Wednesdays, 5:30 - 7:30 pm (PT) • 5 weeks • February 3 – March 3
Join us on campus or online!
Globalization, migration, political polarization, technological disruption, and geopolitical rivalry—the issues dominating today’s news often seem to be unprecedented, but all of them have deep historical roots.
In this series of lectures, distinguished Stanford historians David Kennedy and James Sheehan return to examine the forces shaping the 21st century through the lens of the past, revealing how earlier generations confronted many of the questions that define our own age. Drawing on examples from the United States and around the world, they explore disruptive technologies from the railroad to artificial intelligence, migration in American and global history, the populist strain in democratic political cultures, the changing character of modern warfare, and the evolution of the post–Cold War international system. By placing today's challenges in historical perspective, the course offers fresh insight into current events and a deeper understanding of the long historical forces that continue to shape our world.
Students can choose to attend this course on campus or online. Sign up for Section H if you think you might attend class on the Stanford campus at least once. There is no commitment—you can still choose to attend via Zoom for any session. Sign up for Section Z if you know you will exclusively attend via Zoom.
| SECTION H: Register for On-Campus Course » |
SECTION Z: Register for Online Course » |
Course Instructors
David M. KennedyDonald J. McLachlan Professor of History, Emeritus, Stanford
David M. Kennedy has long taught courses in the history of the 20th-century United States, US foreign policy, American literature, and the history of the North American West. His Pulitzer Prize–winning book Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945 recounts the history of the American people in the two great crises of the Great Depression and World War II. He is the founding faculty director of Stanford’s Bill Lane Center for the American West.
James SheehanDickason Professor in the Humanities and Professor of Modern European History, Emeritus, Stanford
James Sheehan is an expert on the history of modern Europe and has written widely on the history of Germany, including his book Where Have All the Soldiers Gone? The Transformation of Modern Europe. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society and a past president of the American Historical Association. Sheehan has received many grants and awards, including the Officer’s Cross of the German Order of Merit.