A global study of agriculture, forests, and environmental change from 1500 to the present. Topics include the effects on societies and civilizations of climate change, the expansion of agriculture, deforestation and reforestation, state and empire building, and international competition in Eurasia, Africa, and America. Maps and primary sources will permit students to examine global competition, land-use change, agrarian crisis, and sea fishing in the United States and Europe during the 19th and early 20th centuries. A research paper based on primary sources will be required.

This seminar examines the causes and the course of the Civil War, its social, economic, and political results during Reconstruction, and the early roots of both de jure segregation and the civil rights movement. It will examine the process of emancipation from the perspective of social history. Violent conflicts over free labor, the establishment of sharecropping, and the political and economic policies pursued by various groups - freedpeople, ex-masters, northern policymakers, wage laborers, and African American women, for example - will be covered.

This multicultural course introduces students to the visual arts of Asia from the earliest times to the present. In a writing- and speaking-intensive environment, students will develop skills in visual analysis and art historical interpretation. Illustrated class lectures, group discussions, museum visits, and a variety of writing exercises will allow students to explore architecture, sculpture, painting, and other artifacts in relation to the history and culture of such diverse countries as India, China, Cambodia, Korea, and Japan.

This course introduces Mandarin Chinese and emphasizes development of oral proficiency as well as gradual acquisition of reading and writing skills. Supplements class work with lab.

This course introduces Mandarin Chinese and emphasizes development of oral proficiency as well as gradual acquisition of reading and writing skills. Supplements class work with lab.

Introduces listening, speaking, reading, and writing modern Japanese; hiragana, katakana, and approximately 150 Kanji. Supplements class work with audio and video.

Introduces listening, speaking, reading, and writing modern Japanese; hiragana, katakana, and approximately 150 Kanji. Supplements class work with audio and video.

A yearlong course that introduces the basics of Modern Standard Arabic, this course concentrates on all four skills: speaking, listening, reading, writing. Beginning with a study of Arabic script and sound, students will complete the Georgetown text Alif Baa and finish Chapter 15 in Al Kitaab Book 1 by the end of the academic year. Students will acquire vocabulary and usage for everyday interactions as well as skills that will allow them to read and analyze a range of texts.

Introduction to Sanskrit, the classical language of India. Related to other Indo-European languages (including English) and the ancestor of most of the sixteen major Indian languages (e.g., Hindi), Sanskrit is the medium of the literary classics, and of the texts of the Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain religions. The first-semester course covers Sanskrit grammar. The emphasis is on sentence construction, recognition and production of grammatical forms, and translation. Attention is also given to script, chanting, and pronunciation.

First Year Korean I is the first half of a two-semester introductory course in spoken and written Korean for students who do not have any previous knowledge of Korean. This course is designed to improve students' communicative competence in daily life, focusing on the four language skills: speaking, listening, reading and writing.