World War I: Instrument of Change

The bodyguard, Count Franz von Harrach, described how a “thin stream of blood spurted” from the Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s mouth and how his wife, Sophie, fell, slumped “with her face between his knees.” The June 28^th, 1914 assassination of this husband and wife team, destined as the next in line to take the throne of the Austrian Empire, rapidly disassembled ninety-nine years of

 

A Tin Box, Several Sabers, and Newspapers: The Rise of the West in the 19th Century

Pulled from the depths of a coal mine in Northern England in 1815 was a small tin box tucked into the shirt pocket of a dead seventeen-year-old male, William Thew. The young man used his pocketknife to etch the following words into the back of that tin:

 

Early Modern Political Economy of Labor

As opportunities presented by the New World, and new occasions to take advantage of “old world” trading routs settled into some sort of European normalcy, how best to do so became hotly debated. Indeed, the riches of the New World and Asia via new routes of trade became politicized i

 

Written Lectures: Digging this online teaching technique

This semester I am teaching an online World History course, 1500 to the present. That I am OER certified (Open Educational Resources) meant that I chose to employ a collection of primary documents and selected essays rather than an expensive textbook for reading materials. Each week, the class moves through the readings and assignments. My laptop’s built-in camera killed the “live” lecture, so I switched to

 

1,000-Word Lecture… Based on Assigned Primary Documents

College freshmen often have a difficult time understanding the historical processes. The ability to look at trends covering hundreds of years is often difficult for them, but that’s part of what historians do (reference The History Manifesto by Jo Guldi and David Armitage). Some technical troubles with my laptop’s built-in camera forced me to

 

Your Choice: “Deep Read” or “Deep Dystopia”

Maryanne Wolf (the Director of the Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at UCLA) recently authored an article, “Skim reading is the new normal. The effect on society is profound,” in The Guardian Newspaper (25 August 2018). Her crux is

 

An Arrest Warrant which Listed No Crime

In eighteenth-century Britain, warrants of arrest typically outlined the crime by which a suspected individual was to lose their liberty. These legal proceedings usually required the signature(s) of a judge or collection of legal overseers. In Admiral John Byng’s arrest warrant, though three signatures directed a marshal to apprehend him, something vital was missing: