HIST 212 : US REVOLUTIONARY 1763-1817 (W)

When we think of how this nation was created, we think of the founding fathers. But while Madison, Jefferson, Washington, and Adams were all important, what about the other founders - the men and women who not only debated what it would mean to be a citizen of the United States, but who built the towns and cities, plowed the fields, and taught the next generation exactly what it would mean to be an American? This course examines the events and people who participated in the nation's founding, both the elites and the non-elites. It explores the processes of western expansion, the challenges faced by Native Americans confronting this new nation, and ideas about the nature of freedom, citizenship, and government in the period of near constant turbulence from the end of the Seven Years War, which set in motion the events that led to the Revolution, to the end of the War of 1812, which finally created a truly independent nation.