5
History 1001: Traditions and Encounters: World Cultures to 1500
Section A: Fall 2018 CRN 2506
Hawaii Pacific University
Syllabus
Course Description
This course will examine patterns of interaction among the world’s cultures that have driven large scale historical change over the last 2,000 years, with particular attention to the natural and human responses to macro-historical change from the development of agriculture to the emergence and spread of “universal” religions. This at once thematic and chronological approach will enable you to gain a fuller knowledge of, and an appreciation for, the roots of many of today’s world's cultures and enable you to see how and why encounters and exchanges between these “traditional” cultures came to influence the shape society today. This course will also offer you an acquaintance with the tools of world historical analysis and enable you to gain some experience in their application. It is assumed that few of you have a good grasp of historical method or have any great knowledge about non-western societies. This course will therefore be directed to introducing you to them and will concentrate on general principles rather than details that might overwhelm you. This course hopes that, through active learning and other innovative approaches, students will be able to examine large-scale questions that probe what it means to be human, explore where we have come from and where are going, while engaging their critical thinking skills and exploring their own ethics and values and those of others across the pre-modern world from a variety of perspectives.
By the way, graduates with experience in world historical analysis are exactly what large corporations, private institutions, and the American military are now seeking to employ. Microsoft’s Bill Gates is investing millions in promoting the broadest version of world history education, called “Big History” into school systems in the United States as he believes it offers the best means of delivering a world class education to all Americans. So this an excellent course for those who wish to do more at work than ask “Do you want fries with that?”
Instructor, Office Location, and Office Hours.
Your instructor is saitory History Professor Marc Jason Gilbert. Gilbert received his PhD from UCLA has studied and travelled in Afghanistan, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Central America, China, Cameroon, India, Indonesia, Iran, Laos, the Philippines, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Vietnam, Yemen, and throughout Western Europe. He has recently served as President of the World History Association and is editor of World History Connected, a free, on-line useful toll of the course. His office is the downtown campus at 1188 Fort Street Mall, Suite 422, Honolulu, Hawaii 96813. His e-mail address is mgilbert@hpu.edu. His office Phone is 808-544-1169. His office hours are 3:30-4:30 Tuesday and Thursday and by appointment. As Dr. Gilbert lives just a few blocks from campus, he...
