HIS 328 The Young Republic
This course will be a junior-level course that provides a survey of the history of the United States through an examination of primary documents and secondary literature. This course will help students engage with the tumultuous and uncertain period of the Early Republic when the United States was in its infancy. We will explore the fledgling democratic republic from its founding until the War with Mexico in 1848, chronologically and thematically, to gain a better understanding of the early years of the nation. The key themes of the course include: the on-going struggle over citizenship, the meaning and implications of national manifest destiny, discourses of slavery (and race) and freedom, the emergence of a middle-class language of national virtue, and the evolution of a democratic political economy. The goal is to develop an informed critical perspective on the founding era of the nation.