Uncovering Western History, Volume 1

This module covers the 14th century BCE, with a focus on the late 1350s to the mid-1330s in the ancient Near East (Egypt, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, as well as Syria and the Levant ). Using excerpts from letters between ancient kings, students will explores the relationship between these powerful rulers (the so-called “Great Kings,” which included the pharaoh) as well as that between the pharaoh and his vassals in the Levant and in Syria. Important t...

Students will encounter multiple versions of several narratives from US and global history across multiple eras. These will include accounts of post-Civil War Reconstruction in America and ‘the rise of the west’/creation of the modern world. Personal, family, and national narratives will be incorporated, as well.

The first central question the module will help students examine is, How do historians and other scholars create, contest, and modify n...

The story of Francis Drake in world history begs many questions, but perhaps it is at core a question of who owns history, or who “curates” the legacy of a national hero (or in the case of Spain, a favorite villain)? Drake is a classic ‘national hero’ vs. ‘arch-villain.’