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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2014/2015
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DRPS : Course Catalogue : School of History, Classics and Archaeology : Postgraduate (History, Classics and Archaeology)

Postgraduate Course: The American Civil War and Reconstruction (PGHC11391)

Course Outline
SchoolSchool of History, Classics and Archaeology CollegeCollege of Humanities and Social Science
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate)
Course typeOnline Distance Learning AvailabilityAvailable to all students
SCQF Credits20 ECTS Credits10
SummaryThis course provides an introduction to the advanced study of a crucial period of American history. The course will focus on the period from the Mexican War to the Compromise of 1877. The course is structured around historically and historiographically significant themes. Each class session will address a particular theme or interpretative issue that has generated significant controversy in recent scholarship. It will begin by considering the pre-war background to the war, focusing on the problems of nationalism, sectionalism, and slavery, before going on to examine topical aspects of the war itself. Some attention will be paid to military events, but students will spend more time on the social, political, and cultural dimensions of the war, such as the role of women; northerners' ambivalence toward the policy of emancipation; and nationalism and dissent on both sides. Finally, the course will explore how different groups of Americans have remembered the Civil War, and will ask what has been at stake in differing representations of the Civil War from 1865 to the present.
The course will examine the historiographical debates that have raged since the outbreak of the war itself, and employ archival and other documentary material to evaluate them on the basis of their evidential strengths and weaknesses.
Course description Week 1: Introduction: Course Map and Introduction to Civil War Era
Week 2: The Antebellum North & South [asynchronous forum seminar]
Week 3: Expansion and the Sectional Crisis [synchronous seminar]
Week 4: The Road to Disunion [asynchronous forum seminar]
Week 5: Causes of the Civil War [synchronous seminar]
Week 6: The Union War[asynchronous forum seminar]
Week 7: The Confederate War [synchronous seminar]
Week 8: The War for Emancipation [asynchronous forum seminar]
Week 9: Reconstruction on the Ground [synchronous seminar]
Week 10: Political Reconstruction [asynchronous forum seminar]
Week 11: Concluding session & Civil War Memory [synchronous seminar]
Asynchronous forum discussions will include front-loaded screencasts or podcasts of short 10 minute lectures introducing the topics to be discussed over the course of the week's seminar. All primary source material discussed in both synchronous and asynchronous seminars will be provided electronically by the course organiser via Learn.
In addition to this there will be two half-hour virtual office slots provided per week, via Skype.
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Information for Visiting Students
Pre-requisitesNone
Course Delivery Information
Academic year 2014/15, Available to all students (SV1) Quota:  None
Course Start Semester 2
Course Start Date 12/01/2015
Timetable Timetable
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 200 ( Seminar/Tutorial Hours 12, Online Activities 10, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 174 )
Assessment (Further Info) Written Exam 0 %, Coursework 100 %, Practical Exam 0 %
Additional Information (Assessment) Learn forum posts (20%) and one 3,000 word essay (80%). The weekly use of Learn discussion forums will serve as a critical component of the online instruction.
Online versions of the postgraduate essay feedback form will be employed on the course.
Using discussion forums is a well-established practice in online learning to help students engage with the material and interact with each other. This is particularly important for courses, like those taught as part of the online MSc, that have a significant asynchronous component.
Each week, students will be responsible for a 200 word posting in which they will make a significant observation about the reading(s). They will also be responsible for posting two responses to their classmates' initial postings, each 100 words in length. These posts will help to create a conversation among the students prior to the course's infrequent synchronous sessions and provide the instructor with insight as to the students' mastery of the readings and interests. The forum posts will be evaluated weekly, using the standard written material rubric.
Feedback Not entered
No Exam Information
Learning Outcomes
After completing the course, students will be able to:
- demonstrate an in-depth knowledge of some of the most important issues and themes connected to the United States before, during, and after the Civil War;
- independently identify and pursue research topics in this period of American history;
- exhibit an understanding for different conceptual approaches for the study of history;
- analyse and contextualise primary source material;
- arrive at independent, well-argued, well-documented and properly referenced conclusions in their coursework essay;
- demonstrate their skills in group discussion and oral presentations;
- demonstrate their written skills, their analytical and theoretical skills in coursework;
- demonstrate their ability to reflect on the reading & research they have undertaken and provide feedback for their peers.
Reading List
To facilitate the learning experience for online students, all readings will be in the form of scholarly articles available via JSTOR or other databases available through the University of Edinburgh library and primary sources, also available online.
A sample of the texts to be read is listed:
James L. Huston, "Property Rights in Slavery and the Coming of the Civil War," Journal of Southern History 65 (1999): 249-286.
Gary J. Kornblith, "Rethinking the Coming of the Civil War: A Counterfactual Exercise," Journal of American History 90 (2003): 76-105.
Robert Tracy McKenzie, "Contesting Secession: Parson Brownlow and the Rhetoric of Proslavery Unionism, 1860-1861," Civil War History 48 (2002): 294-312.
Drew Gilpin Faust, "Christian Soldiers: The Meaning of Revivalism in the Confederate Army," Journal of Southern History 53 (1987): 63-90.
Leslie A. Schwalm, ""Overrun with Free Negroes": Emancipation and Wartime Migration in the Upper Midwest," Civil War History 50 (2004): 145-174.
Daniel E. Sutherland, "Guerrilla Warfare, Democracy, and the Fate of the Confederacy," The Journal of Southern History 68, no. 2 (May 2002): 259-292.
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills The study of the past gives students a unique understanding of the present that will enable them to succeed in a broad range of careers. The transferable skills gained from this course include:
- understanding of complex issues and how to draw valid conclusions from the past
- ability to analyse the origins and development of current historiographical debates
- a command of bibliographical and library- and/or IT-based online and offline research skills
- a range of skills in reading and textual analysis
- ability to question and problematize evidence; considering the relationship between evidence and interpretation
- understanding ethical dimensions of research and their relevance for human relationships today
- ability to marshal arguments lucidly, coherently and concisely, both orally and in writing
- ability to deliver a paper or a presentation in front of peer audiences
- ability to design and execute pieces of written work and to present them suitably, as evidenced by the final assessment essay of 3,000 words
KeywordsCivil War Recon
Contacts
Course organiserProf David Silkenat
Tel: (0131 6)50 4614
Email: David.Silkenat@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMrs Lindsay Scott
Tel: (0131 6)50 9948
Email: Lindsay.Scott@ed.ac.uk
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