Revised 8/2023

HIS 262 - United States History in Film (3 CR.)

Course Description

Examines selected topics in the United States history, which shaped the American experience, presented in film. Lecture 3 hours per week.

General Course Purpose

This course examines selected significant events, movements, and personalities from America’s social, cultural, and intellectual development in light of the perceived and historical truths. The content material contrasts the "mythology" surrounding these events with the actual facts in order to provide a broader view of the circumstances prompting behaviors.

Course Prerequisites/Corequisites

None.

Course Objectives

  • Establish a chronology of historical events in American History from Colonial America to the present.
  • Identify the social, economic and political forces at work in the evolution of American history
  • Evaluate and interpret historical documents and primary sources.
  • Interpret films as texts that can help reveal the nature of historical characters and events.
  • Explain how movies reveal the social, political, and cultural concerns of the time in which they were produced.
  • Evaluate films as complex cultural documents that reflect the concerns of the era in which they were produced.
  • Write an effective historical essay.

Major Topics to Be Included

  • Colonial America
  • The Early Republic
  • Age of Reform
  • The Civil War
  • Westward Expansion
  • Industrialization
  • The New Era-1920s
  • Great Depression & the New Deal
  • World War II
  • The Cold War
  • Post War America (1945-1970)-Suburbia & Civil Rights
  • The Rise of Conservatism
  • Since 1980