How did early modern (1500-1800 CE) Europeans experience the night? What role did animals play in shaping the Ottoman Empire in Egypt? How was nature understood and studied in Tokugawa Japan? What kind of impact did the Little Ice Age have on societies? These are some of the questions the present course unravels. This is a seminar course on global environmental history. It geared towards intensive collective reading and discussion. The focus is the relationship between early modern societies, empires, and environment. Through an exploration of nine monographs, we will also explore how history-writing on this subject has evolved. In course of the semester, we will learn about Europe, Mexico, United States, Japan, Russia, Brazil, South Africa, Egypt, and West Indies.We will cover themes as diverse as time, disease, literature, colonialism, seas, knowledge, frontier, resource, and climate. By the end of the course, students will have a considerable understanding of how societies, empires, and environment moulded each other to produce the early modern world.
pratyay.nath@ashoka.edu.in