This seminar, led by Bruce Laurie of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, will explore antislavery and abolition movements in the nineteenth century, offering "in-depth exploration of historic personalities, themes, and events and intensive work with primary source materials."

"A study of the sectional conflict beginning with the nullification crisis. The course will not only examine the political, social and economic developments in the period leading to the Civil War, but will emphasize the political thought of Abraham Lincoln, Stephen Douglas, and John C. Calhoun."

"This course will examine military aspects of the war, as well as political developments during it, including the political history of the Emancipation Proclamation, the Gettysburg Address and the Second Inaugural. The course also examines the post-war Amendments and the Reconstruction era."

"In the last decades of the 19th Century, the United States took decisive steps away from its rural, agrarian past toward its industrial future, assuming its place among world powers. This course examines that movement, covering such topics as business-labor relations, political corruption, immigration, imperialism, the New South, and segregation and racism."

"Even though the powers of the American Executive are controlled and limited, extraordinary acts of statesmanship are possible. This seminar examines two presidents who demonstrated extraordinary political leadership. We will examine these statesmen and the political circumstances in which their prudence revealed itself."

"This course will examine military aspects of the war, as well as political developments during it, including the political history of the Emancipation Proclamation, the Gettysburg Address and the Second Inaugural. The course also examines the post-war Amendments and the Reconstruction era."

"A study of the sectional conflict beginning with the nullification crisis. The course will not only examine the political, social and economic developments in the period leading to the Civil War, but will emphasize the political thought of Abraham Lincoln, Stephen Douglas, and John C. Calhoun."

"This course will explore the history of black Americans as they strove to secure their dignity as human beings, and rights as American citizens, in the face of racial prejudice. It will examine the diverse viewpoints of leading black intellectuals and activists on human equality, slavery, self-government, the rule of law, emancipation, colonization, and citizenship. Contemporary issues to be considered may include affirmative action, black reparations, racial profiling, and the 'achievement gap' in education."

"Alexis de Tocqueville's 'Democracy in America' is the best study of America to be written by a foreigner. It examines government, religion, the races, private associations, literature, the family, and much else, all the while contrasting democratic America with old aristocratic Europe. This course will examine as much of the book as we can, focusing especially on Tocqueville's account of the love of equality (and its dangers) and his prescriptions for the preservation of liberty."

Professor John Wood Sweet "uses the dramatic story of Venture Smith, an enslaved African in New England who earned his freedom, to anchor an analysis of the colonial dynamics that brought together — and kept apart — a series of disparate regions and peoples in the increasingly global early modern world."