HIST 363 World Environmental History
This course surveys the key themes and developments in world environmental history; that is, the history of how human societies have changed their environments and how the environment has influenced the courses of societies. It examines pre-modern cultures' intellectual, economic, and technological approaches to the environment, the role of epidemic and environmental transformation in the colonial age, and the revolutionary changes introduced to the environment in the modern period of industrialization and population growth and the rapid consumption of resources that has involved. The course places contemporary environmental issues in their deep historical contexts.
Prerequisites
4 Undergraduate credits
Effective August 26, 2006 to present
Meets graduation requirements for
Learning outcomes
General
- Analyze the environmental aspects of economic growth and modernization, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
- Assess different narrative strategies to describe environmental issues and world history, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
- Evaluate the impact of environmental changes on people of different racial/ethnic, class, gender, national, and cultural backgrounds, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
- Examine how environmental history rewrites previously dominant interpretations in history, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
- Know economic, technological and demographic factors which have influenced the world environment historically, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
- Understand the role of a world citizen who is responsible for the rapidly changing environment, consistent with the analytical and expressive complexity and sophistication that are distinctively characteristic of upper-division courses completed at a comprehensive university.
Minnesota Transfer Curriculum
Goal 5: History and the Social and Behavioral Sciences
- Employ the methods and data that historians and social and behavioral scientists use to investigate the human condition.
- Examine social institutions and processes across a range of historical periods and cultures.
- Use and critique alternative explanatory systems or theories.
- Develop and communicate alternative explanations or solutions for contemporary social issues.
Goal 10: People and the Environment
- Explain the basic structure and function of various natural ecosystems and of human adaptive strategies within those systems.
- Discern patterns and interrelationships of bio-physical and socio-cultural systems.
- Describe the basic institutional arrangements (social, legal, political, economic, religious) that are evolving to deal with environmental and natural resource challenges.
- Evaluate critically environmental and natural resource issues in light of understandings about interrelationships, ecosystems, and institutions.
- Propose and assess alternative solutions to environmental problems.
- Articulate and defend the actions they would take on various environmental issues.
Spring 2026
| Section | Title | Instructor | books | eservices |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50 | World Environmental History | Wagstrom, Thor A | Books for HIST-363-50 Spring 2026 | Course details for HIST-363-50 Spring 2026 |