Undergraduate
100 Level Courses (2023-2024)
Course Nomenclature
- H1-F = "First Term"; the first term of the Fall/Winter Session (September - December)
- H1-S = "Second Term"; the second term of the Fall/Winter Session (January - April)
- Y1-Y = full session (September - April)
- Students should note that courses designated as "...Y1F" or "...Y1S" in the Timetable are particulary demanding.
100-level HIS courses are designed for students entering university. They take a broad sweep of material, and introduce students to the methods and techniques of university study. Each week, students will attend two lectures given by the course professor, and participate in one tutorial led by a teaching assistant. First year courses are not considered to be in an "area" for program requirements. All 100-series HIS courses are mutually exclusive, with the exception of AP, IB, CAPE, or GCE transfer credits. Students may enrol in only one 100-series History course. Students enrolled in more than one of these courses (or who have completed one of these courses or a previous HIS 100-series course with a mark of 50% or greater) will be removed at any time. First-Year students can also enrol in 200-series HIS courses. ALL students enrolled in a History Specialist, Major, or Minor program must take ONE 100-level HIS course.
First-Year Foundation Seminars
First-Year Foundation Seminars are open only to newly-admitted, Faculty of Arts & Science students (3.5 credits or less). They are 1.0 credit or 0.5 credit courses that focus on discussion of issues, questions and controversies surrounding a particular discipline (or several disciplines) in a small-group setting that encourages the development of critical thinking, writing skills, oral presentation and research methods. FYF seminars are as rigorous and demanding as any other first-year course and require in addition the acquisition of those skills expected of successful undergraduate students. With a maximum enrolment of 30 students each, they are an ideal way to have an enjoyable and challenging small-class experience in your first year. Details can be found at the First-Year Opportunities website.
First-Year Foundation Seminars:
- Count as 1.0 or 0.5 of the 20 credits required for an Hon. B.A., Hon B.Sc. or B. Com.
- First-Year Foundation Seminars are not required to get into any Program of Study. However, they may count towards your Program. Please check with your college registrar for further details.
- Can be counted towards the breadth requirement.
Ranging widely chronologically and geographically, this course explores the phenomenon of violence in history. It examines the role and meanings of violence in particular societies (such as ancient Greece and samurai Japan), the ideological foundations and use of violence in the clash of cultures (as in slavery, holy wars, colonization, and genocide), and the effects and memorialization of violence.
Exclusion: HIS100Y1, HIS102Y1, HIS103Y1, HIS106Y1, HIS107Y1, HIS108Y1, HIS109Y1, HIS110Y1
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3), Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)
Instructor: M. Meyerson/L. van Isschot
Lecture: Tuesday & Thursday 4-5
Tutorials: TBA
Temporal Requirement: ½ credit
Interactions among peoples, empires, and cultures, with particular attention to the non-European world. Can we speak of “international relations” before the modern concept of nation-states was established? What forms did globalization take in the pre-modern era? Covering a broad chronological sweep, we will look at exchanges of goods and technologies; dissemination of ideas and religions; voyages of migration and exploration; and episodes of conquest and colonization.
Exclusion: HIS100Y1, HIS101Y1, HIS103Y1, HIS106Y1, HIS107Y1, HIS108Y1, HIS109Y1, HIS110Y1, HISA04H3/HISA05H3
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3), Thought, Belief and Behaviour (2)
Instructor: C. Chin
Lecture: Tuesday & Thursday 3-4
Tutorials: TBA
Temporal Requirement: ½ credit
In the 21st century, the idea of fake news and its rapid circulation via social media shapes how humans perceive events around them. The issue of what counts as authentic, or “fake,” is not simply a recent phenomenon, but is central to the idea of history itself. What materials get saved, whose stories get told, and why are some stories represented as more important than others? By examining specific examples of “misinformation”–propaganda, suppression of information, and hidden actors-- in a global context, this course explores how historical narrative and public memory have been shaped by the collection and valuation of texts, experiences, and material objects, all themes central to the craft of history.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: L. Bertram
Lecture: Wednesday 11-1
Tutorials: TBA
Temporal Requirement: ½ credit
Ever wonder how and why the founding of Islam in 610, the Mongol conquests of Eurasia in the 13th century, the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade, the Haitian Revolution (1791-1804), or the detonation of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki changed the world? This course ten events changed the world and continue to have ramifications today. Experts will give guest lectures on the important “events,” while students will learn how historians work to understand the significance of these moments, human agency, and the idea of an “event,” itself.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: A. Smith
Lecture: Monday & Wednesday 1-2
Tutorials: TBA
Temporal Requirement: ½ credit
First-Year Foundation Courses
This first-year seminar explores radical traditions of education beyond and in resistance to formal schooling. Transnational in scope—and journeying from the late nineteenth century to the present day—we will study the pedagogical innovations and grassroots struggles of anarchic youth, guerrilla intellectuals, and feminist revolutionaries who used education broadly, and historical inquiry in particular, as tools for empowerment and collective liberation. Focusing on primary sources from archives of anticapitalist, antiracist and anticolonial movements, we will investigate traditions of self-teaching and co-learning, genealogies of critical and transformative pedagogies, the construction of decolonial survival and supplementary schools, student mobilizations within and against the university, as well as abolitionist education in our contemporary moment. This course invites participants to interrogate the relationship of education to freedom and justice through collective criticism, self-reflection and creative expression. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: C. Johnson
Lecture: Thursday 5-7
A first-year seminar on the history of queerness, in all its complexity and diversity, in the no less complex and diverse settings of East, South, and Southeast Asia. Our journey will encompass empires and Indigenous peoples, rulers and rebels, and range from early recorded history down to the twentieth century. Focus will be placed on primary sources and introducing students to the evolving definitions of "queerness" itself. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: Y. Wang
Lecture: Wednesday 1-3
This course will look broadly at the question of power and resistance in the Americas (Canada, the United States, and Latin America) through the prism of graphic novels. Each week we will read a graphic novel related to important historical moments or events, drawing on scholarly articles to help us contextualize the novel. We will discuss the medium of graphic novels, their history and place in the broader culture, as well as how they might help or hinder our ability to study and disseminate information about the past. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: M. Mishler
Lecture: Tuesday 11-1
This course introduces students to the interdisciplinary study of history by exploring processes of remembering and forgetting intrinsic to every society. Topics include the ideas of history and memory, memory cultures and narratives and counternarratives and the study of legal trials, museums, monuments, novels and films as popular vehicles of historical knowledge. The course analyzes in particular how the experiences of war and violence have been both remembered and forgotten. The intersection, and dislocation, between trauma and remembrance is a main theme, as is the topic of collective memories in post-conflict societies. Restricted to first-year students. Not eligible for CR/NCR option.
Distribution Requirements: Humanities
Breadth Requirements: Society and its Institutions (3)
Instructor: J. Jenkins
Lecture: Monday 11-1