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SoSe 18: Colloquium North American Studies

Jessica Gienow-Hecht

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This colloquium has three purposes: first, it is designed for M.A. students preparing to write a thesis. To this end, we shall meet several times in small individual sessions to discuss students’ research projects. Second, it offers graduate students, ABDs and postgraduates the opportunity to discuss their research and ideas related to North American history. Third, it features a diverse number of guest speakers presenting their own research. Students will meet some select speakers individually for tea prior to a session to ask questions relating to their career and their research interest. While individual research topics of these diverse groups will necessarily differ, we will seek to relate them to the central theme and concept of “harmony,” borrowing from history, musicology and related fields. In sum, we will discuss new research trends, topics, publications, and career trajectories while also welcoming outside speakers in class. All students interested in North American history and related fields are welcome. Course requirements: Active and regular participation in class (no “sit-ins”); be familiar with, and ready to discuss, required readings for class; introduction of individual guest speakers, online and in-class presentation of questions and research proposal. After each guest presentation, students are required to post two critical questions on blackboard, one pertaining to the immediate topic of the talk, the other reflecting their own research in the context of the presentation. Kate L. Turabian, A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, 6th ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996) Chicago Manual of Style (http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/home.html Ideas of Harmony in Medieval culture and Society (Firenze: Sismel, 2017). Chenyang Li, “The Confucian Ideal of Harmony,” Philosophy East and West 56, 4(October 2006): 583-603. Moshe Barash, “Composition and Harmony,” Modern Theories of Art 2: From Impressionism to Kandinsky (New York: New York University Press, 1998), 352-370. Jean-Christian Vinel, “The Sociology of Harmony,” The Employee: A Political History (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013), 63-86. Stephen Angle, “Human Rights and Harmony,” Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Feb., 2008), pp. 76-94. close