2013-2014 Academic Catalog

Apr 23, 2024

2013-2014 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

HIST 162 - The History of the Modern Middle East

The contours of today’s Middle East was shaped by World War I and the breakup of the Ottoman Empire. The geography of the Middle East, which was established with broad strokes under the Sykes–Pichot Agreement of 1916, has experienced serious turmoils since then as a result of the Second World War, the formation of the State of Israel and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Now with the Arab Spring the political landscape in the area faces its first truly grassroots challenge. The Arap Spring is a harbinger of a coming potential collapse to the 20th century order in the Middle East. In this course, we will examine the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the emergence of Nation states during the 19th and early 20th century in the Middle East. Specifically, the countries of Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Turkey will be examined in greater detail. We will concentrate on the policy of the Great Powers towards the region and the question of Humanitarian Intervention, which dominated European diplomatic history in the 19th and early 20th century. The European Policy towards the area was subsumed under the rubric of “the Eastern Question”. Does the Arab Spring represent a revival of the “Eastern Question”? If so, how do modern socio-economic complexities along with the greater number of intervening international players bode for the future of the region? What are the parallels with the past? This course aims to show us that we cannot understand today’s Middle East without examining the developments in the turn of the 20thCentury.
Fulfills the Historical Perspective.

Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered periodically.