Mode of Instruction: Lecture and Discussion
This course examines the history of modern South Asia (focusing on the nations of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh) from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present. Key themes include British imperialism and its effects on South Asian society; military conflict and conquest; social reform, cultural change, the “invention” of new traditions and identities; food, famine, and colonial medicine; anti-colonial nationalism and the politics of independence; Partition and its violence; and post-independence politics and society.
Mode of Instruction: Seminar
How did law justify European imperialism? What did law look like in different imperial contexts? How do the histories of empire and imperialism help us understand the history of law? Looking across regions and contexts, from early modern Iberian empires, to early colonial North America, to Africa and Asia, this course examines the relationship between law, empire, expansion, and colonialism from the 17th to 21st centuries. With a few exceptions, our readings and discussions will follow chronological order, veering off course occasionally to look at issues comparatively. Throughout, we’ll be working to uncover how imperial approaches to law changed over time and how laws and legal institutions with imperial origins have shaped expectations and experiences into the present.
Mode of Instruction: Lecture and Discussion
What is “South Asia”? And where does it fit in global narratives? Is it the land of outsourcing and opportunity? Or underdeveloped and plagued by inequality and indifference? Is it the land of cultural vibrancy and religious diversity? Or the cradle of religious conflicts and communalism? Does it have a shared history and collective future? Or diverse pasts and multiple futures?
Global South Asia seeks to answer these questions by looking at the ways the contemporary nation-states of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and their neighbors have been connected to other parts of the world throughout history. Taking apart these twinned narratives of failure and success; division and diversity; progress and timelessness, we will study South Asia as a global region from roughly 1700 to the present. Focusing on the region’s longstanding connections to the Middle East, East Africa, and Southeast Asia, we will examine its cultural, political, and economic histories in order to understand its place in the world today.
Mode of Instruction: Seminar
What are the promises that law makes? (To be accessible? To be transparent? To be meaningful? To make everyone equal before it? To create a just society? To build a better world? To create equal opportunities? To make life predictable? To create order?) And how does it work to fulfill those promises? In this seminar, we will look to literature, film, and social science research about the past and the present to interrogate these promises and to identify the ways in which law has failed to deliver on (and has sometimes gone against) them.
Mode of Instruction: Seminar
What is Islamic law and how does it influence the way Muslims live? Depending on who you ask, you may receive one of many answers to this question. Looking at the origins and evolution of Islamic law around the world, this course introduces students to important concepts in the study of Islamic law (e.g., sharīʾa, fiqh, uṣūl al-fiqh, qiyās, ijtihād, etc.) and their development from the classical period up to the present.
Mode of Instruction: Lecture and Discussion
Throughout human history, law and religion have had an intimate—and at times fraught—relationship. Yet despite statements of religious neutrality, freedom, and secularism, many nations today continue to encounter conflicts over religion and law. This course explores this entangled relationship in the past and the present by charting the twinned histories of law and religion, the evolution of church and state separation, and the relationship between state law and ethical civil society.
Mode of Instruction: Online, Asynchronous
This course provides an introduction to the history of books and libraries from ancient times to the present. During the course, we consider the book as an object, a technology, and an idea and discuss some of the ways it has changed society—and responded to changes in society. For the most part, we focus on the history of books and libraries in western Europe and North America, but there will also be opportunities for you to think about the history of books and libraries in other parts of the world as well. You’ll learn this history through guided readings, discussions, and short writing assignments. At the end of the semester, you’ll demonstrate what you’ve learned with a final project assignment focused on the future of books and the library.