Lecture
1: History and Mythistory
The lecture provides a working
definition of History and a rationale for its study. It also lays out a
model, or interpretation, for application to subjects studied throughout the course.
Warning: students often tend to disregard introductory lectures such as this
because they are heavy on theory and light on facts. Don’t make this mistake.
Ideas and terms from this lecture will be used and tested.
Outline of
Lecture
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Introduction
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Most
people say they hated History in school, but public interest in History is
abundant and growing.
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What Is
History?
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We’re
dealing here with History as a subject, as an academic discipline. It is
one of those disciplines called the humanities. The Humanities study the
human condition through texts, or documents. In History we try to
understand human events by examining their origins.
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What Is
History Good for?
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History,
simply put, is experience. Experience, History is important first as a tool
for making decisions, for judgment. It has another important purpose, too:
identity. History tells us who we are.
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Themes for the
Course
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What
is an American? In this course we look for the origins of American nationhood.
They lie in the American people(s), the American environment, and the
American constitution.
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Assignments
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Tocqueville
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Introductions to Tocqueville’s
Democracy in America—learn how the book came to be and why it is
considered important
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WWW
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Uses
and Applications of History, Prof. Isern’s
page, which ties closely to lecture content
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Library of
Congress, the resources of which we will use frequently
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The National Archives,
the resources of which we also will use frequently
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HIST 104 Home Page
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