Descriptions Archive

Winter 2027

Course Description:

This course introduces students to debates on gender and politics in African history. It examines women’s political authority, participation, and activism across changing understandings of statehood in pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial Africa. Particular attention will be paid to the ways women have historically interacted with, challenged, and shaped political structures, legal systems, and institutions at local, national, regional, and international levels. The course is broadly organised around themes including pre-colonial political structures and colonial legacies, constructions of femininity and masculinity, spiritual authority, democratisation, violent conflict, sex and sexuality, women’s movements, and contemporary political struggles. We will draw on texts that illustrate a range of sources for African history, including life histories, documentaries, ethnographic texts, poetry and music.

Topics in History –Trans History
HIST 4915A
Professor Jennifer V. Evans (she/her/they)
Fall 2026
How do we historicize lives that institutional archives historically erased, criminalized, or pathologized? This advanced seminar bridges transgender history, queer theory, visual culture, and critical museology. Moving beyond mere “visibility,” we will treat the exhibition space, the art object, and the material fragment as primary sites of historical production. Students will examine the concepts of “shimmering” trans embodiment, affective shadow archives, and the politics of institutional critique.
Ultimately, this course shifts the focus from simply reading trans history to actively curating it.
The coursework will center around a group project with a focus on the role of artistic creation in creating a space for trans/trans* livability in the contemporary moment. Working together with trans artists, the Ottawa Trans Library, and either the Carleton University Art Gallery or MacOdrum Library, students will curate an exhibit. This will include liaising with the artists and gallery workers, conceptualizing the exhibit, promoting it, and follow up work in the form of a future grant application to the City of Ottawa art fund.
Structure and Expectations
This course meets synchronously for one 3-hour block per week and will be run as a seminar, with students taking turns presenting ideas from the readings and facilitating the overall discussion. A good discussion includes a plurality of diverse, well-informed voices. To that end it is absolutely imperative that students come to class prepared, having read the readings thoroughly. Students should be prepared to be active members of class, contributing to discussion on a weekly basis. The participation grade will be based on active participation. If for any reason a student struggles with participation, please come see me to discuss workarounds.
 

HIST 4915A

Professor Jennifer V. Evans (she/her/they)

Fall 2026

How do we historicize lives that institutional archives historically erased, criminalized, or pathologized? This advanced seminar bridges transgender history, queer theory, visual culture, and critical museology. Moving beyond mere “visibility,” we will treat the exhibition space, the art object, and the material fragment as primary sites of historical production. Students will examine the concepts of “shimmering” trans embodiment, affective shadow archives, and the politics of institutional critique.

Ultimately, this course shifts the focus from simply reading trans history to actively curating it.

The coursework will center around a group project with a focus on the role of artistic creation in creating a space for trans/trans* livability in the contemporary moment. Working together with trans artists, the Ottawa Trans Library, and either the Carleton University Art Gallery or MacOdrum Library, students will curate an exhibit. This will include liaising with the artists and gallery workers, conceptualizing the exhibit, promoting it, and follow up work in the form of a future grant application to the City of Ottawa art fund.

Structure and Expectations

This course meets synchronously for one 3-hour block per week and will be run as a seminar, with students taking turns presenting ideas from the readings and facilitating the overall discussion. A good discussion includes a plurality of diverse, well-informed voices. To that end it is absolutely imperative that students come to class prepared, having read the readings thoroughly. Students should be prepared to be active members of class, contributing to discussion on a weekly basis. The participation grade will be based on active participation. If for any reason a student struggles with participation, please come see me to discuss workarounds.

Winter 2027

Instructor: Christine Chisholm

 

Dr. Maurice Mongeau with young Bernadette Bainbridge at the Rehabilitation Institute in Montreal. The image was part of an article discussing the ‘flying squad’ approach to helping mother’s cope with the news of having given birth to a child with disabilities.Source:Toronto Daily Star, March 26, 1966. Photographed by Len Sidaway.
 

Course Description:
What does it mean to be “normal”? How have ideas about disability evolved over time? This course explores the rich and complex history of disability, tracing how societies have understood, represented, and treated disabled individuals across different cultural and historical contexts. While drawing on global perspectives, we will focus heavily on Canadian histories, examining key moments of discrimination, exclusion, and resistance.
Through case studies, students will engage with both medical and cultural interpretations of disability, analyzing how these frameworks have shaped policies, public attitudes, and the lived experiences of disabled individuals. We will also explore the material aspects of disability, from assistive technologies to accessibility policies, and consider how historical narratives have influenced contemporary debates.
This course encourages students to think critically about the intersections of disability with race, gender, and class, drawing on multi-disciplinary approaches and Critical Disability Studies. By the end of the course, students will not only gain a deeper understanding of disability history but will also be equipped to ask new and thought-provoking questions about what it means to be human.
Format and Assessment: In-person. Weekly three-hour classes will include lectures, discussions, and other course activities.
Your mark in the course will be based on your attendance and participation (including the submission of thoughtful discussion questions), a midterm, a research essay, and a final examination. The course provides students with multiple opportunities to develop and demonstrate their historical thinking through varied forms of expression, including written, oral, and participatory activities.
Aims and Goals:
Understand and explain historical events, people, institutions, movements, and ideas in the history of disability
Evaluate historical arguments and historical scholarship
Recognize and apply historical methods and historical theories to make historical arguments
Express in writing the results of historical thinking and research
Text: All articles and book chapters assigned will be available via ARES and online. No purchases are required.



Questions? Please email me at: ChristineChisholm@cunet.carleton.ca

Dr. Guadalupe Escalante Rengifo

Winter 2027

This course covers the major events that shaped Latin America from the Wars of Independence to the end of the twentieth century. First, we examine how emerging nations built their political, economic, and cultural structures while navigating the legacies of Spanish and Portuguese rule. Central to this inquiry is how Latin American states both reproduced and transformed colonial hierarchies of race, gender, social classification, religion, and identity. Second, the course considers how twentieth-century states navigated major revolutions, economic shifts, foreign interventions, dictatorships, and migration. Finally, we will reflect on late-twentieth-century resistance movements that challenged local and global forces, including racism, populism, neoliberalism, and extractivism. Throughout the term, students will engage with key concepts and explore a rich mix of sources—such as archival materials, press and media, music, popular art, literature, and film—to develop a critical understanding of Latin American history and culture.

Dr. Guadalupe Escalante Rengifo

Winter 2027

What is oral history, and what makes it unique? In this fully asynchronous course, students explore theory, ethics, and practice of oral history. The course begins by examining foundational approaches to oral history and its power to democratize history and amplifying underrepresented voices, as well as exploring key debates surrounding memory, narrative, the labor of remembering, and co-production of knowledge. Next, learners will familiarize themselves with essential legal and ethical frameworks before putting theory into practice through an original oral history project—gaining hands-on experience in project design, active listening, interview strategies, and digital recording. Moving from practice back to theory, the course covers transcription, critical interpretation, and project curation. Finally, the course focuses on archiving and preservation, equipping participants with real-world research skills.

Fall 2026 / Winter 2027

This course is required for all first-year MA students in History and Public History.

It is meant to be your anchor in the first year of your program, a place where you will explore what it means to think historically and “do” history through a sampling of theoretical and methodological approaches. There is no single way to be a historian, after all, but at the same time, there is something distinct about historical research compared with other disciplines. We will explore sources, archives, and the various ways historians construct narratives out of what we find. (For example, we will read an academic article about Cold War Italy in which the author completely makes up the people he is writing about. Can historians do that?) We will consider written mediums as well as visual and material; theories about how historical lenses can amplify or marginalize certain angles or groups in the past; and source discussions that touch on big issues like memory, knowledge production, and voice.

Class Format:

This course runs for the full academic year, from September to April, for 0.5 credits. That means we generally meet every two weeks instead of every week, and the workload is more spread out. That said, it is still a core course for your degree and will require your consistent attention. We will meet for one 3-hour seminar every second week, which will primarily involve student-led discussions of the assigned readings (normally 3-4 academic journal articles or book chapters, or one short book). Attendance is mandatory for success in this class.

Assessment:

Participation in the seminar discussions; written assignments such as reading responses and peer review. You will also begin to explore your own thesis or MRE topic as you become more familiar with advanced historical theory and method: this class will help you design and workshop your MA project proposal in order to submit it to your advisor and an outside faculty reader by the end of April.

Texts:

Readings will consist of book chapters and journal articles available electronically through the library catalogue or other resources available for free online. One or two short books might be required for purchase.

Questions? Feel free to email me at erica.fraser@carleton.ca

Winter 2027

HIST 3110 A

Course Description:

HIST 3110 examines the history of food and foodways across the globe, from late antiquity to the present. This course will be organized around weekly themes, designed to introduce students to a variety methodologies and topics within the field of food history, including taste and the senses; production, distribution, and consumption; diet and nutrition; foodways of religion, gender, and ethnicity; the rise of the restaurant and gastronomy; and, local and global food movements. 

The format of this course will be an in-person three-hour block, with time devoted to lecture and group discussion. In-class time will also be given to workshopping the term research paper.  

Winter 2027

Title: HIST 5702X – Topics in Public History: Memory, Monuments, Memorials & Commemoration

Brief Course Description – In this course, students will learn about the role of public historians — before, during and after the professionalization of the field in the 1970s — in the researching, development and interpretation of monuments, memorials and commemoration initiatives in the 20th and 21st centuries. Together we will encounter stories about private and public commemoration with case studies from Canada, the United States, and internationally. Understanding the role of public historians, memory keepers, storytellers and others who have created, settled, and unsettled places and landscapes of memory and commemoration is at the heart of this course. We will explore monuments and memorials in a variety of forms – not just in bronze and stone. Students can expect guest speakers, and a hands-on approach to learning about the intersections of public history, memorialization and commemoration. 

HIST 2510A: 19^th Century Germany

Fall 2026

Instructor: Sean Eedy

Introduction:  Looking across the long nineteenth century, HIST 2510 explores German and Austrian history from the Napoleonic Wars through to the end of World War I.  In doing so, we will discuss some of the dominant military and political developments of the period, including the 1848 Revolutions, the wars of Unification, and the colonization of Africa.  We will explore the roots of German nationalism at a time when the German-speaking lands were struggling for identity and how this nationalism changed across the nineteenth century. 

At the same time, this course intersects everyday life through discussions of women, the working-class, youth and children’s culture and the use of those histories in constructions of modern German identities.  Lectures and assigned readings examine the parallel and intertwined aspects of the course as perceptions of race, gender, culture, and civilization are used to justify exclusion in the German states while liberals and radicals demand the expansion of rights and representation.

Class Format: HIST 2510 is scheduled once per week for a three-hour in-person lecture. 

Aims and Goals: This course allows students opportunity to develop their critical analytic and communication skills.  Being able to interpret historical documents and analyze the works of historians is central to the discipline as is the ability to clearly, concisely, and convincingly argue one’s position.  As such, students will be introduced to the historical practice and methodology and the importance of argumentation and the use of evidence in the construction of their writings.

Assessments: Students will be required to submit formal written assignments that demonstrate engagement with the three primary readings in the course.  Guidelines will be made available in the course syllabus.  In addition, there will be a cumulative final exam.

Texts:  Students will be assigned sections from The German Worker edited by Alfred Kelly, as well as the complete texts of Effi Briest by Theodor Fontane, and A Butcher’s Tale by Helmut Walser Smith.  Those sections of The German Worker will be made available on Brightspace.  Effi Briest and A Butcher’s Tale will be available through the university bookstore, though students may choose to find versions from online vendors.  A print copy of each of these texts is available in the university library.  Effi Briest is also in the public domain. 

HIST 1004A: Europe in War and Cold War

Winter 2027

Instructor: Dr. Sean Eedy

Introduction:  Picking up where HIST 1003 left off (though having taken 1003 is not necessary), this course introduces students to European history in the latter half of the twentieth century.  Topics covered may include the Second World War and the Holocaust, dictatorship and Soviet-style Communism, social and student protest and uprisings including domestic terrorism, détente between East and West, and the end of the Soviet empire.  Students will witness how ideological differences between wartime allies created a rupture in postwar Europe and how western economics and changing policies on the use of force undermined the legitimacy and stability of Soviet Bloc states.  Between lectures and readings, this course addresses questions of class, gender, culture, and politics, through the examples of music, film, comics, sport, consumerism, political protest, etc.  Students should complete HIST 1004 with an awareness of some of the more pertinent events in Europe during the Cold War and their impacts on the people, society, and culture of Europe up to the fall of the Soviet Union.

Class Format:  HIST 1004A meets once per week for a three-hour block. 

Aims and Goals:  This course allows students the opportunity to develop their critical analytic and communication skills.  For some, this course may be their first encounter with historical interpretation and analysis and may also be their first experience with academic essay writing.  Being able to interpret historical documents and analyze the works of historians is central to the discipline as is the ability to clearly, concisely, and convincingly argue one’s position.  As such, students will be introduced to the historical practice and methodology and the importance of argumentation and the use of evidence in the construction of their writings.

Assessment:  Student evaluation in HIST 1004 will come from two written assignments, a weekly quiz drawn from lecture and reading content, and a final exam. 

Text:  Konrad H. Jarausch, Out of Ashes: A New History of Europe in the Twentieth Century (Princeton University Press, 2015).  This book is ordered through the Carleton University Bookstore.  Be advised, it is also available through online booksellers and as a free ebook through the Carleton University Library.  In addition, journal articles will be posted to the course Brightspace page for weekly readings.

Questions:  feel free to email me at seaneedy@cunet.carleton.ca

HIST 1003A: Empire, War, and Revolution in Europe, 1850-1939

Fall 2026

Instructor: Dr. Sean Eedy

Introduction:  This course introduces students to Europe in the latter half of the nineteenth century and into the first half of the twentieth.  Some topics covered may include the Crimean War, Neo-Colonialism, the First World War, the Russian Revolution, and the rise of European Fascism.  Students will see and understand how the spread of new political ideas after the French Revolution upset the status quo in Europe.  Between lectures and readings, this course addresses questions of class, gender, culture, and politics as they are explored from both a top-down and bottom-up perspective.  Though the course cannot cover every event in Europe within the time frame, it provides students with a chronological awareness of some of the more significant events and their impacts on the European continent and its people up to the beginning of the Second World War.

Class Format:  HIST 1003 meets once per week for a three-hour block. 

Aims and Goals:  This course allows students opportunity to develop their critical analytic and communication skills.  For some, this course may be their first encounter with historical interpretation and analysis and may also be their first experience with academic essay writing.  Being able to interpret historical documents and analyze the works of historians is central to the discipline as is the ability to clearly, concisely, and convincingly argue one’s position.  As such, students will be introduced to the historical practice and methodology and the importance of argumentation and the use of evidence in the construction of their writings.

Assessment:  Student evaluation in HIST 1003 will come from two written assignments, a weekly quiz drawn from lecture and reading content, and a final exam. 

Text:  Konrad H. Jarausch, Out of Ashes: A New History of Europe in the Twentieth Century (Princeton University Press, 2015).  This book is ordered through the Carleton University Bookstore.  Be advised, it is also available through online booksellers and as a free ebook through the Carleton University Library.  In addition, journal articles will be posted to the course Brightspace page for weekly readings.

Questions:  feel free to email me at seaneedy@cunet.carleton.ca