HST305 Contemporary Europe (1945–1989)

[3–0, 3 cr.]

This course covers the period from the end of World War II to the fall in 1989 of the Berlin Wall and the beginning of the end of communist rule in Eastern Europe and Russia. Its main focus is on the post-war ascendancy of both the United States and the Soviet Union and the developing rivalry between them known as the Cold War. Main flashpoints of the Cold war include Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, the Middle East, and Afghanistan. In addition to the history of the Cold War, the course may also address topics such as the Universal Declaration of the Human Rights, the civil rights movement, feminism, the 1968 student revolutions and the technological and information revolutions.