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This course is a survey and critical examination of the social, political, economic, cultural, religious institutions and faiths, and intellectual history of “the West” from remote antiquity to the 20th century. Accomplished primarily through lectures, the course emphasizes not only the most significant traditions but also transformations—that is, the continuities, habits, rituals, changes, and revolutions—in Western history. Sections covered include: the Ancient Greeks, the Roman Republic and Empire, the Renaissance, Reformation, and the Scientific Revolution, the French Revolution and Napoleon, Industrialization, and Colonization and Decolonization.
This work, written probably around 830-833 by Eginhard, a Frankish historian and court scholar, is an invaluable source of information on Charlemagne, the king of the Franks (768–814), king of the Lombards (774–814), and first emperor (800–814) of the Romans and of what was later called the Holy Roman Empire. As an example of the classical renaissance at the Carolingian court and as the first medieval biography of a lay figure, this work was originally composed in an excellent Latin style and analyzed Charlemagne’s family, his foreign and domestic achievements, his personal tastes, the administration of his kingdom, and his death.
This work is written by the medieval philosopher St. Augustine as De civitate Dei contra paganos (Concerning the City of God Against the Pagans) about 413–426. It was written in response to pagan claims that the sack of Rome by barbarians in 410 was one of the consequences of the abolition of pagan worship by Christian emperors. Augustine responded by asserting, to the contrary, that Christianity saved the city from complete destruction and that Rome’s fall was the result of internal moral decay. He further outlined his vision of two societies, that of the elect (“The City of God”) and that of the damned (“The City of Man”).
This work, probably composed between 1349 and 1353, is a collection of tales by Giovanni Boccaccio, an Italian poet and scholar, depicting ten young people who fled the city during the Black Death in Florence, and kept their spirits up and scandal at bay by telling stories. It is regarded as a masterpiece of classical Italian prose with exquisite writing and sophisticated structure. Sex, violence, intrigue, humour, generosity, and compassion, all find a place in a rich, controlled narrative. It is generally acknowledged that Boccaccio borrowed many of the stories from folklore and myth.
This work by John Locke is a classic in the history of political theory. It was directed against the principles of Sir Robert Filmer, whose books assert the divine authority of kings and deny any right of resistance. In the second treatise, Locke defines political power as a “Right of making Laws with Penalties of Death, and consequently all less Penalties, for the Regulating and Preserving of Property, and of employing the force of the Community, in the Execution of such Laws and in defense of the Common-wealth from Foreign Injury, and all this only for the Public Good.”
This work is written by Friedrich Engels, a German socialist philosopher. Beginning with an account of the history of the Industrial Revolution as a process of increasing class polarization between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie involving the building of ever-larger factories and the spread of chaotic urbanization. The discussions followed focus on phenomenology of the great towns- London, Dublin, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and the major towns of Yorkshire, analyzing its social geography, its transport system, and its class apartheid. He concludes that the working class of the great cities offers a graduated scale of conditions in life, and that the average is much nearer the worst case than the best.
The Communist Menafesto, also referred to as the Manifesto of the Communist Party, was first published on February 21, 1848 in German as Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei. Commissioned by the Communist League and co-authoered by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, it laid out the League’s purposes and program on the instruction of its Second Congress (London, November 29-December 8, 1847). The Manifesto suggested a course of action for a proletarian revolution to overthrow the bourgeois social order and to eventually bring about a classless and stateless society and the abolition of private property.
This book is a collection of George Orwell’s short essays, including the essay Shooting an Elephant, which is a searing and painfully honest account of Orwell’s experience as a police officer in imperial Burma; killing an escaped elephant in front of a crowd 'solely to avoid looking a fool'. The other masterly essays in this collection include classics such as 'My Country Right or Left', 'How the Poor Die' and 'Such, Such were the Joys', his memoir of the horrors of public school, as well as discussions of Shakespeare, sleeping rough, boys' weeklies and a spirited defence of English cooking.
This speech by Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) was delivered on July 5, 1852 as an address to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. It criticizes the chasm between America’s Founding principles and the institution of slavery. In the speech, Douglass lamented that Independence Day wasn’t a day of celebration for enslaved people. At the same time, he urged his audience to read the U.S. Constitution not as a pro-slavery document, but as a “Glorious Liberty Document.” Frederick Douglass was a former slave who became a nationally recognized abolitionist orator during the antebellum period.
