HISTORY 450
HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA
Dr. P. Dreyfus
DESCRIPTION:
Ever since the first Europeans set sight on California, the region has held an almost mythic attraction to generations of migrants from throughout the world. Choosing California has almost always represented a hope for more – more power, more land, more riches, more freedom, more comfort. As is the case everywhere else, however, generations of Californians have found themselves constructing real lives, not dreams, and therefore have always been forced to accommodate their expectations to the social and economic realities of the land.
Such adjustments have been fraught with excitement and frustration, creating, for better or worse, a dynamism for which California appears to be famous even today. With a history characterized by continual immigration, rapid economic growth, mindless environmental degradation, frequent bouts of social violence, and the extraordinary accumulation of wealth, California may be one of the most American of American places. Its history is unique while at the same time reflecting and condensing the larger national experience of the United States.
This course will survey the history of California from its pre-European roots to the present day. We will address the region’s unique and general attributes by examining the relationship between economic change, inter-ethnic conflict and accommodation, and politics.
TEXT:
Rice, et al, The Elusive Eden
COURSE REQUIREMENTS:
Students will be responsible for two midterm examinations and one 6-page word-processed take-home examination at the end of the semester. This final exam will involve analysis of documentary evidence. Each of the three exams will be weighted equally in determining final grades.
A late take-home exam will automatically be discounted by one full grade level (10%). In addition, university policy requires students who wish to receive a grade of "incomplete" to file a formal petition with the instructor. These petitions are available in department offices. Any student who has not completed the course assignments for this class and has not filed a proper petition will be assumed to have withdrawn without authorization and will receive a grade of "WU." This is equivalent to an "F". Please be careful to follow proper administrative procedures so that you don't waste your efforts and ruin your grade.
CLASS SCHEDULE:
Week of Tues. 1/24 INTRODUCTION & INDIGENOUS CALIFORNIA
Topics: Regional ecology, Native American life, significance of animistic belief system.
Readings: Rice, ch. 2-3
Film: Rock Paintings of the Chumash. AV#80913
Week of Tues. 1/31 INDIGENOUS & SPANISH CALIFORNIA
Topics: European/Native contact, imperial politics, mechanisms of colonial control, the mission system, the creation of gente de razon
Readings: Rice, ch. 5-6
Week of Tues. 2/7 MEXICAN CALIFORNIA & U.S. CONQUEST
Topics: The rise of the Californios, the Mexican class system, the basis of American interest, Manifest Destiny, the Bear Flag Revolt.
Readings: Rice, ch.7-9
Film: The Dream of Don Guadalupe AV#88361
Week of Tues. 2/14 GOLD RUSH
Topics: Gold fever, migration, ethnic conflict, environmental consequences of mining technology, statehood and early state politics.
Readings: Rice, ch.11-12
Week of Tues. 2/21 GOLD RUSH, Cont'd & MIDTERM REVIEW
Film: The Story of the Gold Rush AV#86176
Week of Tues. 2/28 RAILROAD ERA
Topics: Post-gold economic development, The Big Four, transportation monopoly and state politics.
Readings: Rice, ch.13-14
MIDTERM EXAMINATION on Tuesday, February 28
Week of Tues. 3/6 GILDED AGE
Topics: Urbanization and industrialization, San Francisco machine politics, Sinophobia and the Workingmen’s Party.
Readings: Rice, ch.15-16
Denis Kearney, Workingmen's Party (1878)
Harper's Weekly on the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)
Film: Carved in Silence AV#82942
Week of Tues. 3/13 PROGRESSIVISM
Topics: The rise of the "progressive" middle class, the Union Labor Party struggle, anti-monopoly, female reformers, the life of Katherine Philips Edson.
Readings: Rice, ch.17-18
Week of Tues. 3/27 PROGRESSIVISM, Cont'd, WATER WARS
Topics: John Muir and the Hetch Hetchy controversy, Los Angeles takes the Owens Valley.
Readings: Rice pp.287-92, 370-1, 396-8.
Week of Tues. 4/3 MIDTERM EXAMINATION on Thursday, April 5
Film: Thirsty City. AV#88362
Week of Tues. 4/10 BOOM & BUST, 1920s-1930s
Topics: Roaring Twenties California-style, autos and oil, culture wars, the depression of 1929, Upton Sinclair’s EPIC campaign.
Readings: Rice, ch.20-21
Upton Sinclair on the EPIC Plan (1934)
Film: The Great Depression: We Have a Plan. AV#85549
Week of Tues. 4/17 WWII & AFTERMATH
Topics: California and the Pacific War, African-American migration, Japanese-American internment, the onset of the Cold War, anti-Communism.
Readings: Rice, ch.22-24
Japanese-American Internment, National Archives Selected Docs.
Film: Unfinished Business AV#68316
Week of Tues. 4/24 THE SIXTIES
Topics: The resurgence of dissent, collapse of Cold War consensus, youth movements and the university.
Readings: Rice, ch.25-26
DISTRIBUTION & DISCUSSION OF TAKE-HOME ESSAY QUESTIONS
Week of Tues. 5/1 THE SIXTIES, Cont’d.
Topics: Reaganism, the anti-war movement, the Black Power movement, Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee.
Readings: Rice, Ch.27
Mario Savio on the Free Speech Movement (1965)
Black Panther Party Program (1966)
Film: Berkeley in the Sixties AV#84817
Week of Tues. 5/8 CALIFORNIA SINCE THE 70s
Topics: The changing face of California, the meaning of diversity, coalition politics, environmentalism, California budget politics.
Readings: Rice, ch. 29-30
Film: First to Worst AV#66661
TAKE-HOME ESSAYS DUE THURSDAY MAY 10 IN CLASS