Online Course Syllabus: U.S. History from 1870

Course Links: Lectures & Readings Emayzine Home

Victor Valley College Fall Session 2009 US History 118 Instructor: Dr. Eric Mayer, Sections 26537 Office No. ScL26 Telephone: 245-4271 (ext. 2299) EMAIL: history118@gmail.com

All lecture notes can be downloaded for free from the site. Please do not bring lecture notes to class…they are for home study and use only. Prerequisite: None—But there is an intensive amount of analytical writing in this course as well as critical thinking. However, it is assumed that most of you do not have college level or academic writing skills and there will be online help available.
*Note: Syllabus subject to possible revision

Requirements: Students must watch or listen to at least 30 minutes of national or international news per day. If you take the local newspaper or the Los Angeles Times make sure that you read the national and international news.The New York Times is also an excellent freeon line newspaper. The key for doing well in this course and understanding the history that we cover is that you be informed as to what is happening about you. History is not "dead", it is constantly affecting your reality, and if it is dead, then we all are affected by the ghosts of the past. History is the analysis and understanding of processes that have created our present reality

Course Description: A survey of US history from the 1870's to the present. In the course we will be particularly concerned not with names and dates, but rather with historical processes that made the US the way it is. The course will focus on political history, but more importantly on the history of the struggles between labor and capital, women and minorities versus the dominant patriarchal state, and the plight and status of the working poor and the way in which they either made, influenced, or were exploited by the American system. In essence, political, economic, and most importantly social history will be covered in this course in order to understand just what the "American Experience" represents for the majority of Americans, not just the elite. Note: This is not a “lollipop” history course where everything turns out for the best. US history is an epic drama full of victories as well as atrocities. For this reason you will not be fed disconnected facts so common in courses that focus on what can only be described as American mythstory. This is course emphasizes critical thinking and understanding processes of causality that forged the saga of US historical development between 1870 and 1988.

Required Texts:

1. Grapes Of Wrath Centennial Ed, Steinbeck
2. People's History Of Us 1492 To Present P.S. Ed, Zinn,
3. America: Narrative History Vol Two, Tindall and Shi.
NOTE...The books are available at the VVC Bookstore

Attendance: Students must check their email regularly. Class time is composed of your reading and writing analysitical historical essays. It is the students’ responsibility to make sure that they have been dropped, reinstated, or are currently enrolled in the course. I will not do any grade changes that are related to attendance or registration issues. IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO MAKE SURE YOU HAVE BEEN DROPPED. DO NOT ASSUME THAT I WILL DROP YOU AS A MATTER OF COURSE DUE TO YOUR LACK OF ATTENDANCE

Grading The grade break down is as follows: Exam one=20% of final grade, Book review 1=20% of final grade; Exam 2= 20% of final grade; Final Exam = 20% of final grade; Book Review 2 = 20% of final grade In order to pass the course all outstanding assignments or exams must be turned in by the day of the final examination. The Book Review is due on the day of the Final Exam. Finally the course is progressively graded in that grades can only help you. 90%-100% A 80% -89% B 70% -79% C 60% -69% D 0% -59% F

Course Mechanics: The course is lnternet driven. Therefore it is essential to surf the net regularly. I encourage on line class participation in the forms of comments, questions, contention, and even debate. My ultimate goal in the course besides teaching world history is to create students who will be able to argue logically, and back up their assertions with evidence. An objective of this course is to teach students the skills that they need to educate themselves. The course stresses on-line, team-learning interaction. This course will not be a passive learning experience, it will be highly interactive in terms of how you explain historical causality and outcome.