Episodes: Immigration and Migration.
Read the
Recollections of a Norwegian Immigrant from the Library
of Congress's American Memory website.
Revised episode drafts must be submitted to the instructor via e-mail by 2:00 p.m. today.
Episodes: Commodity History.
Analyze the statistical information on our
nineteenth century time series data page. What were the high and low
years for cotton, wheat, and wholesale prices? How closely do these price
changes track each other? Look closely at the cotton competition chart. When
were the low and the high years for U.S., Egyptian, and Indian cotton
exports to England? What might the global political implications of this be?
Scan the columns of "deflated" cotton prices for Liverpool
and N.Y. for high and low years. Are these the same in the two cities? What
would explain any divergences? Examine the GDP chart. Which periods appear to have
the greatest rate of change in GDP (either up or down)?
Members of the RED discussion group will need to post comments to the Course Discussion Board before class.
If approved, your (revised) first episode must be submitted to the History Engine by 8:00 p.m. today. After submission, please remember the episode number that the system has assigned to your contribution.
Episodes: From Country Store to Department Store.
Read the Encyclopedia Britannica biographies of
A.T. Stewart,
Aaron Montgomery Ward, and
Marshall Field.
Read the company history of
Dun and Bradstreet on the D&B corporate website.
Imagine that their account was being submitted to the History Engine.
What is your assessment of the organization, clarity of writing, objectivity,
and expression of historical significance expressed in this account?
You may optionally read the article by Wendy Gamber,
"A Gendered Enterprise: Placing Nineteenth-Century Businesswomen in History,"
Business History Review, 72 (Summer 1998): 188-217.
Members of the BLUE discussion group will need to post comments to the Course Discussion Board before class.
Episodes: Symbol, Ritual and Gender in American
Nationalism.
Read the history of the
statue of Freedom atop the U.S. capitol and analyze the images of the
statue shown on the official Architect of the Capitol website.
Read the history of
Liberty Enlightening the World on the National Park Service website.
Read about the
historical origins of Memorial Day on the USMemorialday.org website.
Read the Wikipedia biography of
Francis Bellamy. Look at a scanned image of the
original text of the Pledge of Allegiance (Youth's Companion, September 8, 1892)
on the FirstMention.com website. Perform a
Google image search for "lady Columbia." Analyze the images that
appear on the first two or three pages of results.
Consider all these sources together. Who created these symbols and rituals. When and why? To what extent have subsequent uses or invocations remained true to the original intent? How should subsequent uses honor these original intentions? In what ways should people in democracy be free to appropriate and interpret these symbols to suit their own visions? What uses would you consider "out of bounds?"
Members of the GREEN discussion group will need to post comments to the Course Discussion Board before class.
Episodes: High Plains Massacres.
Go the
Chicago Tribune Historical Full Image
database. Please browse, read, and prepare to discuss five or six articles
from the following searches:
Members of the RED group will need to search for "Sand Creek" and Colorado
over the date range 1864 to 1866. Members of the GREEN group will need
to search for "Fetterman" over the range 1867 to 1869. Members of the BLUE
group will need to search for "Custer" and "Horn" over the range 1876 to
1877. Members of the PURPLE group will need to search for "Wounded Knee"
and "killed" over the range 1890 to 1891.
All participants will need to read the brief summary of the Wounded Knee
Massacre of 1890 in Ayers, American Passages, pp. 547-548. Then
read some
Lakota Accounts of the Massacre at Wounded Knee on the
PBS.org website. How would you assess the quality of each of the texts
you read as sources or as episode summaries?
Members of the PURPLE discussion group will need to post comments to the Course Discussion Board before class.
Please be sure that you have updated your research journal for this week.
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Note: The instructor reserves the right to change any provisions, due dates, grading percentages, or any other items without prior notice. All assignments on this schedule are covered under the university's policy on plagiarism and academic integrity. See the syllabus statement for further details. This page was last updated on 9/9/2007.