HIST 244: The Civil War and Reconstruction

1 Unit
This course will explore the causes, course, and consequences of the American Civil War, from the 1840’s to 1877. The primary goal of the course is to understand the multiple meanings of a transforming event in American history. Those meanings may be divined in many ways: national, sectional, racial, constitutional, individual, social, intellectual, or moral. We will especially examine three broad themes: the crisis of union and disunion in an expanding republic; slavery, race, and emancipation as national problem, personal experience, and social process; and the political and social challenges of Reconstruction. The course attempts to understand the interrelationships between regional, national, and African-American history. Sacks