Course List

Course Number	Course Name	C - L - H	Hrs
330-101-DW	Western Civilization	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: This course traces the growth of Western civilization from its roots in the Judeo-Christian and Greco-Roman traditions to the 20th century. Among the major themes covered are the emergence and influence of key intellectual currents, social and political revolution, the development of industrial society, the birth of the nation state, imperialism, totalitarianism, and the two world wars. Students are introduced to basic concepts such as historical cause and social change, race, class and gender, as well as to the major political ideologies.
330-214-DW	20th Century History	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: The 20th century was the most turbulent in human history, witnessing wars, revolutions, ethnic conflicts, environmental disasters and dramatic changes in the lives of almost all groups throughout the world. These courses will focus on such themes as nationalism, imperialism, racism, anti-Semitism, communism and fascism; World War I and the rise of totalitarian regimes; World War II and the Holocaust; anti-colonial struggles; the Cold War and the collapse of communism; and the spread of religious fundamentalism and terrorism.
330-270-DW	Post-Classical History	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: This course introduces the student to the historical development of modern Western civilization from the disintegration of the European feudal and Christian order in the 14th century to the birth of the sovereign national state and a self-conscious universal culture in the late 18th century. The geographical scope includes Russia, the Middle East, Europe, the Mediterranean basin, and the continents and seas that saw European expansion. The purpose is to set students upon a historical journey through the complexity of persons and events, ideas and movements, and immense religious, social, intellectual and political changes of those centuries, and to examine the main lines of analytical interpretation of our past that attempt to give it shape and meaning. Topics given particular attention are the social, economic and religious upheavals of the 14th and 15th centuries, Renaissance humanism and its achievements, the Protestant Reformation and its consequences, the development of modern monarchies, the state and absolutist and constitutional politics, the ‘revolutions’ in science, agriculture and transoceanic commerce, and the colonization of the 16th and 17th centuries, the early industrial revolution, the thought and international politics of the Enlightenment, the origins, the ideas and course of the American and French Revolutions.
330-306-DW	Applied U.S. History	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: These courses investigate different aspects of the colonial heritage of the United States, the American Revolution and the early days of the American Republic. They will then examine the territorial and economic expansion of the country and the issue of race relations from slavery through to the modern civil rights movement. They will also discuss the expansion of capitalism, the redefinition of the role of government as a result of the Great Depression, and American foreign relations.
330-314-DW	Applied 20th Century History	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: This course examines the significant political, economic and socio-cultural changes that have marked the history of the last century. Students will explore both primary and secondary sources that shed light on various major topics pertaining to 20th-century history.
330-370-DW	Modern History-19th and 20th Centuries	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: This course is a general survey of European and Western history from the French Revolution until the aftermath of World War II. Its main emphasis is on the understanding of first, the important broad socio-economic and political changes, and second, the relationship between these changes and the history of ideas. We examine the connection between the French Revolution and the ideas of such influential conservative thinkers as Edmund Burke and Joseph de Maistre. Similarly, the link between the Industrial Revolution and the various socialist ideologies is traced. The steady growth of liberalism and nationalism in the 19th century and of totalitarian and revolutionary ideologies in the 20th century are naturally important course themes.
330-BWS-03	History of Science and Technology	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: When we think of science and technology, we often think of the inventions and developments that have shaped our world into what it is - cellphones, vaccine development, cars, TikTok, hydroelectricity, etc. Media and advertising often frame science and technology as forces of progress and development. But is this always true? Have science and technology been used to benefit everyone or just a select few? And what about other species? What about the planet? Whose desires and whose interests are being fulfilled? This course will look at alternative histories of science and technology. It’ll ask questions such as: What are the costs of our way of life on people? What about the rights of other species and the integrity of our planet? How has our drive for “progress” in Canada affected Indigenous people? What other existing teachings, practices or visions of science, technology and the future could we learn from?
330-BXS-03	Ideology, Technology and Conflict	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: This course will focus on the causes and consequences of World War I and World War II. Technological innovations, including nuclear energy and the internet, will be discussed in addition to the concepts of nationalism, imperialism, capitalism, communism, fascism, and racism. Students will be required to write two tests, each including an essay of no less than 250 words, and a term paper of 750 to 1000 words. The term paper will be a review of a primary source, to be chosen from a set of documents provided by the instructor. The competency to be acquired is the ability “to analyze one of the major problems of our time using one or more social scientific approaches.” (Being that history is counted as a social science here at Dawson College, the approaches of historians will be applied.)
330-BXS-03	Snapshots of the 20th Century	3 - 0 - 3	45
Description for Course: Snapshots always capture a moment in time. However, they might also reveal far more. The 20th century was a remarkable period of exhilarating and tumultuous change and challenge. We will consider moments in time as an entrée to exploring various aspects of this period in order to understand its continuities and discontinuities. The Model T Ford (Michigan, Manchester, 1908-27) and Tiananmen Square’s ‘Tank Man’ (Beijing, 1989) are examples of those moments in time that represented something far more. In this course, we will traverse and consider key topics in 20th century history, and students will analyze issues using social scientific approaches.
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