Professor Sue Peabody
Themes
What happens to historical facts and storytelling when the people
and events of the past are recalled not through books and lectures
but in dramatic or interactive media such as film, the internet,
CD-ROMs or computer games? In what ways do these media enhance our
understanding of the past? In what ways do they limit our
appreciation of historical argument and evidence? How is the "reader"
different from the "viewer" or "user" of history?
Students in this class will have the opportunity to grapple with these questions through the study of European royalty from the medieval and early modern periods. We will study what kings and queens meant to European society from 1100-1700 and what they mean to American audiences in the mid- to late- twentieth centuries. Do new technologies merely reformulate old questions to do they enable a fundamentally new relationship with the past?
Required Readings (cost is approximate)
Burke, Peter. The Fabrication of Louis XIV. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992. $17.00 0300059434
Cougarpack. $30.00 (see attached Table of Contents)
Optional Readings
Kagan, Donald, Steven Ozment, Frank M. Turner. The Western Heritage, Interactive Edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1996. $25.00 0134861353 (note: includes volumes I and II)
OR:
Kagan, Donald, Steven Ozment, Frank M. Turner. The Western Heritage, Volume I. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1996. $21.75 (used) 0134392663
Grades
20% Class Attendance and Participation
20% Think Questions
20% In-Class Writing Assignments
10% Bibliography
10% Preview
20% Final Project (including self-evaluation)
Final Project
Students will be responsible for creating a final project based
upon the life of a European monarch from the period 1100 to 1700.
Students choose one of the following forms for the final project:
website, video (documentary, dramatic, or experimental), CD-ROM
project (multi-media product, simulation, or game). Team projects are
encouraged.
1. Students should first select a monarch whose life interests them. For ideas, browse around in the Western Heritage textbook or CD-ROM. Students should also decide which format they intend to use for the final project.
2. Conference. Meet with the instructor during the second week of class to discuss the idea.
3. Bibliography. Compile a bibliography of no fewer than ten works (scholarly books and articles) on the topic. Order these from Pullman or interlibrary loan as soon as possible. Note: The works that you use MUST be available from a four-year institution such as WSU or PSU.
4. Preview. Write a two-page description of what you intend to
accomplish in your project.
What aspect or events of the monarch's life do you intend to
emphasize? What effect(s) are you trying to elicit in the
viewer/user/audience? Why do you think that this topic is interesting
or relevant today? What do you see as the most difficult aspects of
the project?
Also, write a two-page outline or diagram of the content that your project will contain.
For example, for a website, you might list the main pages of your site and how they will be linked. For a video, you might list the scenes or the storyboard. For a CD-ROM product, you might list the various components of the project.
5. Final projects will be presented to the class on July 29 and July 31. They will be graded on: historical content, organization, imaginative use of technologies, and execution. Teammembers will also rate one another on their level of contribution. Since this course does not offer training in any of the relevant technologies, it is understood that execution will not be the primary factor in determining grades.
6. In addition to the project itself, each student will write a 5-7 page self-evaluation of the project, discussing the problems encountered, the lessons learned, and an assessment of one's own performance.
For further help, see on reserve:
Levy, Edmond. Making a Winning Short: How to Write, Direct, Edit and Produce a Short Film.
Druin, Allison and Cynthia Solomon, Designing Multmedia Environments for Children (see especially chapters on "Online Multimedia" [websites] and "Multimedia Authoring"). Note: this book is on reserve for a different class: "Introduction to Educational Technology"
December, John. HTML and CGI Unleashed (reserve under "Perm Res")
Harms, David. Wesbite Programming with Java (reserve under "Perm Res")
Tilton, Eric, Carl Steadman and Tyler Jones. Designing and Managing an Effective Website. (reserve under "Perm Res")
Manger, Jason J. Essential Java. (reserve under "Perm Res")
Assignments
Week 1
1:1
Class orientation
1:2
David Cannadine. "Introduction: Divine Right of Kings" in Rituals of
Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies, ed. D.
Cannadine and S. Price. Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press,
1987, pp. 1-19
Sean Wilentz. "Introduction: Teufelsdröck's Dilemma: Symbolism, Politics and History" in Rites of Power: Symbolism, Ritual and Politics since the Middle Ages, ed. S. Wilenz, pp. 1-10
RESERVE: Geertz, Clifford. "Centers, Kings and Charisma: Reflections on the Symbolics of Power" in Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York: Basic Books, 1983, pp. 121-146
Week 2
Th 6/26
Rosenstone, Robert A. "History in Images/History in Words" in Visions
of the Past: The Challenge of Film to Our Idea of History (Harvard
University Press, 1995)
Natalie Zemon Davis, "`Any Resemblance to Persons Living or Dead': Film and the Challenge of Authenticity Yale Review 76 (1987): 457-482
Western Heritage, 175-176 (or Interactive version, "Henry II" and "Eleanor of Aquitaine")
Week 2
Meet with instructor to discuss final project this week.
M 6/30
Think Question #1 Due
Website: McMichael, Andrew, Michael O'Malley, and Roy Rosenzweig. "Historians and the Web: A Beginner's Guide." http://web.gmu.edu/chnm/beginner.html
Castries, René de la Croix, duc de. "Charles V the Wise." In The Lives of the Kings and Queens of France. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979, pp. 109-113
Western Heritage, 208-213 (or "Hundred Years' War" in Interactive version)
Tu 7/1
Castries, René de la Croix, duc de. "Francis I." In The Lives
of the Kings and Queens of France. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979,
pp. 143-153
Richardson, Glenn. "Good Friends and Brothers?: Francis I and Henry VIII." History Today 44 (September, 1994): 20-26
HANDOUT: Trinh T. Minh-ha, "The Totalizing Quest of Meaning" in Theorizing Documentary, ed. Michael Renov. New York: Routledge, 1993.
Western Heritage, 235-236, 244, 284-285 (or "Francis I" in Interactive version)
Th 7/3
RESERVE: David Lowenthal, The Past is a Foreign Country, chap. 5:
"How We Know the Past," pp. 185-259
Think Question #2 Due
Week 3
M 7/7
Bibliography due.
Sorlin, Pierre. "How to Look at an Historical Film." In The Film in History: Restaging the Past. Oxford: BAsil Blackwell, 1980, pp. 3-37.
Roddick, Nick. A New Deal in Entertainment: Warner Brothers in the 1930s. London: British Film Institute, 1983, pp. 235-248
Western Heritage, 289-297 (or Interactive Version, "Philip II" and "Elizabeth I")
Tu 7/8
RESERVE: Cherniavsky, Michael. "Ivan the Terrible as Renaissance
Prince," Slavic Review 27 (1968): 195-211
RESERVE: Yurenyev, Rostislav. "From History to Film." In "Ivan the Terrible": Classic Film Scripts, pp. 9-15
Western Heritage, 364 (Interactive version, "Ivan IV the Terrible, of Russia")
Th 7/10
Burke, Peter. The Fabrication of Louis XIV, 1-105
Week 4
M 7/14
Burke, Peter. The Fabrication of Louis XIV, 108-212
Think Question #3 Due
Tu 7/15
Rosenstone, Robert A. "The Historical Film: Looking at the Past in a
Postliterate Age" in Visions of the Past: The Challenge of Film to
Our Idea of History (Harvard University Press, 1995), 45-79
RESERVE: Grindon, Leger. "The Politics of the Spectacle: The Rise to Power of Louis XIV." In Shadows on the Past: Studies in the Historical Fiction Film. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1994, pp. 123-178.
Guarner, José Louis. Roberto Rossellini., pp. 112-117.
Western Heritage, 317-327 ("Louis XIV of France" in Interactive Version)
Th 7/17
Preview Due
WEBSITE: Roy Rosenzweig, "`So, What's Next for Clio?' CD-ROM and Historians," The Journal of American History 81:4 (March 1995): 1621-1640
http://web.gmu.edu/chnm/clio.html
Week 5
M 7/21
WEBSITE: Crawford, Chris. The Art of Computer Game Design. On my
webpage.
Western Heritage, 240 ("Roses, War of the")
Tu 7/22
Appelo, C.J., R.D. Huijsman, C. Pronk. "Implementation of Virtual
Worlds." Interactive Entertainment Design (February, 1994): 6-9
Crawford, Chris. "Interactivity, Plot, Free Will, Determinism, Quantum Mechanics, and Temporal Irreversibility" Interactive Entertainment Design (April, 1995): 2-5.
HANDOUT: Karen Swan, "History, Hypermedia, and Criss-Crossed Conceptual Landscapes." In Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 1994 (Vancouver, BC, 1994), 120-139
HANDOUT: Rauf Yildiz and Madeleine Atkins, "Evaluating Multimedia Applications" Computers Education 21:1/2 (1993): 133-139.
HANDOUT: James B.M. Schick, "Simulations." In Teaching History With a Computer: A Complete Guide for College Professors. Chicago: Lyceum, 1990, 100-147.
Th 7/24
McLuhan, Marshall. The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of
Effects.
Think Question #4 Due
Week 6
M 7/28
Feit, Josh. "Lost in Cyberspace: What Went Wrong with Portland's
Hottest CD-ROM Company?" Willamette Week 23:18 (March 5, 1997):
20-27
Gary Chapman, "Must Technological Research Increase Inequality?" New York Times, March 10, 1997
Tu 7/29
Class presentations
Th 7/31
Class presentations
Self-evaluation due