Course Description

Welcome! This site is for students, parents, teachers and anyone else interested in the tenth-grade World History 2 Course at Santa Fe Prep.

The overall course covers the history of the world from roughly 1500 to the present. The first quarter opens with the time when Asia was the center of world affairs, then traces European encounters with Asia and the Americas, and the complex interactions and consequences of the so-called "Columbian Exchange" between Europe, Asia, the Americas and Africa. The first quarter ends with a survey of the European Renaissance and Reformation, in both its local and global dimensions. The second quarter will focus on the rise of absolute monarchies and new ideas and practices, especially with the scientific revolution and Enlightenment. The second quarter ends with assessments of the legacies of the French Revolution, Napoleon and the emergence of the British Empire. The third quarter starts with the implications of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars in the wake of the Congress of Vienna, i.e., the discourse on rights, reaction, revolution and reform, the rise of new ideologies, in particular, Classical Liberalism, nationalism, and romanticism, and conservative reactions to the changes wrought by the American and French Revolutions. The course then examines the rise of industrialization and social change in 19th-century Europe, and the emergence of middle and working class cultures, followed by new iterations of liberalism and conservatism, the proliferation of more ideologies, e.g., socialism, communism, ultranationalism, social Darwinism, and antisemitism. Then the course examines the unification of the Italian and German nation states, and the creation of the modern welfare state. From there the course traces the rise of a new wave of Western imperialism, followed by the rest of the world's reactions to the rise of European empires and ideas, and in particular, the emergence of industrial Japan and their surprising victory over Russia. The third quarter ends with the outbreak of the First World War. The fourth and final quarter surveys the effects of the First World War, followed by the brief peak of classical liberal nation states and promises for peace, and the rapid rise of authoritarianism, in both communist and fascist variations, with a special focus on the rise of Nazism, the Nazi racial transformation of Germany and the Holocaust and Shoah of modern Europe. The fourth quarter concludes by looking at the causes and effects of the Second World War, the Cold War, the end of European empires in Asia and Africa, the emergence of the Modern Middle East and China, the end of the Cold War, history since 1989, all the way to the present, including current events.

Friday, October 31, 2014

Week 11 - Absolutism and Europe's Social and Political Order, 1600-1715

Monday through Thursday, November 3-6, 2014
Quiz#4: Covers Protestant and Catholic Reformations. Key terms and persons will be assessed in-class on Day 3; online portion of quiz will go live Thursday, 10/30 at 3:30PM and will remain open until Monday, 11/3 at midnight.
Historiographies are DUE by the end of the class day, Thursday, 11/6.
Book Review submissions to the Student Magazine are DUE at the latest by Friday, 11/21 to the magazine editors, Emma Koolpe and Beckett Maestas.
Long Periods: Devoted to research and writing historiographies in the library.
Head's Holiday on Friday, 11/7 - no classes.

Day 1, Monday, November 3: The Rise of Absolutism.
In-class: Introduce the rise of absolutism and Europe's social and political order, 1600-1715.
Homework for Day 3:Create an image of a primary source from independent research projects, and bring to class on Day 3 to post on the classroom wall map.
ALSO: Read, "The Struggle for Survival and Sovereignty," from The West in the World, Vol II., eds. Sherman and Salisbury, pp. 391-403 (up to "The Struggle for Sovereignty in Eastern Europe) and prepare notes on the following key terms, persons, and questions for a graded discussion in class:

Question#1: What were the pressures that the lower orders of French society faced in the 1600s (Use primary sources for support)?

Question#2: What were the pressures that the elite orders of French society faced, and how did these pressures help lead to the rise of absolute monarchy (Use primary sources for support)?

Key Terms: The Great Chain of Being, royal absolutism, the Fronde, noblesse de robe, Edict of Nantes, Intendents, and mercantilism.
Key Persons: Bishop Bossuet, Henry IV, Cardinal Richelieu, Cardinal Mazarin, Jean Baptiste Colbert, and Louis XIV, "the Sun King".

Long Periods: Meet in library for research, writing and discussion on historiography.

Day 3: The Rise of Absolute Monarchies and France under Louis XIV, 1661-1715.
In-class: Discuss the homework readings, key terms, persons, and questions on France.
Homework for Monday, 11/10:Read "The Struggle for Sovereignty in Eastern Europe," from The West in the World, Vol II., eds. Sherman and Salisbury, pp.403-409 (up until the section, "The Triumph of Constitutionalism"), and prepare notes on the following questions for discussion.
Question#1: How did the struggles in everyday life and issues of sovereignty compare between Western and Eastern Europe, based on the examples of Brandenburg-Prussia, Austria, Russia and Poland?

Key Terms: sovereignty, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, the (French) Wars of Aggression, the Peace of Utrecht, estates, serfs, Brandenburg-Prussia, the Hohenzollerns, Austria, the Hapsburgs, the Ottomans, the Tsars, and the Romanovs.
Key Persons: The Great Elector Frederick William, Leopold I, Jan Sobieski, Ivan IV (the "Terrible"), and Peter I (the "Great").

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