This course will cover the period from Columbus’s first voyages to the Americas at the end of the fifteenth century, until the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions of the late eighteenth century. The course will be divided into three units: Exploration, discovery, and conquest; Colonization, Slavery, and Commerce; and Enlightenment and Revolution. Through these units, we will see how over the course of three centuries the Atlantic Ocean’s role in human society changed from being a seemingly insurmountable barrier to being a place across which people, ideas, and commodities moved. The end point will be an Atlantic World in which governments run by people of European descent flourished on both sides of the ocean; where key governments embraced the ideals of the Enlightenment, but where millions of people were still living in slavery.

Topics during the semester will included Columbus’s journeys; the colonization of Virginia; the English Civil War and its impact on the Americas; the growth of the trades in sugar and tobacco; and the spread of the Enlightenment.

Each week will include at least two readings, mixing primary sources and secondary sources. So along with stressing the material covered,  there will also be an emphasis on developing students’ abilities to analyze primary texts.

Week 1: Introduction to Atlantic History

Week 2: The Spanish and the Age of Discovery

Reading, Primary: Sandoval, selections (blackboard)

Reading, Secondary: Terraciano, “The Early Iberian American World,” from The Cambridge History of America and the World

Key Character: Sandoval

Week 3: Emigration and Settlement

Reading, Primary: https://docsouth.unc.edu/southlit/smith/smith.html, pp. 47-9, 110-114, 121-125

Reading, Secondary: Games, “Making Colonies and Empires in North America and the Greater Caribbean,” from The Cambridge History of America and the World

Key Character: Pocahantas

Week 4: Pirates and Slave Traders

Reading, Primary: Code Noir – https://revolution.chnm.org/d/335/;  https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/73564/pg73564-images.html, chapters VI-VIII

Reading, Secondary: Dubois, Laurent, ‘The French Atlantic’, in Jack P Greene, and Philip D Morgan (eds), Atlantic History: A Critical Appraisal

Key Character: Francois l’Olonnais

Week 5: Constitutions and Empires: from 1688 to 1763

Reading, Primary: Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, pp. 13-17, 23-25, 43-48, 52-53: https://english.hku.hk/staff/kjohnson/PDF/FRANKLINautobiographyB.pdf

Reading, Secondary: Dunn, Richard S., ‘The Glorious Revolution and America’, in Nicholas Canny, and Wm Roger Louis (eds), The Oxford History of the British Empire: Volume I

Key Character: Benjamin Franklin

Week 6: Slavery (Plantation and Otherwise) in the New World

Reading, Primary: Phillis Wheatley, Selected Poems: 1. On Being Brought from Africa to America; 2. An Hymn to the Morning; 3. An Hymn to the Evening; 4. To the Right Honourable William, Early of Dartmouth

Reading, Secondary: John Thornton, “African Dimensions of the Stono Rebellion”, The American historical review, 1991-10, Vol.96 (4), p.1101-1113.

Key Character: Phillis Wheatley

Week 7: The Enlightenment

Reading, Primary: La Condamine, the preface, and pages 1-5, 100-108 (on blackboard week 7 section)

Reading, Secondary: Winterer, “Enlightenment and the American Revolution,” in The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions, https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-history-of-the-age-of-atlantic-revolutions/enlightenment-and-the-american-revolution/2AC61696FC382E722B55674AC367ED27

Key Character: La Condamine

Week 8:  American Revolution I

Reading, Primary: Thomas Paine, Common Sense, pages 67-68, 84-101, https://calhum.org/files/uploads/program_related/TD-Thomas-Paine-Common-Sense.pdf. 

Reading, Secondary: Peterson M, The Revolution in British America: General Overview. In: The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions.

Key Character: Thomas Paine

Week 9: American Revolution II

Reading, Primary: US Constitution and Bill of Rights

Reading, Secondary: Edling, Max M., and Wim Klooster. “Shaping the Constitution.” Chapter. In The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions

Key Characters: Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson

Week 10: French Revolution I

Reading, Primary: Declaration of the Rights of Men;

                                   Selected letters from Thomas Jefferson:

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-15-02-0100
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-15-02-0272

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-15-02-0259
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-15-02-0172

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-12-02-0194

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-12-02-0242 (this one is quite long; don’t get caught up in the details)

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-12-02-0248 (paragraphs 2 and 3 only)

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-24-02-0079

Reading, Secondary: Overview of the French Revolution By David Andress – The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions

Key Character: Lafayette

Week 11: French Revolution II

Reading, Primary: The Writings of Thomas Paine, Volume II, selections on Blackboard; A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, selections: pp. 22-25, 71-73, and 159-161. Document is on Blackboard.

Reading, Secondary: Suzanne Desan, “Foreigners, Cosmopolitianism, and French Revolutionary Universalism,” in Suzanne Desan, Lynn Hunt, William Max Nelson. The French Revolution in Global Perspective. Cornell University Press; 2013

Key Characters: Thomas Paine and Mary Wollstonecraft

Week 12: Haitian Revolution I

Reading, Primary: Selections (blackboard)

Reading, Secondary:  Taber, Overview of the Haitian Revolution – Cambridge History of the Age of the Atlantic Revolutions

Key Character: Vincent Ogé

Week 13: Haitian Revolution II

Reading, Primary: Selections (blackboard)

Reading, Secondary: Phillipe Girard, Toussaint Louverture, the Cultivator System, and Haiti’s Independence (1798–1804). In: The Cambridge History of the Age of Atlantic Revolutions. The Cambridge History of the Age of the Atlantic Revolutions.

Key Character: Toussaint L’Ouverture

There will be three quizzes, at the end of each unit; a primary source assignment; and a take-home final.

Breakdown:

This course has four tutorial sessions. Grading of tutorials will be based on your participation in discussions focusing on the primary and secondary reading listed for the corresponding week (5% each tutorial).

Topics covered are as listed:

1. Week 3: Emigration and Settlement—2024/09/19
2. Week 5: Constitutions and Empires: from 1688 to 1763—2024/10/03
3. Week 8:  American Revolution I—2024/10/24
4. Week 10: French Revolution I—2024/11/07

Venue & Time: HYS-G04, 12:30-13:30

請注意大學有關學術著作誠信的政策和規則，及適用於犯規事例的紀律指引和程序。詳情可瀏覽網址：https://www.cuhk.edu.hk/policy/academichonesty/。

學生遞交作業時，必須連同已簽署的聲明一併提交，表示他們知道有關政策、規則、指引及程序。

• 如屬小組習作，則所有組員均須簽署聲明；所有組員（不論有否簽署聲明及不論有否直接或間接撰寫有問題的內容）均須負上集體責任及受到懲處。
• 如作業以電腦製作、內容以文字為主，並經由大學「維誠」系統 (VeriGuide) 提交者，學生將作業的電子檔案上載到系統後，便會獲得收據，收據上已列明有關聲明。

未有夾附簽署妥當的聲明的作業，老師將不予批閱。

學生只須提交作業的最終版本。

學生將作業或作業的一部份用於超過一個用途（例如：同時符合兩科的要求）而沒有作出聲明會被視為未有聲明重覆使用作業。學生重覆使用其著作的措辭或某一、二句句子很常見，並可以接受，惟重覆使用全部內容則構成問題。在任何情況下，須先獲得相關老師同意方可提交作業。