The online version of the Caltech Catalog is provided as a convenience; however, the printed version is the only authoritative source of information about course offerings, option requirements, graduation requirements, and other important topics.

HISTORY

Hum/H 1 ab. East Asian History. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 2. American History. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 3 a. European Civilization: The Classical and Medieval Worlds. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 3 b. European Civilization: Early Modern Europe. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 3 c. European Civilization: Modern Europe. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 4 a. Civilization, Science, and Archaeology: Before Greece: The Origins of Civilization in Mesopotamia. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 4 b. Civilization, Science, and Archaeology: The Development of Science from Babylon through the Renaissance. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H 4 c. Civilization, Science, and Archaeology: The Origins of Polytheism and Monotheism in Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Israel and the Nature of Religious Belief. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H/HPS 10. Introduction to the History of Science. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

Hum/H/HPS 11. History of Astronomy and Cosmology. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Humanities.

H 40. Reading in History. Units to be determined for the individual by the division. Elective, in any term. Reading in history and related subjects, done either in connection with the regular courses or independently, but under the direction of members of the department. A brief written report will usually be required. Graded pass/fail. Not available for credit toward humanities–social science requirement.

Art/H 69. Modernism in the Visual Arts, 1850-1945. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Art.

E/H/Art 89. New Media Arts in the 20th and 21st Centuries. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Engineering.

H 98. Reading in History. 9 units (1-0-8). Prerequisite: instructor’s permission. An individual program of directed reading in history, in areas not covered by regular courses. Instructor: Staff.

H 99 abc. Research Tutorial. 9 units (1-0-8). Prerequisite: instructor’s permission. Students will work with the instructor in the preparation of a research paper, which will form the basis of an oral examination. Instructor: Staff.

H 108 a. The Early Middle Ages. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. This course is designed to introduce students to the formative period of Western medieval history, roughly from the fourth through the tenth centuries. It will emphasize the development of a new civilization from the fusion of Roman, Germanic, and Christian traditions, with a focus on the Frankish world. The course focuses on the reading, analysis, and discussion of primary sources. Not offered 2012–13.

H 108 b. The High Middle Ages. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course is designed to introduce students to European history between 1000 and 1400. It will provide a topical as well as chronological examination of the economic, social, political, and religious evolution of western Europe during this period, with a focus on France, Italy, England, and Germany. The course emphasizes the reading, analysis, and discussion of primary sources. Not offered 2012–13.

H 109. Medieval Knighthood. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. This course tells the story of the knight from his beginnings in the early Middle Ages, through his zenith in the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries, to his decline and transformation in the late medieval and early modern periods. The course treats the knight not simply as a military phenomenon but also as a social, political, religious, and cultural figure who personified many of the elements that set the Middle Ages apart. Instructor: W. Brown.

H 110. Saints, Sinners, and Sexuality in the Medieval World. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. This course will investigate medieval conceptions of sanctity, transgression, and appropriate behavior for men and women. We will examine institutions as well as individuals, and explore real situations as well as the imaginary realms created in romances and manuscript marginalia. From the earliest Christian martyrs to Joan of Arc, we will investigate a wide range of sources—literary, artistic, and documentary—to get at the often contradictory but always fascinating intersections of faith, gender, and the forbidden in the medieval world. Not offered 2012–13.

H 111. The Medieval Church. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. This course takes students through the history of the medieval Christian Church in Europe, from its roots in Roman Palestine, through the zenith of its power in the high Middle Ages, to its decline on the eve of the Reformation. The course focuses on the church less as a religion (although it will by necessity deal with some basic theology) than as an institution that came to have an enormous political, social, cultural, and economic impact on medieval life, and for a brief time made Rome once more the mistress of Europe. Not offered 2012–13.

H 112. The Vikings. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. This course will take on the Scandinavian seafaring warriors of the 8th–11th centuries as a historical problem. What were the Vikings, where did they come from, and how they did they differ from the Scandinavian and north German pirates and raiders who preceded them? Were they really the horned-helmeted, bloodthirsty barbarians depicted by modern popular media and by many medieval chronicles? What effect did they have in their roughly two centuries of raiding and colonization on the civilizations of medieval and ultimately modern Europe? Not offered 2012–13.

H 115 abc. British History. 9 units (3-0-6); first, second, third terms. The political and cultural development of Great Britain from the early modern period to the twentieth century. H 115 a covers the Reformation and the making of a Protestant state (1500–1700). H 115 b examines the Enlightenment and British responses to revolutions in France and America (1700–1830). H 115 c is devoted to the Victorian and Edwardian eras (1830–1918). H 115 a is not a prerequisite for H 115 b; neither it nor H 115 b is a prerequisite for H 115 c. Not offered 2012–13.

H 116. Studies in Narrative: History, Fiction, and Storytelling. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course examines the fraught relationship between historical and literary narratives, two interdependent but often opposed forms of storytelling. It will look at works that raise the issue of veracity and storytelling, including fictions like Graham Swift’s Waterland, films such as Kurosawa’s Rashomon, and the “historical novellas” in Simon Schama’s book Dead Certainties. It will also investigate in some detail the works of American, French, and Italian historians who have tried to solve this problem by turning to so-called microhistory. Not offered 2012–13.

H 118. Histories of Collecting. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course examines the history and theory of collecting, concentrating on collectors, collections, and collecting in the West since the Renaissance. It will include field trips to collections around Los Angeles, including the Huntington Art Gallery and the Museum of Jurassic Technology, and the examination of issues such as forgery and the workings of art markets. Not offered 2012–13.

H/Art 119. Art Worlds. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. Among theorists and practitioners of art, the “art world” has come to be seen as a central force in the production of contemporary art. But what is the art world? When and how did it come to assume this remarkable importance? Drawing on resources including social history, philosophical aesthetics, artists’ writings and anthropological theory, this course will examine crucial moments in the formation and changing conception of the art world. Topics include the relation of art worlds to the valuation, collecting, and market for art; the ambivalent relations of the art world to artistic avant-gardes; and the comparative strength of the art world’s position in the age of 21st-century globalization. Objects from local collections, and local collections themselves, will be central to the analysis. The course will include a number of field trips as well as presentations by contemporary artists. Not offered 2012–13.

H 120. Epidemics in American History. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. This course is intended to offer students a broad overview of the history of epidemic disease in the United States from the Revolutionary War until 1920, with a particular emphasis on politics, law, and social relations. In other words, it is concerned with the ways that various groups of people (victims of disease, potential victims, medical personnel, agents of the government, etc.) reacted to the outbreak of virulent diseases. This course is designed to illustrate various changes over time, from the forms of medical treatment to the role of governmental bureaucracies in the regulation of public health. Instructor: Schoeppner.

H 121. American Radicalism. 9 units (3-0-6); offered by announcement. The course will cover a number of radical social, political, and artistic movements in 20th-century America. A focus on the first two decades of the century will center around the poet, journalist, and revolutionary John Reed and his circle in Greenwich Village. Topics will include their involvement with artistic experimentation, the Industrial Workers of the World, the Mexican Revolution, the Russian Revolution, and the movements for birth control and against American involvement in World War I. Other areas of concentration will be the Great Depression of the ’30s, with its leftist political and labor actions, and the freewheeling radicalism of the ’60s, including the anti-Vietnam protests, Students for a Democratic Society, and the ethnic struggles for social and political equality. Some reference will be made to the anti- globalization movements of today. Not offered 2012–13.

H 122. Household and Family Forms over Time. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. This course examines the wide variety of family forms and household structures in past societies, as well as the social, cultural, institutional, and economic variables that influenced them. The course focuses mainly on Europe from about 1600 to the present, as this is the area for which most research has been done, but there will be some discussion of other parts of the world, including Asia, Africa, and North and South America. Special attention is given to comparisons among different societies. Instructor: Dennison.

H/SS 124. Problems in Historical Demography. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. Birth, marriage, and death—the most basic events in people’s lives—are inextricably linked to larger economic and social phenomena. An understanding of these basic events can thus shed light on the economic and social world inhabited by people in the past. In this course students will be introduced to the sources and methods used by historical demographers to construct demographic measures for past populations. In addition, the course will cover a broad range of problems in historical demography, including mortality crises, fertility control, infant mortality, and the role of economic and social institutions in demographic change. While the emphasis is on societies in the past, there will be some discussion of modern demographic trends in various parts of the world. Instructor: Dennison, Jennings.

H 130. Postmodern History. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. In recent years some historians have experimented with new and innovative ways of telling the past—on the printed page, using film and video, and on the Internet. The course will focus on these new approaches to historical presentation and knowledge. Students will read, watch, and interact with various examples of these innovative historical works. They will also be exposed to the critiques of traditional historical writing from philosophers, literary critics, and postmodern theorists, which provide intellectual underpinning for experimenting with new forms of history. Not offered 2012–13.

H/F 131. History on Film. 9 units (2-2-5); third term. An investigation into the variety of ways history has been and can be represented on the screen. Some terms the focus will be a specific historical period or nation; other terms the focus will be the nature of film as a medium for history and biography. The class will include weekly screenings of films as well as weekly discussion sections. Not offered 2012–13.

H/F 132. Nations/Cultures on Film: Japan. 9 units (2-2-5); third term. Based upon the premise that a great deal of the history and culture of a nation is inscribed in the dramatic features its film makers produce, the course will each term focus on a single nation and/or culture. Each week there will be a screening, supplemented by appropriate readings dealing with history, culture, and film analysis. During the two hour weekly seminar, students will be expected to discuss the film and the readings, while the instructor will provide additional background material and introduce them to the language of cinema. Possible topics include the United States, Japan, Russia, France, Spain, Germany, and Italy. On occasion the class may deal with particular periods in history (e.g. the Italian Renaissance, Imperial Rome) or with cultures that cross national boundaries, such as the Arab World or Latin America. Students will be expected to write short papers after most screenings and one formal term paper. Not offered 2012–13.

H/F 133. Topics in Film History. 9 units (2-2-5); offered by announcement. The course will focus each term on one kind of motion picture—either a film genre, or films made by an individual director, or from a single nation or region of the world or particular historical era. Included are weekly screenings, readings on film, a weekly discussion meeting, and a term paper. Not offered 2012–13.

H/F 134. The Science Fiction Film. 9 units (2-2-5); third term. This course will introduce students to some of the classic works of the science fiction film from the earliest days of cinema until the present. It will analyze aesthetic, historical, and social documents, and will show that such films, while describing alternative, hypothetical, and futurist worlds, also serve as a commentary upon and/or a critique of contemporary (to the film) historical, social, political, and ideological systems and attitudes. Not offered 2012–13.

H 135. War, Conquest, and Empires. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. This course will use historical examples of war and conquest and ask why some periods of history were times of warfare and why certain countries developed a comparative advantage in violence. The examples will come from the history of Europe and Asia, from ancient times up until World War I, and the emphasis throughout will be on the interplay between politics, military technology, and social conditions. Instructor: Hoffman.

H/F 136. Ethnic Visions. 9 units (2-2-5); offered by announcement. In recent decades, directors from ethnic minorities that are often un- or misrepresented in mainstream Hollywood films have been making dramatic features depicting the history, problems, and prospects of their own communities. This course will feature a selection of such films by directors from African, Latino, Asian, Muslim, and European American ethnic groups, with an eye toward assessing the similarities and differences in the processes of immigration, acculturation, and Americanization. Not offered 2012–13.

H/L 142. Perspectives on History through Russian Literature. 9 units (3-0-6), second term. The Russian intelligentsia registered the arrival of modern urban society with a highly articulate sensitivity, perhaps because these changes—industrialization, the breakdown of traditional hierarchies and social bonds, the questioning of traditional beliefs—came to Russia so suddenly. This gives their writings a paradigmatic quality; the modern dilemmas that still haunt us are made so eloquently explicit in them that they have served as models for succeeding generations of writers and social critics. This course explores these writings (in English translation) against the background of Russian society, focusing especially on particular works of Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Goncharov, Tolstoy, and Turgenev. Instructor: Dennison.

Law/PS/H 148 ab. The Supreme Court in U.S. History. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Law.

Art/H 155. Making and Knowing in Early Modern Europe. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Art History.

HPS/H 156. The History of Modern Science. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 158. The Scientific Revolution. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 159. The Cold War and American Science. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 160 ab. Einstein and His Generation: The History of Modern Physical Sciences. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

H 161. Selected Topics in History. 9 units (3-0-6); offered by announcement. Instructors: Staff, visiting lecturers.

HPS/H 162. Social Studies of Science. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 166. Historical Perspectives on the Relations between Science and Religion. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 167. Experimenting with History/Historic Experiment. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 168. History of Electromagnetism and Heat Science. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 169. Selected Topics in the History of Science and Technology. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 170. History of Light from Antiquity to the 20th Century. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 171. History of Mechanics from Galileo through Euler. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 172. History of Mathematics: A Global View with Close-ups. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H/Pl 173. History of Chemistry. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 174. Early Greek Astronomy. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 175. Matter, Motion, and Force: Physical Astronomy from Ptolemy to Newton. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 178. Galileo’s Astronomy and Conflicts with the Church. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 179. Cambridge Scientific Minds: How We See Them; How They See Themselves. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 180. Physics and Philosophy from the Scientific Revolution to the 20th Century. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 181. Evidence, Measurement, and the Uses of Data in the Early Modern Period. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 182. See and Tell: 3-D Models for the Visualization of Complex Concepts From the 16th Century to Modern Times. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

Art/H 183. Spectacle: From the Court Masque to the Great Exhibition of 1851. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see Art History.

H/HPS 185. Angels and Monsters: Cosmology, Anthropology, and the Ends of the World. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course explores late medieval European understandings of the origins, structure, and workings of the cosmos in the realms of theology, physics, astronomy, astrology, magic, and medicine. Attention is given to the position of humans as cultural creatures at the intersection of nature and spirit; as well as to the place of Christian Europeans in relation to non-Christians and other categories of outsiders within and beyond Europe. We will examine the knowledge system that anticipated racializing theories in the West. Instructor: Wey-Gomez.

HPS/H 186. The Sciences in the Romantic Era. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

H 187. The Constitution in the Early Republic. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. This course will trace many of the major constitutional debates that occurred during the first half-century of U.S. History. We will look to the courts, to the legislatures, to Presidents, and to constitutional theorists of the Early Republic to gain insight into how the first generations of Americans understood their Constitution and the governments and rights it recognized. During this formative period, Americans contemplate the location of sovereignty in a federated republic, the rights and privileges of citizenship, and the role of judicial review in a democratic society. Though we will remain firmly entrenched in the period before the Civil War, we will find that many of the issues that created constitutional strife two centuries ago are still relevant to the constitutional questions of today. Not offered 2012–13.

H 188. Origins of the US Civil War. 9 units (3-0-6); first term. The purpose of this course is to investigate the various causes of the US Civil War. Students will be exposed to prevailing interpretations, which rely mostly on national frames of reference when identifying the economic, political, and constitutional causes of the Sectional Crisis and War. Half of the term will be devoted to these themes. Subsequently, we will be spending the second half of the term examining recent scholarship that examines the international factors on the brewing Sectional Crisis, from the ramifications of British Emancipation to the fluctuating global cotton market. During the last week, we will discuss these interpretative differences and identify possible avenues of synthesis. Students will leave the course with a thorough understanding of the causes of the Civil War and an introduction to transnational influences on American historical development. Instructor: Schoeppner.

HPS/H 189. Biology and Society. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

HPS/H 190. Nuclear War in History, Fiction, and Memory. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

H 191. Perspectives on History through German Literature. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. Industrialization, economic growth, and democracy came to Germany much later than to England and France, and the forms they took in Germany were filtered through the specific institutional character of Central Europe. German-speaking writers and intellectuals saw these trends from the perspective of indigenous intellectual traditions, and the resulting collisions of values and priorities largely shaped European and American social, political, and literary debates for much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This course explores these writings (in English translation) against the historical background of Central European society, focusing on particular works of Goethe, Hoffmann, Heine, Nietzsche, Kafka, Rilke, and Mann. Not offered 2012–13.

H 192. The Crusades. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course will introduce students to the series of religiously motivated European invasions of the Middle and Near East that began at the end of the eleventh century and that led to the creation of Latin Christian principalities in Palestine. Though the crusading movement came to embroil much of Europe itself, the course will focus strictly on the military expeditions to what the Crusaders called the Holy Land, and the history of the Crusader states up to the point of their destruction at the end of the thirteenth century. The course will be guided by the following questions: how did medieval Christianity justify wars of aggression against foreign peoples and religions? What motivated western Europeans to leave their homes and march into a hostile environment, where they often faced impoverishment if not death and where maintaining a Christian presence was a constant struggle? How did they manage to erect stable political entities in alien territory that lasted as long as they did, and how did they have to adapt their own culture to do so? Finally, how did the native peoples of the regions the Crusaders invaded and conquered—Muslim but also Christian and Jewish — perceive the Crusaders? How did the Crusaders’ presence affect life in a region whose populations had their own ancient histories and patterns of life? Not offered 2012–13.

En/H 193. Cervantes, Truth or Dare: Don Quixote in an Age of Empire. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see English.

H/HPS 194. Travels, Travelers, and Travel Tales: 1700-1900. 9 units (3-0-6); third term. This course explores the different and changing forms of travel and its representations in the 18th and 19th centuries. It will examine travels within Europe, in the Middle East and Asia, in Africa and the Pacific, in order to look at different sorts of travel from varying points of view, including travel as recreation, the collection and interpretation of scientific data, the control of resources, and the epistemological claims that underwrite imperialism. Recent critical writings on travel narrative and travel fiction will supplement historical travel texts and images, which may include the Paris Academy’s exploration of Peru, Cook’s travels to the Pacific, and Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle. Instructor: Brewer and Huebner.

H 195. Medicine, Magic, and Miracle: Healing in the Medieval West. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. This course explores the options and strategies that sufferers had in the later Middle Ages for healing various illnesses. By considering healing methods for illnesses like infertility, paralysis, fever, gout, anxiety, plague, and lovesickness among others, we can see how medicine, magic, and miracle overlapped and differed for patients and practitioners. This course also allows us to explore the emergence of university-trained medical practitioners as an option for more than just the nobility and the interactions between various kinds of practitioners at a time that had far fewer separations between medicine and religion. Not offered 2012–13.

H 196. Dante’s Inferno. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. One of the seminal works of Western culture, Dante Alighieri’s “Inferno” is an essential text for any educated soul. This course, part historical inquiry and part literary analysis, will present a structured reading of the first third of his Divine Comedy, “Inferno”. Over ten weeks we will explore the depths of human sins and Dante’s commentary on them as we journey through hell along with Dante and Virgil. Students will be introduced to the process and practice of reading Dante—the lectura dantis—and will investigate the late medieval world that gave rise to Dante and his masterwork. Not offered 2012–13.

En/H 197. American Literature and the Technologies of Reading. 9 units (3-0-6); second term. For course description, see English.

HPS/H 198. Print In a Global Context, 14th to 19th Centuries. 9 units (3-0-6). For course description, see History and Philosophy of Science.

H 201. Reading and Research for Graduate Students. Units to be determined for the individual by the division.