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- Dates: Thursdays, May 7, 14, 21 and 28
- Time: 1:00 - 2:30pm ET
- Why did some of the world’s greatest civilizations — long the centers of wealth, learning, and technological sophistication — lose their commanding lead to a once-marginal Europe? For centuries, imperial China, Mughal India, Safavid Persia, and the Ottoman Empire stood at the pinnacle of global power. Their cities dazzled, their economies thrived, and their rulers often viewed Europe as a distant and inferior fringe. Yet by the late 19th century, the balance had been dramatically reversed: European empires dominated global trade, carved up vast territories, and pressed these older powers to the brink. This four-lecture series explores that stunning transformation. We will examine the internal strengths that once made these civilizations great—but also the structural constraints that limited their ability to adapt. At the same time, we will trace Europe’s unexpected ascent, driven by maritime expansion, scientific inquiry, financial innovation, and relentless interstate competition.
- Dates: Fridays, May 1, 8, 15, and 22
- Time: 10:30-Noon ET
- In 1848, a wave of revolutions swept across Europe, shaking nearly every major state and raising hopes for the end of absolute monarchy and the rise of new nation states and parliamentary rule. For a brief moment, it seemed as if a new political order was within reach. Yet by 1851, those hopes had largely collapsed amid bloody repression, internal divisions, and decisive military interventions, leaving power firmly in the hands of a more fearful and determined aristocracy and monarchy. The failure of these revolutions did not end the forces they unleashed. Instead, it set the stage for decades of intensified political conflict, growing class tensions, and more radical movements as industrialization and modernization transformed European society. This course focuses on the upheavals in France, Austria, the German states, Piedmont-Sardinia, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Denmark, and the Netherlands, while also examining why two major powers—Great Britain and Russia—remained largely untouched by revolution.
- Dates: Mondays, May 4, 11, 18 & June 1
- Time: 10:30-Noon ET
- In the thirteen fateful years before the Civil War, US politics did not merely struggle—it broke down. This four-lecture series explores how a functioning political system collapsed under the weight of slavery, sectional rivalry, and failed leadership. Three forces drove this unraveling: the intensifying divide over slavery, the fragmentation and collapse of the Whig and Democratic parties, and a succession of presidents—Taylor, Fillmore, Pierce, and Buchanan—unable or unwilling to meet the crisis. Along the way, we encounter some of the most dramatic episodes in U.S. political history, brought to life by a cast of brilliant and deeply flawed figures, including Stephen Douglas, Charles Sumner, Thaddeus Stevens, Abraham Lincoln, and Jefferson Davis. Congress became a battleground, compromise grew elusive, and political norms eroded. By the end, the machinery of government could no longer contain the nation’s divisions. This course traces how the conflicts of the 1850s made disunion—and ultimately war—unavoidable. This is the first in a two-part series of lectures on the coming of the American Civil War.
- Dates: Mondays, May 4, 11, 18 & June 1
- Time: 1:00-2:00PM ET
- This course explores how World War II transformed Hollywood—and how Hollywood shaped the war’s meaning. We begin with the exodus of European talent in the 1930s and early 1940s, as filmmakers fled Nazi persecution and remade their careers in America. Figures such as Fritz Lang, Ernst Lubitsch, Peter Lorre, and Billy Wilder reshaped Hollywood, while stars like Hedy Lamarr, Audrey Hepburn, and Leslie Caron experienced the war firsthand. We then examine how studios confronted the war, navigating isolationist debates before Pearl Harbor and the constraints of wartime filmmaking. Finally, we turn to the postwar years, when films explored the war’s human costs—psychological trauma, family strain, and moral ambiguity. Directors such as Fred Zinnemann and John Frankenheimer helped redefine the war film, shaping how the conflict would be remembered.