History

Claire will be away for the first week of classes. Anjuli and Dr. Wilkinson will introduce you to the key themes and concepts of IB history while I am away.

In your first class Anjuli will introduce you to primary sources, and you will discuss with your classmates the merits and disadvantages of different sources in interpreting history. In the double block on Day 6 Dr. Wilkinson will consider the questions "What is History?" and "What is Historical Fact?" The powerpoint presentations from these classes can be found in the 'Class Documents' section below.

In the next discussion block Anjuli will look at the aims and objectives of the History course, including the assessment requirements and teaching schedule. In the last class of the week she will hand out an essay assignment and spend some time explaining the key requirements and expectations of history essays. The essay is due Monday 8 October. Anjuli will also give you a copy of the Communist Manifesto and I would like you to read Chapter I for the next class.

I should be back for the rest of this cycle, and we will spend some time learning the basic tools for studying Mao, namely analysing the Communist Manifesto. For this reason it is essential that you read the sections required before each class.

The first lesson of this cycle will be dedicated to considering political leadership theory, which we will later use as a lense through which to investigate the leadership of Mao.

Before delving into Mao's rise and rule it is necessary to understand elements of Stalin's regime in the Soviet Union. I will provide a brief summary of Stalin's regime in Soviet Russia pre-1949, and we can discuss how far you think his ideology follows, and where it diverges from, the Communist Manifesto. I will then give you a brief background history of China prior to Mao's rise to power, which is intended to give you some context in order to understand the forces that led to Mao's ascent. In Cycle Five we will then focus on Mao himself, and his historical background, before moving to consider different interpretations of why Mao was able to gain such power.

REMINDER: The essay is due on Monday 8 October at 5pm. Please hand in a hard copy to Susan Tham before then (she sits at the desk outside Cyrus' office).

We will consider the chronology of events, from the creation of the Chinese Communist Party, to the culmination of the Long March. We will be using the readings from Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, as well as the Jonathan Spence summaries in order to supplement the lectures.

We will spend the first couple of lessons debating whether Mao is primarily a Machiavellian politician, or an idealist who recognised the need for pragmatism. Please read Chapter 4 from Jung Chang and Jon Halliday to get some idea of the arguments used by those arguing that Mao was Machiavellian. Formulate your own arguments to argue that he was ideologically sound.

These lessons will concentrate on the final years before the CCP gained power. From 1945-1949, what roles did the GMD and the CCP take on? How successful were the American negotiations led by Marshall? What were the key factors leading to the CCP taking power in 1949?

We will consider what the needs of the new republic were, and how the Communist Party responded to these challenges. In particular, we will look at the role played by Mao in these negotiations and how the party leadership was divided. It is also important to assess the role of the peasants, the use of rectification campaigns, and how collectivisation became a political tool within the leadership.

In the double block on Day 6 I will show you the format of the Paper One test, and you will work on some example past papers.

REMINDER: Paper One Test on Wednesday 28 November, Day 6, Double Block. This will be used as part of your term grade.

This cycle will be devoted to consolidating information on the topic so far, and preparation for the test in the double block. We will then start to look at the Great Leap Forward and analyse whether it should be considered a second Five Year Plan or something that diverges markedly from the orginal Soviet 'blueprint'.

This is the last section of the Mao topic, looking at the consolidation of Mao's power and the role of the Cultural Revolution in achieving political hegemony. As a final summary we will also explore the foreign policy that China pursued towards other nations, specifically the USA and the Soviet Union. This will be a good precursor to the introduction to the Cold War.

We will finish off the remainder of the Mao topic, then I will introduce the Cold War and give you the book of readings. Before the Christmas break we will consider the origins of the Cold War, and some of the key developments in the early years following World War Two.

REMINDER: Hand in the outline for your suggested IA topic Monday 17 December by 5pm. Both SL and HL students are expected to hand this in. If you are leaving before then, hand it in at least two days before you leave, so that I have a chance to let you know if the topic is viable. The first draft will be due two weeks after Christmas break.

We will continue with the early years of the Cold War, and watch a CNN documentary that follows the origins of the Cold War post-WWII.

We will look specifically at post-WWII treaties, conferences and speeches that are considered crucial to the origins of the Cold War. We will also look at alternative interpretations suggesting roots of the Cold War can be seen before the Second World War in the Russian Civil War, the Zinoviev Letter and the Munich Agreement and Nazi-Soviet Pact. In the double block we will investigate the central role of Germany in the deepening Cold War conflict, specifically looking at the Berlin Blockade.

REMINDER: First draft of IA due Monday 28 January.

This cycle will be dedicated to the role of the Third World in the Cold War. First I will summarise some of the key events and countries that have been considered a part of the proxy war conflicts during the Cold War years. You will read Dale Tatum's introduction to the realist paradigm and role this mentality played in the conflict. The following class will be spent reading excerpts from Richard Crockatt's evaluation of Third World conflicts. In the double block we will watch a documentary on the Cuban Missile Crisis. Thirteen Days, a movie based on the crisis, will be screening on Thursday 7 February at 7.30pm.

REMINDER: Paper Two Test Monday 4 February (C block) or Tuesday 5 February (B block). This will be used as part of your term grade.

We will be drawing on some of the case studies from the Third World and integrating the idea of brinkmanship and the arms race into our case study of the Cuban Missile Crisis. We will also start to explore the concept of Cold War culture, relating the impact the United States foreign policy had on its internal politics. In particular, we will focus on Marcarthyism, the civil rights movement and the use of language during the Cold War period.

REMINDER: Final draft of IA due Friday 29 February. SL students - this is the last date that you are able to submit this work, otherwise there will be no time to mark it before it gets sent to the IB for moderation, and you would receive an N as final your History SL result.

We will consider the significance of the arms limitation talks on detente, and look at Hanhimaki's piece suggesting that detente was the precursor to the end of the Cold War, albeit in an ironic way. We will also look at the rebellions in Eastern Europe to assess their significance in the Soviet Union's increasing problems in the region.

The Judge and Langdon reading on the Second Cold war will be used as an entry point to discussion about the Second Cold War, specifically investigating the thesis that the period of detente is a concept create by scholars to more easily study the history of the Cold War, but in reality there was no genuine period of detente. We will do some review for the Paper One test on Thursday.

We will analyse some of the reasons for the end of the Cold War, including economic factors, political factors and the significance of leadership within the Soviet Union and the United States. The final double block will be dedicated to your Paper 1 test on the Cold War.

REMINDER: Paper One test on Thursday 6 March, Day 6, Double Block. This will be counted as part of your final term grade.

We will start this topic by evaluating an article that appeared in the New York Times called Go Back to Black by K.A. Dilday from 27 February 2008. This article, and the letters to the editor in response, offer us a framework from which to consider the terms that we use when referring to the Civil Rights movement and the people involved. In the double block we will look in more depth at a number of the key terms we will come across when discussing the Civil Rights movement, notably the terms African American and black, but also key concepts such as assimilation and segregation. We will also spend some time considering Barack Obama's recent speech on race and see how this fits into the history of the race within the States.

We will look at the history of slavery in the colonies, and consider the long-term implications of capturing and bringing people to a foreign land. We will look at the American Revolution, the CIvil War and the Recontruction period, followed by a more detailed assessment of the post-Reconstruction period and some of the legislation that was passed in the South during that time.

In this cycle we will begin our work on minorities in the 20th century, and will consider some major events that shaped the living conditions and social status of blacks in America. The Great Migration, the Depression and World War Two will all be analysed for their impact on a growing black identity and organisations such as the NAACP.

REMINDER: Please submit your essay on the NAACP by 5pm, Monday 14 April.

The NAACP was influential in questioning Jim Crow during the Second World War, and after the war they started to shift their focus from 'separate but equal' facilities, towards a push for full integration. To achieve this, they convened legal teams to combate segregated education in the South, resulting in the infamous Brown v Board of Education. We will look at the legislation and the reaction following the decision on 17 May 1954.

These lessons will concentrate on two organisations and their aims. First, the NAACP its use of legislation to push the Brown v Board of Education decision. Second, Martin Luther King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and its role in protesting for enforcement of these legislative victories. I have given you copies of one of Martin Luther King's letters in response to criticism from some white preachers from Alabama. We will discuss this in class, and later compare it's tone, aims and methods with a speech from Malcolm X.

We will continue to consider different civil rights organisations, and in these classes will discuss the Nation of Islam and Malcolm X, before moving on to look at some of the key terms used to describe these people and organisations (for example, black separatists, supremacism, black nationalism). From these discussions we will look briefly at one covert governmental response to the increasing civil rights organisations, the COINTELPRO.

This is the last cycle of classes. On Friday at 7.30pm we will be watching The History Boys in the Performing Arts Centre with snacks beforehand. See you there!