Course syllabus

Historical Foundations of the Modern World

History 101 Spring 2021 John Hepp

Purposes of the course: History 101 is a core course required of all Wilkes undergraduates
regardless of major. One purpose of this course is to help you better understand the historical
roots of the global society that we live in today. History is a combination of facts (what
happened) and interpretation (why historians think it happened). In this class you will be
introduced to a variety of historical interpretations and you will develop your own. This
process of historical interpretation involves the second (and equally important) purpose of the
course: refining your communication, research, and analytical skills. These skills should serve
you well throughout your life regardless of your future career.

Outcomes of the course: As a student in History 101 you will:

1. Demonstrate critical reading strategies for comprehension of ideas and synthesis of
ideas;
2. Analyze primary and secondary texts;
3. Write clear expository prose;
4. Place individual events and people in broader historical context;
5. Conduct historical research;
6. Write a structured, interpretive analysis of a historical topic;
7. Identify basic historical trends and concepts;
8. Apply technology to the research and writing process;
9. Apply the principles of intellectual honesty by demonstrating proper documentation
practices;
10. Identify the nature of primary and secondary sources; and
11. Define the roles of the individual in local, national, and global contexts.

General advice: To do well in the class you need (1) to log on to the site regularly (there is
an amazingly high degree of correlation between higher grades in this class and regular site
usage), (2) to read the textbook, (3) to read and to understand the lectures and the
assignments on this web site, and (4) to ask questions of me via email.

Attendance: As an asynchronous online class, the Wilkes University attendance policies

posted on “Colonels Combat COVID” page apply to the due dates of this class. Please keep me
informed of the reasons behind any delays.

Textbook: The text is James Carter and Richard Warren’s Forging the Modern World: A History,
2nd edition (ISBN 978-0190901899). There is an ebook version of this text (in fact, I use the
ebook). You are required to use this book in this course to receive full credit on most
assignments, so please obtain the text as soon as possible.
Office hours and contact information: All my office hours for the semester are virtual. I
will be online on Mondays from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon and Wednesdays from 10:00 a.m. to
12:00 noon. If you email at john.hepp@wilkes.edu during those hours, I will respond as soon as
I am able.

I suggest not waiting for these hours and contacting me by email (john.hepp@wilkes.edu)
whenever you have a question. Sending me an email when you have a question is the usually
best method as (1) you send me the issue while it is still fresh in your mind and (2) I will
respond to you when I next log on. All my classes are online this semester, so I will log on
frequently each day. I will post on the class schedule any days that I will not be available due to
conferences or meetings.

Layout and spirit of the course: This class functions essentially as a guided independent
readings class (with a very little bit of research). I provide the structure and the road map but it
is up to each of you to do the readings and assignments and ask me if you have any questions.
Remember, in a classroom you can always stop me before or after class, but in this online
version you have to contact me if you have a problem.
• Although this class is divided into four units, I expect you to apply both the skills and the
content from previous units in subsequent ones. This is particularly true in unit four,
where some of the information in the textbook builds on concepts developed in the
lectures from the previous units.
• Each unit is divided into learning modules and each module deals with an idea in one or
more lectures and usually has suggested readings from the text. You should complete
each module before going on to the next and you should leave each module with an
understanding of the themes developed in that module. Some of the modules include
links to outside websites, while you do not have to visit every page of every site, you
are “responsible” for the basic content of those sites. You can and should use
information from these websites in your unit examinations.
• Please note that I usually do not lecture to or about the text. I sometimes refer to the
text but the textbook and the lectures are two separate secondary sources for your
study of modern world history. You are responsible for reading all the sources and then
putting them together in a way that makes sense to you (and to me in the
examinations).
• I hope we will have some fun and we will learn a great deal about the historical
background of the modern world this semester. Please feel free to contact me if you
have any questions or concerns.

Outside sources: Except for the research project, all the information you need to answer the
course assignments is contained in the textbook and on this website. You do not need to
consult outside sources to do well but, if you choose to do so, you must cite (acknowledge) all
such sources you use in your answer. Failure to do so will result in a grade of zero for that
assignment, as this would be an example of academic dishonesty or plagiarism. Also, please be
aware that you use all outside sources at our own risk, if the website you use is simply wrong,
your grade may suffer. Please also remember that you can use outside sources to supplement

-2-
the course materials, not to replace them. If I do not see significant use of class sources on an
assignment (other than the bibliography assignment and the research assignment), the maximum
grade you can receive for that assignment is 65% (1.5). In most cases, you will not be permitted
to rewrite the assignment for a higher grade.

Requirements: The ten assignments for the semester are as follows:

Syllabus assignment (5% of the course grade),
Non-U.S. news source assignment (5% of the course grade),
Research project topic assignment (5% of the course grade),
Unit 1 mini-examination (10% of the course grade),
Research project bibliography assignment (10% of the course grade),
Unit 2 examination (15% of the course grade),
Unit 3 examination (15% of the course grade),
Research project (10% of the course grade),
Unit 4 examination (15% of the course grade), and
Final reflections assignment (10% of the course grade).

All assignments must be submitted in a format that I can open and read, such as MS Word (.doc
or .docx), Corel WordPerfect (.wp or .wpd [but not .wps]), text (.txt), rich text (.rtf), or
Adobe Acrobat (.pdf). Any assignments submitted in any format I cannot open will be subject to
the lateness penalty, so please use one of the approved file formats. I do not have an Apple
computer, so I cannot open any of the standard MAC file formats. Fortunately, almost all MAC
programs allow you to save the files so that a PC can open them.

Grading: All your work will be graded on a 100-point numeric scale. I will convert your score
(weighted as above) to a course grade as follows:
4.0 = 94.00 - 100.00 2.0 = 70.00 - 77.99
3.5 = 88.00 - 93.99 1.5 = 65.00 - 69.99
3.0 = 82.00 - 87.99 1.0 = 60.00 - 67.49
2.5 = 78.00 - 81.49 0.0 = 0.00 - 59.99.

Cheating and plagiarism: To summarize: “Please, don't.” I share Wilkes University's deep
commitment to academic honesty and integrity and I expect you to follow the academic
regulations contained in the Student Handbook. Intentional plagiarism will be punished severely,
usually by a grade of zero on the assignment, and will be reported to the appropriate academic
officials. If you have any questions about what is permissible, please contact me. Any work
submitted to me must be either entirely your own or you must fully disclose any other sources
used or people consulted.

-3-
Citation: I do not require that you use any specific system of citation but for information
drawn from course sources I need to see exact page citations. I suggest that you use this simple
form of parenthetical citation for the course sources.
• Information from the textbook should be cited as: (text, p. 23).
• Information from the lectures should be cited as: (“Unit name,” p. 64).
• Information from the web sites should be cited as: (BBC Religion, Judaism at a glance).
The first part is the web site name and the second is specific page on which the
information can be found.

Late assignments:
$ The timeliness of assignments is judged by the time/date stamp of the website, so please
do not cut things too close. If you have a problem, email me so that I know.
$ You may submit any assignment via Assignments up to forty-eight hours late as a matter
of right but points will be deducted from your grade subject to the Wilkes University
attendance policy.
$ After forty-eight hours, you must contact me via email and explain why the assignment
is late. Please use the internal LIVE email for this, as then all your assignments are on
this site.
$ Any assignment that is submitted late (without a valid excuse, such as a personal
emergency, illness, injury or network problem), will be penalized according to the
following scale:
Under forty-eight hours 5%
Over forty-eight hours 10%
Over one week 20%.

Some technical details:

• The email attached to this site is internal to the site. This is a good thing, in that it
allows you and me to send, to receive. and to sort email regardless of where we are,
and, unlike Wilkes' webmail, it keeps all the messages in one place. It can be a bad thing,
however, for if the D2L server goes down or is taken offline for maintenance, none of
us will have access to our LIVE email (this doesn’t happen very often).
• Because the advantages of this email system seem to outweigh its disadvantages, I would
ask that you please use the internal email whenever possible. For a quick question or in
an emergency, however, feel free to contact me at my regular Wilkes' email account:
john.hepp@wilkes.edu. Please do not use this account for your regular course
communications as this will defeat the advantage of having one centralized email system.
Please do not use my regular Wilkes’ email account for submitting late assignments.
• If you have a problem with this site, please contact me if you think it is a content issue (a
page is missing or a link is broken) or, if you think it is a technical issue, please contact
the Wilkes' help desk first. Other than telling you to make sure your pop-up blocker is
turned off, I can answer very few technical issues.
• That said, some course content is designed to open in a new window, so please turn off
any “pop up blocking” you may have when you are using this site.
• Please also note that after logging on to LIVE, there is a box that contains information

-4-
 about any known problems and planned system outages. These are rare but there are
times that the system is down for planned maintenance late at night or for part of a
weekend and you can plan around these outages if you are aware of them.
$ Finally, please log onto the site on a regular basis, as I will update it regularly throughout
the semester. I send emails and make news announcements to keep you informed of any
changes to this course.

Course Schedule: The remainder of this syllabus gives a detailed week-by-week class
schedule along with the due dates of all assignments and the required readings

Unit 1: Historical Methodology

M, 2/1 Week 1: Course introduction and What is History?
Explore web site and read the textbook’s Introduction
F, 2/5 Syllabus assignment due

M, 2/8 Week 2: Historical Methodology

Read Chapter 1 in the textbook
F, 2/12 Non-U.S. news source assignment due

M, 2/15 Week 3: The World Today

Read Chapter 2 in the textbook
F, 2/19 Research project topic assignment due

W, 2/24 Unit 1 mini-examination due

Unit 2: The birth of modern imperialism

(1500-1800)
M, 2/22 Week 4: European Imperialism and Globalization (part 1)
Read Chapter 3 in the textbook

M, 3/1 Week 5: European Imperialism and Globalization (part 2)

Read Chapter 4 in the textbook

M, 3/8 Week 6: Imperialism

Read Chapters 5 and 6 in the textbook

W, 3/17 Unit 2 examination due

 Unit 3: Imperialism evolved
(1800-1939)

M, 3/15 Week 7: Imperialism Expands

Read Chapter 7 in the textbook

M, 3/22 Week 8: The creation of the modern economy (part 1)

Read Chapters 8 and 9 in the textbook
W, 3/24 Research project bibliography assignment due

M, 3/29 Week 9: The creation of the modern economy (part 2)

Read Chapter 10 in the textbook

W, 4/7 Unit 3 examination due

Unit 4: Science and the twentieth century

M, 4/5 Week 10: Revolutions

Read Chapter 11 in the textbook

M, 4/12 Week 11: War (part 1)

Read chapter 12 in the textbook

M, 4/19 Week 12: War (part 2)

Read chapter 13 in the textbook

M, 4/26 Week 13: Looking back

M, 5/3 Week 14: Completing the course (part 1)

F, 5/7 Unit 4 examination due

M, 5/10 Week 15: Completing the course (part 2)

W, 5/12 Research project due

M, 5/17 Finals: Final reflections paper due