1. Western Traditions 203 American Experiences and Constitutional Change

2. First Things First “Things You Need to Know” handout Course website Discussion sections Close reading, thinking, talking, writing –Example: Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address –Terrorist: “Sic Semper Tyrannis!” Define “history” – product or process? –Example: George Washington

3. Whose “History”? Lone Star (John Sayles, 1996) –Power privileges texts –Whose version is the “official story”? –From subatomic physics, Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle Act of measuring something changes the thing No such thing as an “impartial observer”

4. “What we see is not nature, but nature subjected to our means of questioning.” -- paraphrased from Werner Heisenberg (1927)

5. Enduring Conflicts Influence of $$$ on govt. Interests of many vs. few –Class struggle –populism Agrarian vs. urban culture –Counterculture War & national identity vs. peace & internal dissension Confrontation with land Human migrations –Immigration –Slavery –Gold Rush –Movement of African Americans to North –Transience of middle- class –Porous southern border

6. Christopher Columbus & John Smith Columbus (1451- 1506) –Heroic navigator –Mistaken explorer –Agent of destiny –Genocidal conqueror –“dis-” coverer or “un- ” coverer? Smith (1580-1631) –Leader & savior of Jamestown Colony –Raider of Indian towns –Romantic interest of Pocohontas –Public relations expert

7. Primary Sources Original words of contemporary participants and commentators Need close reading Avoid “presentism” –”Strip ourselves in imagination of all the surroundings of our own lives... [the past] is another planet, another human universe” –-- Fernand Braudel (1949)