University of Bordeaux

This course examines the dynamics between cities and countryside during Middle Ages, from the fifth to the fifteenth century. Their evolution and interactions are studied through various aspects including space, politics, religion, and economics, in order to understand the medieval society.

This course analyzes corruption in the United States. It highlights how abuse of position for personal gain has long been a political and social issue with minimal impact because of significant economic growth. It focuses on scandals throughout United States history that have exposed official venality and the U.S. political authorities that have passed laws and regulations to respond to corruption.

This course highlights 1960s, or the “Sixties,” as a puzzling concept in many respects. It uses the concept of the “Sixties” to move beyond both the chronological limits of 1960-1969 and the purely temporal framing of the term. It studies a longer timeframe spanning almost twenty years from the start of the Civil Rights movement (Montgomery bus boycott in December 1955) to the end of the Vietnam War (fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975). It addresses the historical period as defined in international and domestic terms, but also according to geopolitical, political, economic, social, and cultural change; as an era but also a zeitgeist, a time of specific social and cultural effervescence. The course develops a nuanced knowledge of this key period of United States history. Topics include the counterculture, social activism, feminism, and the rises of a New Left and a New Right.

This course consults primary sources such as the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights and analyzes these documents by reading numerous works presenting the history of the United States. The course develops text commentary techniques, and oral participation and group work form an integral part of the tutorials.