This course will expose students to a new way of looking at early American history.
Instead of focusing on the origins and development of the British colonies, it will
explore all of the regions in North America and all of the peoples living in them. 
Students will gain perspective on the formative events that were occurring west of
the Applachians, including the Russian colonization of Alaska and the Spanish
colonization of the West and Southwest. The course will place heavy emphasis on the
practice of history and therefore will draw as much as possible on primary documents.  

The principal objective of the course is to teach students to think critically for
themselves about the relationships between the past and the present, to learn to ask
questions of the past that enable them to understand the present and mold the future,
and to become attuned to both the limitations and possibilities of change.  The
course seeks to acquaint students with the ways in which past societies and peoples
have defined the relationships between community and individual needs and goals, and
between ethical norms and decision-making.

In general students will be expected to: 
1. read a wide range of primary and secondary sources critically.

2. polish skills in critical thinking, including the ability to recognize the
difference between opinion and evidence, and the ability to evaluate--and support or
refute--arguments effectively.

3. write stylistically appropriate and mature papers and essays using processes that
include discovering ideas and evidence, organizing that material, and revising,
editing, and polishing the finished papers.

Week 1: What is the subject matter of early American history?
Week 2: Early Encounters in North America: The Documentary Record, I
Week 3: Early Encounters in North America: The Documentary Record, II
Week 4: Early Encounters: What Does Archaeology Tell Us?
Week 5: The First Spanish Colonies
Week 6: The First French Colonies
Week 7: The First British Colonies
Week 8:	Mapping the Continent by Land and Sea
Week 9:	The Great Plains before Lewis and Clark
Week 10: Russia and the Aleutians
Week 11: The Colonization of Alta California
Week 12: Slavery from the Southwest to the Great Lakes
Week 13: Smallpox: A Continental Pestilence
Week 14: Looking West: Trans-Pacific Trade

Cheating of any kind, including plagiarism, is not tolerated. Any student caught
cheating or plagiarizing will receive an F for the course, no exceptions.  For
further information on plagiarizing, see “understanding plagiarism” at the following 
website: http://www.isd.uga.edu/teaching_resources/academic/#plagiarism.