History 150W-04: The Colonial & Revolutionary Tidewater

James P. Whittenburg
341 James Blair Hall
221-3767
Email: jpwhit@wm.edu
Web page: http://faculty.wm.edu/jpwhit
Office Hours: By Appointment

This isn't your typical class. For one thing, we meet on SATURDAYS ONLY--and usually for the better part of the day. For another, we will spend most of our classtime "on-site" at archaeological excavations, museums, or inside standing (or ruined) historic buildings. The schedule says the starting time is 9:00, but sometimes we'll leave earlier—because of the distances involved. I'll start most classes with some sort of background session--could be a clip from a movie, could be oral reports, or maybe something from the Internet. As soon as possible, though, we'll be into a van and on the road. Now, travel time can be tricky and I do hate to rush students when we are on-site. I'll shoot for getting people back in time for a reasonably early dinner--say 5:00. BUT there will surely be times when we'll get back late. If these admitted eccentricities are deeply troubling, I'd recommend dropping the course. No harm, no foul—and no hard feelings.

I've always held discussions in this class over an extended lunch hour (comes from my association with archaeologists over the years). In my opinion, the food has added considerably to the fun of the course, and I'd like to retain the feature. We'll picnic much of the time. Well, pizza or sandwiches next to the York or the James isn't exactly onerous. Typically, I'll take orders for food by email and you can reimburse me. When we eat at restaurants (like the famous Surry House), I'll put the entire bill on a credit card and, again, you can reimburse me. Most of the time, I'll post a menu on the class website several days before the trip.

Costs beyond the food might include computer disks, photographic supplies/services (optional), and admission fees to some of the museums. Most of the museums (Colonial Williamsburg, Jamestown/Yorktown Foundation, National Park Service, and the several churches) will let us in FREE or nearly so. None of the places charge more than $6. In overview, this is all "heap cheap," especially in view of....

Readings: Everything is available FREE on-line! Click on a title in the syllabus and it will take you either to JStor or Blackboard. Either way, you'll need to log in. All of the Blackboard readings we'll use (and some we will not use) are available under this course--History 150W-04. Just go to "COURSE DOCUMENTS." But you'll need to click on the individual reading. JStor should take you right to the article. There have been some subtle changes in our network lately. If you experience any difficulty, just let me know.

Requirements & Grades: Students generally want to know every little thing about the grading system, but truth be known, it is all pretty-much a subjective process and in the end I evaluate the totality of your work over the course of the semester. Admittedly, many students find this ambiguity unsettling during the semester, but few seem to think the grades unfair in the end. Keep in mind that A grades are reserved for EXCEPTIONAL work, and to win an A for the course means hitting on just about all cylinders just about all of the time. The grade of B covers a much wider range of perfectly acceptable, even superior, performance. Any student who scrambles over all the course requirements and delivers even a modest effort should have no trouble attaining a C--acceptable, but undistinguished. To receive a final grade lower than C, a student in this class would simply have to stop trying. As I am incapable of higher mathematics, I have devised "the rule of quarters." Each component of the course will determine 25% (more-or-less) of your grade for the course:

I. Electronic Journal (25%): For the journal in this class each student will build a web page that contains images pertaining to, accounts of, observations from, and reactions to our field trips, readings, and class discussions--one entry for each week in the semester. NO COMPUTING EXPERTISE IS ANTICIPATED--I'LL TEACH YOU ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW. YOU DON'T EVEN NEED TO OWN A COMPUTER--THE MACHINES IN THE W&M LABS ARE JUST FINE. Many of the pages from last year's class are still available. You might want to take a look. Just click here: Fall of 2002. Some of the very best pages were the work of students who had absolutely no computing experience. I encourage the use of Internet resources and the online databases available in Swem Library. I'd also recommend using web search engines. The "Google" search engine--especially with its ability to find images--is a great tool. You may also use interviews with interpreters, museum staffers, archaeologists, and other experts. I hope you will use some of your own “art”, too. I intend to issue each of you a digital camera ("issue" in this context means "loan"). If you prefer, I will also show you how to scan photographs made with regular cameras. The only technical requirements are that you include these elements in each week's section: text, art, and at least one link to an Internet site that bears on the topic for the week. As a bonus, participating in this seminar's electronic journal project will earn you certification for the undergraduate computing requirement in history. We'll get the web pages started right away--at the first meeting of the class. Thereafter, I’ll be available for optional labs after most field trips. I'll also gladly work with you as needed one-on-one in my office to create and maintain your website. Be as creative as you like in using the web, but be assured that a highly developed set of web-authoring skills is NOT necessary to success in this course. What you say is the key, and the greatest tool you have is the English language. It is the medium of William Shakespeare and Jane Austen, Edmund Morgan, and Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. It is free to you for the taking. Don't abuse it.

The electronic journal must be complete by 5:00 on the last day of exams (18 December). Length is unimportant. Quality is everything. I will expect to see weekly evidence of (1) a grasp of the major points in the readings, (2) critical evaluation of the meaning of the museum or historic site in relationship to the theses expressed in the readings, (3) understanding of the class discussion for the week, (4) an effort to locate web sources of factual information and images appropriate to the week's topic. The form of the actual web page need not be elaborate, but I will expect to see improvement over the course of the semester. I'll offer each student a brief critique and suggestions for improvement. This "electronic term paper" will therefore be a work in progress without formal grades until I evaluate it as a whole at the end of the semester. In composing the text portion of your pages, you might wish to seek advice from the excellent staff of the History Writing Resources Center. These are advanced doctoral students in American history who have special skill in coaching student writers. Check out their website: HWRC.

II. Oral Reports (25%):

Each of you will undertake two oral reports that stress the presentation of factual information linked in some way to the week's topic. The research should be easily accomplished from readily available material on the net, in Swem Library or the Colonial Williamsburg Research Library (where you will be welcome, by the way, and where you will have borrowing privileges). I'll be happy to guide you to additional places to look. My purpose is to have you become familiar with a few of the most basic sources of factual information about early American History and to provide in your reports some “take off points” for class discussions. You'll get the topic assignments one week ahead of time. I'll expect you to email me an outline of the report by 5:00 pm on the Thursday prior to your time at center stage. I'll alert you if anything is amiss. These are to be SHORT reports--no more than 5 minutes--sometimes delivered before we depart, sometimes at lunch, sometimes in the middle of a site visit. Think of them this way: You are standing near the punch bowl at a party. Two or three people come up and demand that you explain your topic to them. In the space of consuming one glass of punch and two crackers loaded with Brie, what would you tell them?

III: Classtime Discussions (25%): As much of the discussion for any week will take place over lunch, we'll often do a lot of talking before we even see whatever it is we came to see after lunch, which in turn privileges the readings. Indeed, the only preparations I will expect is that you have a firm grasp of the readings. There will be also ample opportunity to talk as we poke around the places we visit and on the way home—any place where we have an opening for an impromptu seminar session. Here again you are subject to my appallingly subjective evaluation of your participation in all class time activities. While I do care a great deal about attitude and attendance, I'm also willing to work around scheduling problems (like the schedule for the Women's Crew for several years running), but please talk to me early on.

IV: Final Exam (25%): For the first time in what seems ages, I am going to use a final exam. This exam will consist of short-answer questions that will require you to know the readings and be able to relate them to the sites we'll visit and the discussions we'll have. Well settle on a date late in the semester.

A Note on Guests: I'm delighted to accommodate requests for guests (roommates, siblings, and parents, for example)--to the extent of our available transportation. Do consult me ahead of time. Guests who can provide their own transportation (such as parents) are always welcome, even at the last minute.

Schedule

The schedule below is tentative, but probably about right.

30 August: Worlds Colliding

Sites: The Mariners Museum

Readings:

James Axtell, "The Rise and Fall of the Powhatan Empire," chapter ten in After Columbus: Essays in the Ethnohistory of Colonial North America (1988), pp. 233-258.

John Thornton, "The African Experience of the '20. and Odd Negroes' Arriving in Virginia in 1619," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd Ser., Vol. 55, No. 3. (Jul., 1998), pp. 421-434.

6 September: Outpost of Empire

Sites: Jamestown Settlement Park
Colonial National Park
Association for the Preservation of Virginia Activities/Rediscovery Archaeology Project

Readings:

Carville V. Earle, "Environment, Disease, and Mortality in Early Virginia," in Thad W. Tate & David L. Ammerman, eds., The Chesapeake in the Seventeenth Century: Essays on Anglo-American Society (Chapel Hill, 1979), pp. 95-125.

Edmund S. Morgan, “The Labor Problem at Jamestown, 1607-18,” The American Historical Review, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Jun., 1971), pp. 595-611.