Classroom instruction will include both lectures and seminar discussions. Lectures will provide instruction on weekly topics with opportunities for student inquiry and discussion. Seminars will encourage active class participation in the analysis of assigned primary and secondary readings. Classroom instruction may also include student presentations on specific readings and/or topics, and other types of student-led activities. Classroom instruction may also include tutorials and workshops on transferrable skills, including research methods, academic citation practice, and presentation skills
A sample course outline would include the following topics.
*Note: Content may vary according to the instructor’s selection of topics.
- Introduction: Land, People, Climate
- The Ottoman World
- Tanzimat and Islamic Reforms
- National Movements: Arabism, Turkism, Zionism
- World War I and Lines in the Sand
- The Palestinian Mandate and the Emergence of the State of Israel
- Oil, Saudi Arabia, and Pan-Arabism
- Lebanon: Society and Sectarianism
- The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 1948-present
- Canada & The Middle East: Foreign Policy, Peacekeeping, and Diasporas
- Islamism and the Iranian Revolution of 1979
- Afghanistan: Peace, War, and Intervention
- Authoritarianism, the Revolutions of 2009, 2011, and current conflicts
- Sectarianism, Gender, and Health
At the conclusion of the course, successful students will be able to demonstrate historical thinking skills, research skills, critical thinking skills and communication skills by:
1. Locating, examining, assessing, and evaluating a range of primary sources and secondary scholarly literature critically and analytically (reading history).
2. Constructing historical arguments, taking historical perspectives, and interpreting historical problems through different types of writing assignments of varying lengths (writing history).
3. Participating in active and informed historical debate independently and cooperatively through classroom discussion and presentation (discussing history).
4. Independently and cooperatively investigating the ways that history is created, preserved and disseminated through public memory and commemoration, oral history, community engagement, and other forms of popular visual and written expressions about the past (applying history).
Assessment will be in accordance with the Douglas College student evaluation policy. Students may conduct research with human participants as part of their coursework in this class. Instructors for the course are responsible for ensuring that student research projects comply with College policies on ethical conduct for research involving humans.
There will be at least three separate assessments, which may include a combination of midterm and final exams; research essays; primary document analysis assignments and essays; quizzes; map tests; in-class and online written assignments; seminar presentations; student assignment portfolios; group projects; creative projects; class participation.
The value of each assessment and evaluation, expressed as a percentage of the final grade, will be listed in the course outline distributed to students at the beginning of the term. Specific evaluation criteria will vary according to the instructor’s assessment of appropriate evaluation methods.
An example of one evaluation scheme:
Any combination of the following totalling 100%:
- Participation 10%
- Quizzes and Map Tests 10%
- Primary Document Analysis Essays 30%
- Portfolio 20%
- Midterm Exam 15%
- Final Exam 15%
Textbooks and Course Readers will be chosen from the following list, to be updated periodically:
An instructor’s custom Course Reader may be required. Additional online resources may also be assigned.
Textbooks:
Cleveland, William and Martin Bunton. A History of the Modern Middle East, 5th ed. Boulder: Westview Press, 2013.
Gelvin, James. The Modern Middle East: A History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Goldschmidt, Arthur and Lawrence Davidson. A Concise History of the Middle East. Boulder: Westview Press, 2012.
Hourani, A. A History of the Arab Peoples. London: Faber and Faber, 1991.
Mansfield, Peter. A History of the Middle East, 4th ed. London: Penguin Books, 2013.
Lust, Ellen, ed. The Middle East. Washington DC: CQ Press; 2013.
Ochsenwald, William and Sydeny Nettleton Fisher. The Middle East: A History. McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences, 2010.
Pappe, Ilan. The Modern Middle East. New York: Routledge, 2010.
Sorenson, David S. An Introduction to the Modern Middle East: History, Religion, Political Economy, Politics. Boulder: Westview Press, 2013.
Sourcebooks and Readers:
Amin, Camron Michael, Benjamin C. Fortuna, and Elizabeth B. Frierson. The Modern Middle East: A Sourcebook for History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Clancy-Smith, Julia and Charles Smith. The Modern Middle East and North Africa: A History in Documents. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.
Gettleman, Marvin and Stuart Schaar, eds. The Middle East and Islamic World Reader: A Historical Reader for the Twenty-First Century, 3rd ed. New York: Grove Press, 2012.
Khater, Akram Fouad. Sources in the History of the Modern Middle East Boston: Wadsworth Publishing, 2010.
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