HSTCMP/ARCTIC 321 At the Top of the World: Arctic Histories, taught by Prof. Elena Campbell (counts for SSc and DIV)
sln: 15712
This course explores the history of human understanding of and relationship to the Earth’s northernmost regions by tracing the social, economic, political, and environmental transformations of these areas during the period from the earliest settlements to the end of the 20th century (the creation of the Arctic Council in 1996), as well as the shifts in ideas that accompanied these changes. The topics covered in this course include the history of indigenous settlements and adaptations to the northern environment; European colonization, state-building, and border-making; religion and empire; economic development, industrialization and resource exploitation; exploration, cultural imagination, and nationalism; the international race to the North Pole, the Soviet conquest of the Arctic and the GULAG in the Far North; World War II and Cold War; the issue of indigenous rights, decolonization, environmental concerns and attempts for international cooperation in the Arctic. Special attention will be paid to the transnational and nationalizing trends, as well as the evolving concepts of the region and its past.