Week I: "This Sceptred Isle"

Jan 18: Introduction to the course
Jan 20: The early history of Britain and its peoples

Reading:
Colley, 1-9
Langford, 1-32
Voltaire, 7-18

Week II: Shaping the Political Order

Jan 23: Politics and society in seventeenth-century Britain
Jan 25: The Glorious Revolution and the paradoxes of British liberty
Jan 27: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 1-22
Burke, ix-xxxvi
Langford, 34-68
Voltaire, 44-50, 62-67

Suggested films: Restoration (1995), The Libertine (2005)

Week III: Government at Home and Expansion Overseas

Jan 30: Walpole, the "Robinocracy," and the rage of party
Feb 1: The Atlantic World and the evolution of the First British Empire
Feb 3: Discussion

Reading:
Burke, 131-150, 183-194, 233-245
Rediker, 1-76

Suggested film: Adanggaman (2000)

Week IV: Britain and the Enlightenment

Feb 6: The Augustan Age: art, letters, and music
Feb 8: The Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution
Feb 10: Discussion

Reading:
Langford, 71-100, 183-210
Voltaire, 53-61, 68-100, 107-119

Documents:
Sir Isaac Newton, "Mathematical principles of natural philosophy" (1729)
Dr. John Wallis, "The origin of the Royal Society" (1700)

Music:
G.F. Handel, Messiah (1742)

Suggested film: Longitude (2000)

Week V: Religion and Society in Eighteenth Century Britain

Feb 13: Anglicans, Methodists, and Evangelicals
Feb 15: Social ranking, family life, and leisure
-------- Film: Sense and Sensibility, 7-10 PM, Miller 208
Feb 17: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 30-33, 75-90
Burke, 94-128
Colley, 11-54
Voltaire, 23-43

Suggested film: Barry Lyndon (1970)

Week VI: The Celtic Periphery and the British Nation

Feb 20: The Scots: Lowlanders, Highlanders, and the Scottish Enlightenment
Feb 22: The most distressful country: Ireland in the eighteenth century
Feb 24: Discussion

Reading:
Colley, 55-132
Hugh Trevor-Roper, "The Highland Tradition in Scotland" in Hobsbawm & Ranger, The Invention of Tradition, 1983
Neal Ascherson, "Will Scotland go its own Way?" in New York Times, Feb 2012

Documents:
Robert Burns, "Scots Wha Hae" (1788)
Evan James, "Hen Wlad fy Nhadau" (Land of my Fathers)
(Author unknown), "Wearing o' the Green" (1798)
Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal (1729)

Suggested films: Culloden (1964), Rob Roy (1995)

Week VII: The Ends of the Earth

Feb 27: Global rivalry with and the Seven Years War
Feb 29: Voyages of discovery and despair: James Cook and William Bligh
Mar 2: MIDTERM EXAMINATION

Reading:
Rediker, 77-152
Scott Ashley, "How Navigators Think: The Death of Captain Cook Revisited" in Past & Present (194) 2007

Documents:
Maj. Gen. James Wolfe, "To the citizens of Québec" (1759)
Capt. James Cook, Journal excerpts from first voyage (1769)

Suggested films: The Bounty (1984), The War that Made America (2006)

Week VIII: The King's Obedient and Rebellious Subjects

Mar 5: The American crisis and its aftermath
Mar 7: Patriotism and the monarchy
------- Film: The Madness of King George, 7-10 PM, Miller 208
Mar 9: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 50-54, 91-114
Burke, 246-292
Colley, 132-145, 195-236
Defoe, Moll Flanders (first half)

Week IX: Inside Britain's Underworld

Mar 12: Crime and punishment
Mar 14: The lives of the excluded
Mar 16: Discussion: Moll Flanders

Reading:
Arnstein, 23-30, 33-34, 37-49
Langford, 103-139
Rediker, 153-204
Defoe, Moll Flanders (second half)

Suggested film: The Incredible Journey of Mary Bryant (2005)

Week X: Empire and Industry

Mar 19: The East India Company at home and abroad
Mar 21: The "Triple Revolution:" agriculture, population, and industry
Mar 23: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 64-74, 144-154
Langford, 141-180
Rediker, 205-299
Burke, 363-406
"The Company that ruled the waves" in The Economist, Dec 2011

Document:
Oliver Goldsmith, "The Deserted Village" (1770)

Week XI: Revolution and Reaction

Apr 2: The French Revolution and British radicalism
Apr 4: Republicanism and rebellion in Ireland
Mar 6: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 127-133
Burke, 416-474, 499-507, 295-359

Week XII: Making "Britain" and "the British"

Apr 9: The creation of the British national identity
Apr 11: Men and women in the new Britain
Apr 13: Discussion

Reading:
Arnstein, 134-140
Colley, 147-193, 237-281

Documents:
James Thompson, "Rule, Britannia!" (1745)
Henry Carey, "God Save the King" (1724)
Articles of the Act of Union (1707)

Suggested film: Amazing Grace (2006)

Week XIII: Modern Warfare and the British Heroic Myth, 1793-1815

Apr 16: Nelson and the war at sea
Apr 18: Wellington and the land war
Apr 20: Discussion

Reading:
Colley, 283-319
Langford, 213-242
John Keegan, "Wellington: the Anti-Hero" in The Mask of Command, 1987

Documents:
Admiral Horatio Nelson, Dispatches, letters, and diary entries (1805)
Vice Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, Dispatch to William Marsden, Esq, Admiralty, London (1805)
Charles O'Malley, Wellington's crossing of the Douro (1809)

Suggested films: Waterloo (1970), Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)

Week XIV: Becoming a Superpower

Apr 23: The aftermath of war and the beginning of Britain's "imperial century"
Apr 25: Conclusion: the emergence of Modern Britain

Reading:
Colley, 364-375
Langford, 245-248