 1945–1975.” In The Cambridge History of the Cold War, edited by Melvyn P. Leffler and Odd Arne Westad, 281-304. Cambridge University Press, 2010. doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521837200.015

Week 22: March 15 and 17 – Decolonization in Africa

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: France and Algeria
    • Thursday: Developmentalism and Dictatorship
  • Readings:
    • Gerard McCann. “Possibility and Peril: Trade Unionism, African Cold War, and the Global Strands of Kenyan Decolonization.” Journal of Social History, Volume 53, Issue 2 (Winter 2019): 348–377, https://doi.org/10.1093/jsh/shz099.

Week 23: March 22 and 24 – Dictatorship and Repression

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: Genocide in Central America
    • Thursday: The Disappeared in the Southern Cone
  • Readings:
    • Federico Finchelstein. “State Terrorism.” Chapter 6. The Ideological Origins of the Dirty War: Fascism, Populism, and Dictatorship in Twentieth Century Argentina. Oxford University Press, 2014. DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199930241.003.0006

Historiographic research essay and bibliography. Due in tutorial on Friday, March 25

Week 24: March 29 and 31 – South Africa in the Twentieth Century

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Settler Colonial Order
    • Thursday: The End of Apartheid
  • Readings:
    • Alanna O’malley. “India, Apartheid and the New World Order at the UN, 1946–1962.” Journal of World History 31, no. 1 (2020): 195-223. doi:10.1353/jwh.2020.0007.

Week 25: April 5 and 7 – A New World Order in the 1990s

  • Lectures:
    • Tuesday: The Fall of the Wall
    • Thursday: Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and UN Peacekeeping
  • Readings:
    • Christopher Molnar. “‘Greetings from the Apocalypse’: Race, Migration, and Fear after German Reunification.” Central European History, 2021, 1–25. doi:10.1017/S0008938920001090.

The common cold and COVID-19: As part of the return to campus guidance set out by the provincial government and UBC, any student with any COVID-like symptom is asked to stay away from campus. This may increase the number of absences. If fewer than three weeks in this course (per term), students are asked to inform their instructors, but no documentation is required. If more than three weeks are missed, students are to fill out a self-declaration form and request an academic concession. Staying home and keeping everybody safe will have no bearing on your mark. Participation grading will accommodate these absences and grades will be based on participation in the days attended. The final exam is structured in such a way that missing some lectures will not have an undue impact on students’ ability to answer an essay question.

Lateness penalty: Assignments are due in class on the date specified in this syllabus. If an assignment is not handed in in class, it is considered a day late. The late submission of an assignment will be penalized in an exponential manner. For each day an assignment is late, the penalty will be as follows: 1%, 2%, 4%, 8%, 16%, 32%, 64%, 100%. No assignments will be accepted after eight days without a self-declaration form for an academic concession.

Illness and extenuating circumstances: If you have an illness (in light of the current policies on the common cold and COVID-19) or extenuating circumstances that will prevent you from submitting your assignment on time, extensions can be granted and late penalties can be waived or lessened. However, for this, you must discuss your situation with Dr. Bryce (rather than your tutorial leader) before the due date or fill out an academic concession from the Faculty of Arts.

Academic Concessions: If you miss marked coursework for the first time (assignment, exam, presentation, participation in class) and the course is still in-progress, speak with me to find a solution for your missed coursework. If this is not the first time you have requested concession or classes are over, fill out Arts Academic Advising’s online academic concession form, so that an advisor can evaluate your concession case. If you are a student in a different faculty, please consult your faculty’s webpage on academic concessions, and then contact me if appropriate.

Illness and absences: Notify me as soon as possible if a serious illness or other concern is affecting your ability to keep up with the course. It is also wise to contact the UBC Wellness Centre or your Faculty’s academic advising office if you are experiencing academic or personal difficulties.

Managing your mental health: You may be developing feelings of fear, stress, worry, and isolation. Everyone reacts differently to these feelings and they can be overwhelming. If you need help in coping with these feelings, here are some articles and resources compiled by UBC that will guide you in managing your mental health.

Submission of late assignments: To submit a late assignment, hand in a paper version of your essay to the mailbox labelled “Bryce” in the Department of History before 16:30 on a weekday. Once you hand in the paper version, send your teaching assistant an e-mail and a digital copy of your essay so that we know to look for it in my departmental mailbox. If you wish to hand in an assignment on a weekend or after hours, send your teaching assistant your assignment via e-mail and then hand in the hardcopy on the next business day. The Department of History will not be held responsible for any late assignments that go missing. Be sure to retain a copy of your paper and keep all your notes and drafts. If you have extenuating circumstances that will prevent you from submitting your assignment on time, discuss your situation with me in advance of the due date.

Canvas: This course uses Canvas. Detailed descriptions of the assignments are posted on Canvas. Students should check this site regularly.

Turn It In: In addition to submitting paper copies of all assignments in tutorial, students are required to submit their assignments through TurnItIn. See the course ID and enrolment key on page 1 of the syllabus. TurnItIn is a tool to maintain authenticity and ownership and to prevent plagiarism. It should not only be seen as a deterrent but also as an educational tool that encourages students to properly cite and attribute ideas to their authors. Essays submitted to TurnItIn go into an anonymized database that compares submitted assignments with others and with secondary sources on the internet. Students can remove their name from the file and blind the document. Please note that once you submit your papers to Turnitin.com your work is stored on an American server and is subject to US privacy laws. You can create an alias for yourself and notify your tutorial leader of the alias you use. If you do not want to submit your assignments through TurnItIn, you can instead submit copies of all your research notes. If you choose this option, please notify your tutorial leader ahead of time.

Evaluation of written work: Assignments will be returned accompanied by comments noting areas that need attention. Assignments will only be returned to the writer. Questions about grades cannot be answered effectively by e-mail and students should instead come to the instructor’s office hours. If you ask for an assignment to be reconsidered, note that your grade could go either up or down.

E-mail policy: Please use e-mail to communicate with us only for administrative matters. Please come to the scheduled office hours to address questions that you have, raise them in class, or chat with your instructor before or after class. If you cannot meet during our scheduled office hours, please e-mail us to set up an alternative appointment. We will respond to e-mails within 48 hours, so please do not leave your inquiries to the last minute. Please take the time to compose a formal e-mail. Assignments will not be accepted by email. Please use your UBC e-mail address to communicate with us, and please check this e-mail account regularly to receive updates about this course.

Writing Centres: Take advantage of the free services offered at the Centre for Writing and Scholarly Communication (https://learningcommons.ubc.ca/improve-your-writing/).

Technology etiquette during class time: Please put cellphones on silent and only use them for emergencies. It is inappropriate to surf the web or send text messages during any class at the University of British Columbia.

Academic Honesty and Plagiarism: Authors do not cite sources properly merely to avoid accusations of plagiarism but also to establish credibility, bring other work to the reader’s attention, and demonstrate competing viewpoints. For more on the use of citations, see the History Department’s guidelines: http://www.history.ubc.ca/content/common-questions-about-citations

The University of British Columbia takes academic honesty very seriously.  Any suspected cases of plagiarism will be investigated and academic offences could lead to permanent expulsion from UBC. More information on the University’s procedures on academic offences can be found here: http://www.calendar.ubc.ca/vancouver/index.cfm?tree=3,54,111,959

The code of academic conduct disallows the following:

  • Plagiarism, which the university defines as an individual submitting or presenting the oral or written work of another person as his or her own.
  • Submitting the same, or substantially the same, essay, presentation, or assignment more than once (whether the earlier submission was at this or another institution) unless prior approval has been obtained from the instructor(s) to whom the assignment is to be submitted.

Accessibility and Accommodations: Students with diverse learning styles and needs are welcome in this course. If you have an accessibility or health consideration that may require course format accommodation, please feel free to approach me to discuss your needs.  If you require accommodations for a disability or for religious observance or if you have accessibility concerns about the course, the classroom, or course materials, please contact me or the Centre for Accessibility (https://students.ubc.ca/about-student-services/centre-for-accessibility).

Student Conduct: The University of British Columbia is a community of students, faculty and staff involved in learning, teaching, research and other activities. In accordance with the UBC Respectful Environment Statement, all members of this community are expected to conduct themselves in a manner that contributes positively to an environment in which respect, civility, diversity, opportunity and inclusiveness are valued, so as to assure the success of both the individual and the community. The Student Code of Conduct reflects a concern for these values and tries to ensure that members of the University and the public can make use of and enjoy the activities, facilities and benefits of the University without undue interference from others. The university’s policy and procedures involving disruptive and/or harassing behaviour by students in academic situations is available on this website: 

http://www.calendar.ubc.ca/vancouver/index.cfm?tree=3,54,0,0

UBC Values: UBC provides resources to support student learning and to maintain healthy lifestyles but recognizes that sometimes crises arise and so there are additional resources to access including those for survivors of sexual violence. UBC values respect for the person and ideas of all members of the academic community. Harassment and discrimination are not tolerated nor is suppression of academic freedom. UBC provides appropriate accommodation for students with disabilities and for religious and cultural observances. UBC values academic honesty and students are expected to acknowledge the ideas generated by others and to uphold the highest academic standards in all of their actions. Details of the policies and how to access support are available here: https://senate.ubc.ca/policiesresources-support-student-success

Rubric for Primary documents analysis and Historiographic research essay

 

Poor (F-D) – Under 59%

Fair (C- C+) – 60-69%

Good (B) – 70-79%

Excellent (A) – 80% and up

Analysis. 45%

Analysis is incomplete. Does not present enough evidence

Summarizes material. Analysis is not comprehensive and/or persuasive. No clear argument or goal.

Analysis is accurate and persuasive. Contains a thesis statement but it does not advance a compelling, original argument throughout the paper.

Analysis is comprehensive, accurate and persuasive. Argument is clear and supported throughout.

Structure. 35%

Does not follow the conventions of an academic essay. Specific examples are not used, no quotations.

Contains a weak introduction. Sources are cited, but often paraphrased. The content of the sources is misunderstood or misrepresented.

Contains clear introduction, body, and conclusion. Sources are often paraphrased. Evidence not used in order to advance a clear point.

Contains clear introduction, body, and conclusion. Paragraphs have clear topic sentences. Sources are quoted and analyzed and used to advance main argument.

Style and grammar. 10%

There are numerous stylistic and grammatical issues that make paragraphs difficult to understand.

There are several stylistic and grammatical issues. Spell check was not used, and  the author did not re-read/revise the text enough.

Grammar is good, but some words and concepts are misused. Some minor grammatical errors that would have been caught with an extra reading by the author.

The essay is polished.

Bibliography and citation. 10%

Poor and insufficient citation.

Attempts to follow the Chicago Manual of Style, but there are numerous formatting issues. No distinction between the footnotes and bibliography in terms of formatting.

Follows the Chicago Manual of Style well, and the paper distinguishes between formatting differences of footnotes and bibliography. There are minor errors in italicization and punctuation.

Follows the Chicago Manual of Style perfectly, and the paper distinguishes between formatting differences of footnotes and bibliography.