Loose-leaf Version for Understanding Western Society, Volume 1: From Antiquity to the Enlightenment A Brief History: From Antiquity to Enlightenment

by McKay, John P.; Hill, Bennett D.; Buckler, John; Crowston, Clare Haru; Wiesner-Hanks, Merry E.; Perry, Joe

• ISBN13: 9781457655685
• ISBN10: 1457655683
• Edition: Looseleaf
• Format: Loose-leaf
• Copyright: 2013-09-01
• Publisher: Bedford/St. Martin's

Summary

Based on the highly successful A History of Western Society, Understanding Western Society: A Brief History captures students’ interest in the everyday life of the past and ties social history to the broad sweep of politics and culture. Abridged by 30%, the narrative is paired with innovative pedagogy, designed to help students focus on significant developments as they read and review. An innovative, three-step end-of-Chapter study guide helps students master key facts and move toward synthesis.

Author Biography

John P. McKay (Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley) is professor emeritus at the University of Illinois. He has written or edited numerous works, including the Herbert Baxter Adams Prize-winning book Pioneers for Profit: Foreign Entrepreneurship and Russian Industrialization, 1885-1913 and Tramways and Trolleys: The Rise of Urban Mass Transport in Europe.  He also contributed to Imagining the Twentieth Century.

Bennett D. Hill (Ph.D., Princeton), late of the University of Illinois, was the history department chair from 1978 to 1981. He published Church and State in the Middle Ages, English Cistercian Monasteries and Their Patrons in the Twelfth Century, and numerous articles and reviews, and was one of the contributing editors to The Encyclopedia of World History. A Benedictine monk of St. Anselm's Abbey in Washington, D.C., he was also a visiting professor at Georgetown University.

John Buckler (Ph.D., Harvard University) taught history at the University of Illinois.  Published books include Aegean Greece in the Fourth Century B.C., Philip II and the Sacred War, and Theban Hegemony, 371-362 B.C. With Hans Beck, he most recently published Central Greece and the Politics of Power in the Fourth Century.

Clare Haru Crowston (Ph.D., Cornell University) teaches at the University of Illinois, where she is currently associate professor of history. She is the author of Fabricating Women: The Seamstresses of Old Regime France, 1675-1791, which won the Berkshire and Hagley Prizes. She edited two special issues of the Journal of Women's History, has published numerous journal articles and reviews, and is a past president of the Society for French Historical Studies and a former chair of the Pinkney Prize Committee.

Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison) taught first at Augustana College in Illinois, and since 1985 at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where she is currently UWM Distinguished Professor in the department of history. She is the coeditor of the Sixteenth Century Journal and the author or editor of more than twenty books, most recently The Marvelous Hairy Girls: The Gonzales Sisters and Their Worlds and Gender in History. She currently serves as the Chief Reader for Advanced Placement World History.

Joe Perry (Ph.D., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) is Associate Professor of modern German and European history at Georgia State University. He has published numerous articles and is author of the recently published book Christmas in Germany: A Cultural History. His current research interests include issues of consumption, gender, and television in East and West Germany after World War II.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1
Origins, ca. 400,000–1100 B.C.E.

 

What do we mean by "the West" and "Western Civilization"?
What was the significance of the advent of agriculture?
What kind of civilization developed in Mesopotamia?
How did Mesopotamian culture spread in the Near East?
What were the characteristics of Egyptian civilization?
How did foreign invasions alter the Near East?

Chapter 2
Small Kingdoms and Mighty Empires in the Near East, ca. 1100–513 B.C.E.

 

What new kingdoms arose in the Near East after 1100 B.C.E.?
What was unique about Hebrew civilization?
What explains the rise and fall of the Assyrians?
How did the Persian Empire differ from its predecessors?
 

Chapter 3
The Development of Classical Greece, ca. 2000–338 B.C.E.

 

How did geography shape the early history of the Greeks?
What was the polis and what was its role in Greek society?
What were the major developments of the Greek Archaic Age?
How did war affect Greek civilization?
How did Macedonia come to dominate Greece?

Chapter 4
The Hellenistic World, 336–30 B.C.E.

 

How and why did Alexander the Great create an empire?)
How did Alexander's conquests change the world?
How did Greek culture shape the Hellenistic kingdoms?
What new economic connections were created in this period?
What was the lasting impact of Hellenism?

Chapter 5
The Rise of Rome, ca. 750–31 B.C.E.

 

How did the Romans become the dominant power in Italy?
What were the key institutions of the Roman republic?
How did the Romans build a Mediterranean empire?
How did expansion affect Roman society and culture?
What led to the fall of the Roman republic?

Chapter 6
The Pax Romana, 31 B.C.E.–284 C.E.

 

How did Augustus create a foundation for the Roman Empire?
How did the Roman state develop after Augustus?
What was life like in Rome during the Golden Age?
How did Christianity grow into a major religious movement?
What explains the chaos of the third century?

Chapter 7
Late Antiquity, 250–600

 

How did Diocletian and Constantine try to reform the empire?
How did the Church become a major force in Europe?
What were the key characteristics of barbarian society?
What were the consequences of the barbarian migrations?
How did the church Christianize barbarian societies?
How did the Byzantine Empire preserve the legacy of Rome?

Chapter 8
Europe in the Early Middle Ages, 600–1000

 

What were the origins of Islam and how did it spread?
How did the Franks build and govern a European empire?
What were the accomplishments of the Carolingian Renaissance?
What were the consequences of the ninth-century invasions?
How did conflict shape European development in this period?

 

Chapter 9
State and Church in the High Middle Ages, 1000–1300

 

How did monarchs try to centralize political power?
How did the administration of law evolve in this period?
What led to conflict between the papacy and secular leaders?
What were the causes and consequences of the Crusades?
How did Christianity spread during the High Middle Ages?

 

Chapter 10
The Life of the People in the High Middle Ages, 1000–1300

 

What was village life like in medieval Europe?
How did religion shape everyday life in medieval Europe?
What roles did nobles play in medieval society?
What role did monks and nuns play in medieval life?

 

Chapter 11
The Creativity and Challenges of Medieval Cities, 1100–1300

 

What led to Europe's economic growth and reurbanization?
What was life like in a medieval city?
How did universities serve the needs of medieval society?
How did literature and architecture express medieval values?
How did urban growth shape European religious life?

Chapter 12
The Crisis of the Later Middle Ages, 1300–1450

 

How did climate change shape the Late Middle Ages?
How did the Black Death reshape European society?
What were the consequences of the Hundred Years' War?
Why did the church come under increasing attack?
What explains the social unrest of the Late Middle Ages?

Chapter 13
European Society in the Age of the Renaissance, 1350–1550

 

How did politics and economics shape the Renaissance?
What new ideas were associated with the Renaissance?
How did changes in art reflect new Renaissance ideals? 
What were the key social hierarchies in Renaissance Europe?
How did nation-states evolve in this period?

 

Chapter 14
Reformations and Religious Wars, 1500–1600

 

What were the central beliefs of Protestant reformers?
How did politics shape the course of the Reformation?
How did Protestantism spread beyond German-speaking lands?
How did the Catholic Church respond to the Reformation?
Why did religious violence increase in this period?

Chapter 15
European Exploration and Conquest, 1450–1650

 

What were the limits of world contacts before Columbus?
How and why did Europeans undertake voyages of expansion?
What was the impact of conquest?
How did Europe and the world change after Columbus?
How did expansion change European attitudes and beliefs?

Chapter 16
Absolutism and Constitutionalism in Europe, ca. 1589–1725

 

What made the seventeenth century an "Age of Crisis"?
Why did France rise and Spain fall in this period?
What explains the rise of absolutism in Austria and Prussia?
What was distinctive about Russia and the Ottoman Empire?
Where and why did constitutionalism triumph?
What developments did baroque art and music reflect?

Chapter 17
Toward a New Worldview, 1540–1789

 

How did European views of nature change in this period?
What were the core principles of the Enlightenment?
What did enlightened absolutism mean?