103B: Encountering the Other in Pre-Modern Europe

Download 24.6 Kb.

Date	05.05.2016
Size	24.6 Kb.
	#36598

103B: Encountering the Other in Pre-Modern Europe
Spring 2013

2303 Dwinelle, Friday 10-12 PM

Daniel Melleno (dmelleno@berkeley.edu)

2210 Dwinelle

Office Hours: Thursday 3-5 PM
Using four case studies, this course will examine a variety of ways in which medieval and early modern authors shaped the self-image of Europe by casting foreign cultures as other. We will begin in the eighth century and examine interactions between the Carolingian empire and the Scandinavian raiders and traders commonly known as Vikings. From there we will jump forward to the Crusades to look at some of the most well known encounters between the Latin West and its eastern neighbors. Moving back to Europe we will examine the complicated relationships between Christians and Jews and the practice of 'othering' that occurred as Europeans turned their gaze upon their own societies. Finally we will follow the path of European explorers in the early modern period and look at their encounters with worlds and peoples undreamed of.
As we engage with these four encounters we will discuss how we can use the texts of the past to understand not just the cultures and peoples they describe, but the hidden world of the author and the changing face of Europe across the centuries and into the modern world.
Each case study will take approximately 3 weeks and involve readings from both primary and secondary sources. In addition to short weekly or bi-weekly journal assignments there will be one book review assignment due after spring break and a final assignment that will involve creating a prospectus for an independent research project.
Books: All assigned books are available at the regular bookstores as well as on Amazon.com. There will also be copies on reserve at Moffit Library. Please bring a copy of the assigned reading for the week with you to class,.
Recommended: For those of you who do not have a strong grasp on the overall narrative and events of the Early and Central Middle Ages I suggest you take a look at the relevant events in one of two textbooks:

--Rosenwein, Barbara, A short history of the Middle Ages

D117 .R67 2002, Moffit

--Wim Blockman's Introduction to Medieval Europe 300-1550

D117 .B5413 2007, Moffit

Mandatory:

--Nancy Bisaha. Creating East and West: Renaissance Humanists and the Ottoman Turks, (Philidelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004). ISBN: 0812219767

--Glyn Burgess, ed. The Song of Roland (London: Penguin Books, 1990).

ISBN: 0140445323

--Bernal Diaz del Castillo, The Conquest of New Spain, trans. John Cohen (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1963). ISBN: 0140441239

--R. I. Moore. The Formation of a Persecuting Society, (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990). ISBN:1405129646

--Edward Peters, ed. The First Crusade: "The Chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres" and Other Source Materials, (Philidelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998). ISBN: 0812216563

--Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other, trans. Richard Howard, (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999). ISBN: 0806131373

Further Readings: I will be providing a selection of readings each week either physically or by posting documents through b-space. For those documents posted to b-space it is your responsibility to have them available in class (a lap-top or tablet is acceptable).
Requirements
--Participation (15%): Students are required to attend all class sessions unless they can present a valid (at the instructors discretion) excuse for absence and are expected to actively participate and engage in discussion with the goal of showing that they have completed the reading and actively thought about it prior to class.

--Students will be responsible for finding a time to attend Office Hours during the first two weeks of class. They will also be responsible for attending office hours to discuss their final project in March and again near the end of the semester in April.

--Short Assignments and presentations (15%): Short writing assignments (2-3 pages), Discussion Questions (2-3), and/or presentations on a reading assignment will be assigned to be completed for the next class session. Written work will be due posted to BSpace by 8 A.M. Friday morning.
--Mid-Term Assignment (30%): Book review on R.I. Moore’s The Formation of a Persecuting Society. [4-6 pages, See Handout]
--Final Assignment (40%): The final assignment will be a proposal for an original thesis/research project of the type expected of a 101 course. [12-15 pages, See Handout].
Plagiarism Policy: Plagiarism, the copying of work, the use of work without proper citation or without permission is strictly forbidden and will be dealt with severely. If you have questions about citation or proper use of another's work please come see me. I encourage students to work together if they so choose but all turned in work must be the original product of the student in question.
Library Research Session: There will be two library research sessions this semester designed to provide you with information on how to make the most of Cal’s libraries and the various available internet resources for historical research. I strongly urge you to attend one of these sessions.

Session 1: Wed, March 20^th, 10 A.M. - 12 P.M. in 350 Moffitt

Session 2: Tuesday April 9^th, 12 – 2 P.M. in 350 Moffitt.

Week 1 (1/25): Introductions

Week 2 (2/1): Theories of Othering

--Edward Said’s Orientalism: Introduction (pp.1-28) and Chapter 1(paying special attention to part 2, “Imaginative Geography and Its Representation”).

Moffit Reserve: DS12.S24 1978

--William Sax “The Hall of Mirrors: Orientalism, Anthropology, and the Other” BSpace

--Jennifer Mills-Knutsen, ‘Unconscious Othering, For the Someday Book, January 25, 2013, http://forthesomedaybook.wordpress.com/2013/01/25/unconscious-othering/

Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions
Part I - The Vikings
Week 3 (2/8): The Vikings as Other

--Selections from various Carolingian Annals/Vitae

BSpace

--Abbo of St-Germain-des-Prés, The Siege of Paris

BSpace

--Stuart Airlie, “‘Sad Stories of the Death of Kings’: Narrative Patterns and of Authority in Regino of Prüm’s Chronicle”

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Pages on the methods of Othering observed in the Carolingian sources. What techniques, tactics, and details do they use to shape their images of the Vikings?

Week 4 (2/15): The Vikings: Re-assessments

--Rimbert, Vita Anskarii, selections

BSpace

--Guy Halsall “Playing By Whose Rules?”

Bspace

--Coupland “The Vikings on the Continent in Myth and History”

Bspace

--Gabrille Spiegel, “Theory into Practice”

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions

Part II - Christendom and Islam
Week 5 (2/22): The First Crusade and Islam

--Edward Peters (ed.), The First Crusade: Introduction, Doc. 2, 3, 12

--Fulcher of Chartres, Chronicle, Book 1, in Peters (ed.) The First Crusade (pp. 47-101) and Book 3 (BSpace)

--John Tolan, “Muslims as Pagan Idolaters in Chronicles of the First Crusade.”

BSpace

Assignment: 2-3 Pages addressing how and why Fulcher’s depictions of Arabs and the Middle East grow and change between books 1 and 3.
Week 6 (3/1): Islam: Popular Images

--The Song of Roland

--Jo Ann Hoeppner Moran Cruz, “Popular Attitudes Towards Islam in Medieval Europe”

BSpace

--John Tolan, Sons of Ishmael: Muslims through European Eyes in the Middle Ages: Chap. 6, “Mirror of Chivalry”

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions

Week 7 (3/8): From Arab to Turk: Islam and the Early Modern Period

--Nancy Bisaha, Creating East and West

--Selected Book Reviews of Creating East and West

--BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Pages addressing how images of Islam changed and remained the same with the rise of the Ottomans. Be sure to directly discuss Basaha’s argument.

Part III: Jews, the internal Other
Week 8 (3/15): The Jew Pre 1000

--St. Pauls Letter to the Galatians c. 1-4, St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans c. 9-11, and Selections from St. Augustine.

BSpace

--Bernard Bachrach, Early Medieval Jewish Policy in Western Europe, preface, c. 2 and 4, conclusion

BSpace

--Two Reviews of Bachrach’s Early Medieval Jewish Policy

BSpace

Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions
Week 9 (3/22): The Jew post 1000

--Anna Sapir Abulafia “From Northern Europe to Southern Europe...”

BSpace

--Selected Articles from Christianity and Judaism (BSpace)

--Gavin Langmuir: “The Faith of Christians and Hostility to Jews”

--Miri Rubin: “Desecration of the Host and the Birth of an Accusation”

-- Edward Peters (ed.), The First Crusade: Part III, doc. 4 (pp. 109-111), doc. 5 (p. 112)

--The Life of William of Norwich

BSpace

--Innocent III on the Jews / Lateran IV on the Jews

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Pages discussing the tactics and techniques used to Other Jews in Christian Europe and how they are similar or different to those used on Vikings and/or Muslims.

Week 10 (3/29): Spring Break

--Write Book Review on R.I. Moore’s The Formation of a Persecuting Society (Due 4/5)
Week 11 (4/5): Jews in Early Modern Europe (Book Review due)

--Edward Peters: The Document of Expulsion from Spain in 1492 (pp. 23-28)

BSpace

--Luther “On the Jews and their Lies”

BSpace

--Lorenzo Ganganelli on Ritual Murder Libel

BSpace

--David Katz “The Phenomenon of Philo-Semitism”

BSpace

--Selected Articles from Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation in Sixteenth-Century Germany (BSpace)
Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions
Part IV: The New World
Week 12 (4/12): Discovery

--Tzvetan Todorov, The Conquest of America, Intro and Ch. 1 (pp. 1-50)

--Christopher Columbus, selected documents

BSpace

--Leonardo Olschki, “What Columbus Saw on Landing in the West Indies”

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions
Week 13 (4/19): Conquests

--Bernal Diaz, The Conquest of New Spain (Selections)

--Todorov, The Conquest of America, Ch. 2 (pp. 51-124)

--Hérnan Cortez, selected documents

BSpace

--David Carrasco, “The Exaggerations of Human Sacrifice” and “Human Sacrifice/Debt Payments From the Aztec Point of View”

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 pages discussing the tactics of Othering used by Bernal Diaz and what you think his motives are.

Week 14 (4/26): Consolidation

--Todorov, The Conquest of America, Ch. 3, 4, Epilogue (pp.125-245)

--Bartolomé de las Casas, selected documents

BSpace

--Review of Grafton and Pagden

BSpace
Assignment: 2-3 Discussion Questions

Week 15 (5/3): Conclusions
Dead Week (5/6-5/10): Meetings to discuss final project
Final Project Due 5/15 by 4 PM in my mail box in the Main History Office (3229 Dwinelle)

Download 24.6 Kb.

Share with your friends: