Inventing America

Catalog description

This course examines the history and cultures of North America, beginning in the decades before the arrival of European empires and ending with the Seven Years’ War. It considers the varied experiences of Native Americans, Europeans, and Africans as they came into contact and conflict over this extended period. We will examine the development of European settlements and colonies in relation to Indigenous nations and peoples across the continent and situate them within the broader changes of the Atlantic world. We will also examine how early Americans made sense of each other by paying close attention to changing relationships between Natives and colonists, men and women, slaves and slaveholders, and political leaders and their constituents. In doing so, we will examine how ideas and systems about ethnicity, race, freedom, household, and slavery developed in this period. By the end of the course, students will think of early North America as a dynamic place comprised of various and interconnected polities, ideologies, cultures, and peoples. Satisfies History major and minor requirement. Satisfies Historical Thought requirement.