Preface:

A seminar led by Eve Troutt Powell, Associate Professor of History

This timely seminar is a survey of the history of the Middle East, beginning with the late Ottoman Empire and continuing into the present. While the content of this seminar is punctuated by military struggles, we will also explore the cultural history of the region. We will look hard at the circumstances of daily life in the Middle East and how they are affected by politics and war. We will also examine the historical circumstances that changed the political boundaries of the Middle East in the early twentieth century, and how those changes have continued to shape and provoke the current crises of the region that often dominate our news. This seminar will also pay close attention to the ways in which the Middle East and its peoples are represented in Western society.

Topics to be examined may include:

* Nationalism, World War I and the end of the Ottoman Empire
* Europe and the Middle East, Zionism and Palestine
* Oil, The Gulf States and the Iranian Revolution
* Islamic Movements in the Middle East
* Afghanistan
* September 11, 2001 and the Invasion of Iraq

Teachers of history, social studies, and other subjects will find the materials to be an insight into topics that have shaped our lives in the past and present, and promise to do so into the future.