The United States and the Cold War

This course offers an introduction to the history of the United States during the period of conflict known as the Cold War, from the 1940s to the 1990s. For these fifty years, the superpower rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union dominated global events and left a legacy still evident in our lives today. Beginning with the origins of that rivalry, we will trace the development of Cold War strategies and their implementation in crises around the world, from the Berlin Blockade to the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam War, and Iran-Contra Affair. In addition to examining foreign policy and the actions of Americans abroad, we will also explore how the Cold War impacted life for Americans at home. Students will gain a greater understanding of the flow of American history in the second half of the twentieth century and learn to think critically about the role of the United States overseas. 

This course explores the Cold War, focusing on the years of 1945, the end of World War Two to the Fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the division of the world into Communist and the Free West, and the continuing tensions in Eastern Europe and the Korean Peninsula. Course meets the History major requirement for Group III. 

African Americans shaped their own histories in slavery and freedom. This course is a survey of the first era of African American history from the Trans-Atlantic slave trade through the end of the Civil War. The course follows Africans’ forced journeys from communities 

in West and Central Africa, traces Black experiences during slavery, and follows African Americans’ fights for civil rights and freedom. In the process, it necessarily poses a series of big questions about the relationship between slavery and democracy, and the meaning of freedom in the United States. The course engages a range of critical subjects in African American history: African communities and the Middle Passage; the emergence of slavery in 

North America; African Americans and the American Revolution; African American life 

and resistance under slavery; the abolitionist movement; and African Americans in the Civil 

War. It ends with a look forward to the revolutionary potential of Reconstruction. Students will come away from this course with knowledge of important trends, concepts and interpretations related to African American history. What might the histories of anti-Blackness, resistance, and emancipation have to teach us about our current moment? How might these histories help us understand the national protests and new calls for abolition?