HIST 380 - The American West

Units: 3 ; Breadth Area: GE-UD-3; Diversity
Human habitation and transformation of western environments from c. 15,000 BCE to present. Contending claims of sovereignty; resource extraction and economic competition; colonization; transportation, communication, and exchange; warfare and diplomacy; community formation and nation building; race, citizenship, and belonging.

Breadth Area(s) Satisfied: GE-UD-3 - Upper Division Arts or Humanities, Overlay - Diversity
Prerequisites: Completion of GE Areas 1A, 1B, 1C and GE-2 with grade C- (CR) or better (GE Areas A1, A2, A3 and B4 for students on the 2024-25 or earlier catalogs).
Strongly Recommended Preparation: Upper division status (greater than 60 earned semester units) and completion of lower division Area 3 requirements (lower division Area C requirements for students on the 2024-25 or earlier catalogs).
Possible Instructional Methods: On-ground, or Hybrid, or Online-Asynchronous, or Online-Synchronous.
Grading: A-F or CR/NC (student choice).
Course Typically Offered: Fall ONLY

Student Learning Outcomes - Upon successful completion of this course students will be able to:

Analyze shifting cultural and political conceptions of the American “west” as an idea and place;
Investigate the consequences of settler colonialism for Indigenous peoples;
Consider practices of warfare, diplomacy, and exchange as diverse peoples sought to retain or gain sovereignty;
Examine how diverse peoples and animals have competed for resources in a complex landscape;
Investigate unique political movements in what is now the western United States.

GE-UD-3. Upper-division Arts or Humanities Learning Outcomes

Demonstrate an understanding of and ability to apply principles, methodologies, values systems, and thought processes employed in the arts and humanities.
Analyze cultural production as an expression of, or reflection upon, what it means to be human.
Demonstrate how the perspectives of the arts or humanities are used by informed, engaged, and reflective citizens to benefit local and global communities.

Diversity Overlay Learning Outcomes

Describe the histories and/or experiences of one or more U.S. cultural groups, and the resilience and agency of group members.
Identify structures of oppression and the diverse efforts and strategies used by U.S. cultural groups to combat the effects of oppressive structures.
Analyze the intersection of categories of race and gender as they affect U.S. cultural group members lived realities and/or as they are embodied in personal and collective identities.
Recognize the way that multiple differences (including, e.g., gender, class, sexuality, religion, disability, immigration status, gender expression, color/phenotype, racial mixture, linguistic expression, and/or age) within U.S. cul