Welcome to the website for Cynthia Jurisson's 2025-2026 US History classes. Please consult this website. the Schoology page, and your email for information pertaining to assignments, study methods, study aids, links to research and reference sources, extra credit opportunities, and new Immersion Options.

Contact Information: Dr. Cynthia Jurisson Office Phone: 773.702.0588 cjurisson@uchicago.edu cjurisson@ucls.uchicago.edu

+ Course Basics

	Course Information and Rules
	General Expectations of Students
	General Expectations of Teachers
	ATUS and US History: Policy on Accessibility
	ATUS and US History: Policy on Inclusion and Diversity
	ATUS and US History: Policies on Academic Integrity and the Use of AI
	Extra Credit Form
	Group Leader Evaluation Form

+ Recent Research on Learning and the Brain

	Conditions and Techniques for Effective Learning
	Excerpt from: Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning, Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel, Chapter 8, 2014
	Benedict Carey, "Forget What You Know About Good Study Habits," New York Times, 9/7/2010
	Oliver Sacks. "This Year, Change Your Mind," New York Times, 12/31/2010
	Gretchen Reynolds. "Phys-Ed: Brains and Brawn", New York Times, January 19, 2011
	"Can You Build a Better Brain?" Newsweek, January 2011
	Paul Tough. "What if the Secret to Success is Failure?" New York Times, 09/18/2011
	Roni Caryn Rabin. "Video Games and the Depressed Teenager." New York Times, 01/18/2011
	"Playing sounds to the sleeping aids memory," New York Times, 11/24/2009
	Four Student's Misconceptions About Learning
	"How Test Makes Us Smarter," H. Roediger III, New York Times, 11/24/2009
	Counterintuitive Findings on What Improves Long-Term Learning
	"Want to Ace that Test? Get the Right Kind of Sleep" Benedict Carey, New York Times, 10/16/2014 (Re: recent research indicating that sleep is a different type of learning.)
	"The Role of Parents and Teachers in the Development of Gender-Related Math Attitudes," Gunderson and Levine, 2012. This article co-authored by a Lab parent is a must read; the implications, re: adult involvement in children's learning, may be relevant for a wide variety of academic subjects and educational situations.
	Rob Lazebnik, "The Adults we Failed to Raise: How to teach new grads the skills you kept from them," Wall Street Journal, 7/25/2015
	David Brooks, Building Attention Span, New York Times, 7/10/2015
	Jane E. Brody, "Screens separate the obsessed from life: as children plug in, it is up to parents not to tune out a potential problem," New York Times, 7/7/2015
	Christine Porath, No Time to be Nice: we’re rude at work, and it’s hurting profits, health, and happiness, New York Times, 6/21/2015
	Richard Asa, "Embracing Limbo/Recovering from setbacks: after a setback, spending time in the neutral zone can offer insight on past, perspective on future," Roanoke Times, 7/30/2015
	"How Exercise May Help the Memory Grow Stronger," New York Times, 02/21/2018
	"Cellphones in Classrooms Contribute to Failing Grades: Study," Medscape, 07/27/2018
	"Smartphones Hijack Cognitive Capacity," Medscape, 07/14/2017
	Managing and Avoiding Stress
	Following are links to articles that summarize recent research on neurology, and particularly the impact of stress (worry, anxiety, over-scheduling, lack of sleep) on the brain. Note especially the summaries of recent research by U-Chicago professor Sian Beilock on "choking." Her book, Choke, explains the neuroscience of choking, as experienced by musicians, athletes, students, etc., and presents some proven remedies for those who suffer from this phenomenon. Some of the research for her book was done at U-High.
	Carlin Flora. "Science Reveals How Not to Choke Under Pressure." Discovery Magazine (the Brain Issue), 12/06/2010
	Williams Harms. "Psychologist Shows Why We "Choke" Under Pressure -- and How to Avoid It." UChicago News, 09/21/2010
	Natalie Angier. "Brain is a Co-Conspirator in a Vicious Stress Loop," New York Times, 08/18/2009
	Gabrielle Glaser, "Illuminating Suicide's Shadows," New York Times, 08/21/2016
	Richard A. Friedman, "The Big Myth About Teenage Anxiety," New York Times, 09/07/2018
	"Worried About Risky Teenage Behavior? Make School Tougher," New York Times, 04/30/2018
	"Stop Checking Email So Often," New York Times, 01/09/2015

+ Parent's Corner

	Just for Fun:
	Jeff Ruby, "The Lab Mystique." Chicago Magazine, November, 2009
	The Social and Emotional Health of Adolescents:
	The chapters below are from the book Being Adolescent, by well-known researcher and former U-Chicago colleague Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who also pioneered the study of "Flow."
	Ch. 10, "Coping with Classes"
	Ch. 11, "Conflict and Chaos in Daily Life"
	Ch. 12, "Converting Challenges to Enjoyment: The Flow Experience"
	Ch. 13, "The Growth of Complexity: Shaping Meaningful Lives"
	Clifford Levy. "My Family's Experiment in Extreme Schooling." New York Times, 09/18/2011
	KJ Della'Antonia, "The Right Way to Bribe Kids to Read," New York Times, 07/24/2016
	"Why Fathers Really Matter," New York Times, 09/09/2012
	"Why Facebook is After Your Kids," New York Times, 10/16/2011
	"The Purpose-Driven Life of the Subconscious Brain," New York Times, 08/01/2007
	"The Myth About Boys," Time, 07/26/2007
	"Saving the World in Study Hall," New York Times, 05/11/2008
	"Raising Successful Children," New York Times, 08/04/2012
	"Parents Set the Tone," Chicago Tribune, 11/21/2009
	"Notes from a Dragon Mom," New York Times, 10/15/2011
	"Spot on the Popularity Scale Speaks to the Future -- the Middle has its Rewards," New York Times, 09/02/2008
	"How Children Succeed," New York Times, 08/26/2012
	"It's Good to be the Top Banana," WSJ, 06/08/2012
	"Is Sitting a Lethal Activity?" New York Times, 04/14/2011
	"How Spoiled are our Children?" New York Times, 08/13/2012
	"Google Course Asks Employees to Take a Deep Breath," New York Times, 04/29/2012
	"Good Teen Pals = Good Politics," Chicago Tribune, 01/02/2011
	"What Science Says About Marijuana." (Part of a 6-part series in the New York Times, 07/30/2014)
	"Dealing with Digital Cruelty." S. Rosenbloom, New York Times, 08/24/2014
	"Have Smart Phones Destroyed a Generation." J.M. Twenge, The Atlantic, September, 2017
	"The Role of Parents and Teachers in the Development of Gender-Related Math Attitudes," Gunderson and Levine, 2012. This article co-authored by a Lab parent is a must read; the implications, re: adult involvement in children's learning, may be relevant for a wide variety of academic subjects and educational situations.
	Rob Lazebnik, "The Adults we Failed to Raise: How to teach new grads the skills you kept from them," Wall Street Journal, 7/25/2015
	"How Parents Are Robbing Their Children of Adulthood: Today's "snowplow parents" keep their children's futures obstacle-free, even when it means crossing ethical and legal boundaries," New York Times, 3/16/2019

+ Grammar and Writing Hacks: Write Better, Faster

	How to Read a Text
	Advice on How to Construct a Thesis
	Thesis Mnemonic Checklist
	Parents' Paper Editing Guide
	Grammar and Writing Assistance: Humor for Lexophiles
	Grammar and Writing Assistance: Why English is a Pain
	Grammar and Writing Assistance: Editing and Proofreading
	Grammar and Writing Assistance: Grammatical Insanity
	Chompchomp: On-line Tutorial Assistance for the Historians' and Writers' Vocabulary List
	Turabian Online
	"Why #fakenews Seduces Millions of People," Wall Street Journal MarketWatch, 09/05/2018
	"Why Mistranslation Matters: Would History Have Been Different if Khrushchev Had Used a Better Translator?" New York Times, 07/28/2018

+ Research and Reference Links

	University of Chicago's Regenstein Library
	Class Guide for Regenstein Library
	Pritzker Military Library
	Library of Congress Digital Collections
	Gilder-Lehrman Digital Collections
	"Where was the Bracket Born?", WSJ March 17, 2012

+ Geography Resources

	"Prisoners of Geography," United States, Tim Marshall
	Sheppard Software Tutorials and Games
	Sporcle.com (Sporcle is an online geography site with lots of facts, information, and games)
	BBC News Country Profiles
	The CIA's World Factbook

+ Foundational Questions: What is History? What is Historical Methodology?

	The Historian's Toolkit and the Writers Danger Zones
	"This is Water," David Foster Wallace
	"Why History?" J. Burns (Stanford Daily, 04/10/2014)
	"The New History Wars." J Grossman (New York Times, 09/02/2014)
	Hallett Carr, What is History?
	"Why Study History?" William H. McNeill's Address to the American Historical Association, 1985
	Sarah Bakemore. "The Basic Question." Review of Why Does the World Exist? by Jim Holt, New York Times Book Review, 8/02/2012
	Justin E.H. Smith, "History Should be the Arbiter of Truth Against Lies," New York Times, 6/05/2016

+ Unit I: The Pre-Colonial and Colonial Periods

	The Virginia Ordinance of 1619
	The Mayflower Compact, 1620
	Virginia Slave Legislation, 1630-1691
	Winthrop, "A Model of Christian Charity"
	God's Controversy with New England, Michael Wigglesworth, 1662
	Morgan, Puritan Ethic and the American Revolution
	The Bloody Tenant of Persecution, Roger Williams, 1644
	The Navigation Acts, 1660-1764
	British Mercantilism and the Economic Development of the Thirteen Colonies, Curtis Nettels
	John Peter Zenger's Libel Trial, 1735
	Gordon Wood, The American Revolution: A History, Preface (xxiii-xxv); Origins (3-24); Resistance (27-44); Revolution (45-62); Chronology of the Revolution (xiii-xvii)
	Gordon Wood, "The Radicalism of the American Revolution"
	The Articles of Confederation, ratified March 1, 1781
	Gordon Wood, The American Revolution: A History, Part 7, "The Federal Constitution"
	Brief Review: Study guide for the U.S. Constitution
	Theo Emery: "Lost and Found: Archaeological finds may hint at the fate of colonists who disappeared in the 1500s," New York Times, 8/11/2015
	Noah Bierman, "U.S. Recognizes historic native tribe: Pamunkey Indians take pride in their unity, ancestors," Chicago Tribune, 8/6/2015 (via L.A. Times)
	Tom Ginsburg, "Stop Revering Magna Carta," New York Times, 6/15/2015
	Allen C. Guelzo, "Founding Frenemies," New York Times, 7/4/2015
	Stephen Brumwell, "Death on the Monongahela," Wall Street Journal Books, 7/1/2015
	Erica Armstrong Dunbar, "George Washington, Slave Catcher," New York Times, 2/16/2015
	"The 1619 Project: The 400th Anniversary of the Beginning of American Slavery," New York Times, 8/14/2019
	Supplemental Resources
	A Critic at Large
	The American Wanderer
	Salem Sets Sail
	Pioneer of Special Ops
	Peter Manseau, "The Muslims of Early America," New York Times, 2/9/2015
	"What is History Good For?" Book Review of Dangerous Games: The Uses and Abuses of History, Margaret MacMillan, New York Times, Book Review, July 19, 2009
	Review of "The Norton Anthology of World Religions volume 2: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam" edited by Jack Miles, Wendy Doniger, Donald S Lopez Jr. and James Robson, reviewed by William Dalrymple, New York Times Book Review, 12/21/2014
	Matthew Hutson, "Still Puritan after all these years," New York Times, 8/5/2012
	Review of "George Whitefield" by Thomas S. Kidd, review by Barton Swaim, Wall Street Journal, 2/14/2015
	"The Drinks that Built America," from: A History of the World in Six Glasses, Tom Standage
	"The El Paso Shooting Revived the Free Speech Debate. Europe Has Limits," New York Times, 8/6/2019
	"Nationalists Don't See What is Special About Our Biblical Nation," New York Times, 9/9/2019

+ Unit II: The Early Republic and the Antebellum Period

	Ellis, Founding Brothers, Preface
	Ellis, Founding Brothers, "The Dinner"
	Ellis, Founding Brothers, "The Silence"
	Hamilton, On Manufactures
	"Party Time: Smear Tactics, Skullduggery, and the Debut of American Democracy," Jill Lepore, The New Yorker
	The Constitution Construed: Marbury vs. Madison
	Kentucky Resolutions, 1798 (doc. 19)
	Calhoun, S.C. Exposition and Protest, 1828 (doc. 21)
	Sarah Grimke, The Advocate of Moral Reform
	L.M. Child, "An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans called Africans" (doc. 27)
	Horace Mann, "Report on the Common Schools" (doc. 29)
	Harriet Beecher Stowe, excerpt from "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (doc. 33)
	Dred Scott v. Sanford: The Taney Decision (doc. 35)
	Supplemental Resources: Readings
	"We Could Have Been Canada," The New Yorker, May 8, 2017
	"Sally Hemings Takes Center Stage," New York Times, June 15, 2018
	"Lessons from the Barbary Pirate Wars," New York Times, April 12, 2009
	Jody Rosen, "The American Revolutionary: On Broadway," New York Times, 7/8/2015
	Ben Brantley: "A More Perfect Union: with its move to Broadway, show about America’s founding fathers is shaping the future of musicals," New York Times, 8/7/2015
	Gregory Crouch, Go Your Own Way, Wall Street Journal Books, 7/1/2015
	David Reynolds, "Worse than Dred Scott," (John Marshall rules on the slave ship Antelope) Wall Street Journal Books, 8/8/2015
	The 2nd Amendment: Historical Context and Current Perspectives, New York Times
	"The Supreme Court's Second Amendment Appetite," New York Times, 8/15/2019
	"It's Time to Debate Gun Control on it's Merits," The Washington Post, 8/5/2019
	"What All Mass Shootings Have in Common," The Washington Post, 8/5/2019
	Gordon Wood, "White Man's War," Review of American Revolutions, in: New York Times Book Review
	"Tea Power," from: A History of the World in Six Glasses, Tom Standage
	B. Appelbaum, M.D. Shear, "How the President Came to Embrace Executive Power," New York Times, 8/14/2016
	Supplemental Resources: Music
	Music of the Early Republic
	Amazing Grace, An Iconic American Tune by John Newton, 1772; William Walker, Southern Harmony, Benjamin White, The Sacred Harp
	Click to hear Amazing Grace, sung by the Soweto Gospel Choir. This attests to the song’s international popularity and historical connection to abolition, as well as its powerful message of freedom and redemption
	Original manuscript of Amazing Grace in William Walker’s The Southern Harmony, and Musical Companion
	Contributions of African Americans
	Music of the Antebellum Period
	Stephen Foster (1826-1864), Our National Composer?
	Click to hear the Dave Matthews Band and Neil Young sing their interpretation of Foster’s Oh! Susanna
	Click to hear Camptown Races
	Click to hear Nelly was a Lady
	Click to see PBS’ The American Experience on Foster, including a timeline and recordings of Foster’s music
	Click to see PBS’ The American Experience on Blackface Minstrelsy
	Click to hear Foster's Old Folks at Home -- aka Swanee River (1851)

+ Unit III: Civil War and Reconstruction

	The Republican Party Platform of 1860 (doc. 36)
	Lincoln, First Inaugural Address (doc. 38)
	Jefferson Davis' Message on Conscription, 1862 (doc. 40)
	Lincoln, The Emancipation Proclamation, 1863 (doc. 41)
	Lincoln, "Gettysburg Address"
	Sherman, "Message to the Atlanta City Council"
	Lincoln, "Second Inaugural Address"
	"Report of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction," 1872
	Frederick Douglass, "Address to the Louisville Convention," 1883
	Supplemental Resources
	Music of the Civil War
	Music and Lyrics of the Civil War (doc. 39)
	Battle Hymn of the Republic, Julia Ward Howe, 1862
	Click to hear The Battle Hymn of the Republic sung by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir with orchestra
	Click to see a picture of the manuscript of Battle Hymn of the Republic, as first published in The Atlantic Monthly, Feb. 1862
	Click to see a video on the Importance of music in the Civil War. Note especially the discussion of Foster’s Home Sweet Home, which was sung by soldiers on both sides of the conflict.
	Click to see a video on Field Musicians in the Civil War
	Click for information on Civil War songs about Abraham Lincoln (from the Smithsonian’s American Memory Collection)
	Music after the Civil War
	John Philip Sousa (1854-1932)
	Click to hear the Stars and Stripes Forever march
	Click to hear Semper Fidelis (March of the US Marine Corps) (1888)
	Click to hear The Washington Post (1889)
	Click to connect to the Library of Congress Performing Arts Encyclopedia article on Sousa
	Click to article by Neil Harris, John Philip Sousa and the Culture of Reassurance, from the Library of Congress Performing Arts Encyclopedia
	Charles Ives (1874-1954)
	Click to see the Library of Congress Performing Arts Encyclopedia on Ives
	Click to hear Ives’ Sonata No. 2, Concord
	Click to hear Ives’ Variations on America

+ Unit IV: Moving Toward the Modern World

	The WCTU
	"Address to the Woman Suffrage Association"
	Excerpt from The Jungle, Upton Sinclair
	Beveridge, "America's Destiny"
	Teddy Roosevelt, The Monroe Doctrine Corollary
	Henry Cabot Lodge, Speech to the Senate, 1919
	Woodrow Wilson's Address to Congress, 1917
	Supplemental Resources
	"Wilder Women: the Mother and Daughter Behind the Little House Stories," Judith Thurman, New Yorker Book Review, 8/10/2009
	Sadie Stein, "Crash Diet," Review of A Square Meal, in: New York Times Book Review
	James Morone, "Bootleg Politics," Review of The War on Alcohol, in: New York Times Book Review, 12/30/2015
	"How a Brutal Race Riot Shaped Modern Chicago," New York Times, 08/03/2019

+ Unit V: The Twentieth Century

	George Kennan, The X Article
	Coca Cola and the Rise of America
	The Cold War: A Chronology
	How Brown Changed Race Relations: The Backlash Thesis, M. Klarman
	Critiques of Post-War Suburbia
	"Why Were We in Vietnam?" NY Times Book Review
	The War We Could Have Won, NY Times Op-Ed, May 1, 2005
	Salon.com Book Review by Andrew O'Hehir of: Archie Brown, The Rise and Fall of Communism
	Supplemental Resources
	Tales Calculated to Drive You Mad: The Debunking of Spies, Superheroes, and Cold War Rhetoric in Mad Magazine's "Spy vs. Spy"
	Glossary / Chronology for The Things They Carried
	"Globalization in A Bottle (Coca Cola)" and "Epilogue: Back to the Source (Water)," from: A History of the World in Six Glasses, Tom Standage
	Russell Contreras, "Writer Highlights Route 66 safe havens for black travelers and the guide they needed," Chicago Tribune, 7/10/2016
	J. Eligon, R. Gebeloff, "Segregation, the Neighbor that Won't Leave," New York Times, 8/21/2016
	Chuck Klosterman, "Which Rock Star Will Historians of the Future Remember?," New York Times, 5/29/2016
	Roger Cohen, "Kerrey's Vietnam Dilemma," New York Times, 6/08/2016
	David Brooks, "The Quiet Death of Racial Progress," New York Times, 07/12/2018

+ Unit VI: The State of Our Union? The Constitution, Electoral Politics, the Presidency

	Jim Rutenburg, "A Dream Undone," New York Times, 7/29/2015
	Peter Beinart, "The White Strategy," The Atlantic Monthly, July-August, 2016
	Jonathan Rauch, "How American Politics Became So Ineffective," The Atlantic Monthly, July-August, 2016
	"Governor Hobbles Voting Reform in Illinois," New York Times, 8/22/2016
	Justin E.H. Smith, "No, He's Not Hitler. And Yet... (history may not repeat itself, but it does yield warnings)," New York Times, 6/05/2016
	M. Haberman, M. Flegenheimer, "Donald Trump, a 'Rigged' Election, and the Politics of Race," New York Times, 8/22/2016
	Jill Lepore, "How to Steal an Election: The Crazy History of Nominating Conventions," The New Yorker, 7/04/2016
	John Paul Stevens (Lab Grad and former US Supreme Court justice), "Repeal the Second Amendment," New York Times, 03/27/2018
	The 2020 Election
	Peter Wehner (Republican who served in the Reagan and both Bush administrations), "The Full-Spectrum Corruption of Donald Trump: Everyone and Everything He Touches Rots," New York Times, 08/23/2018
	"Trump's Lose-the-House Strategy," Wall Street Journal, 07/30/2018
	"The Trump First Doctrine," Wall Street Journal, 07/16/2018
	"Death of RBG Affects Everything in Last Stretch of the Campaign," Wall Street Journal, 09/18/2020
	"Trump's Supreme Court Nomination Strategy Guided by White House Counsel, Others" Wall Street Journal, 09/19/2020
	"What Americans Really Think About Abortion," Wall Street Journal, 09/25/2020
	"How to Preserve American Elections," Wall Street Journal, 09/25/2020
	"The Student Vote is Surging. So Are Efforts to Suppress It," The New York Times, 10/24/2019
	"How Trump Has Changed the Republicans," Wall Street Journal, 08/21/2020
	"Congress Isn't Just a Co-Equal branch. We're First Among Equals.," The Washington Post, 05/10/2019
	"Which Constitution is Amy Coney Barrett Talking About?," The New York Times, 10/16/2020
	"The Framers of the Constitution Didn't Worry About 'Originalism,'" The Washington Post, 10/16/2020
	"The Plot Against Gretchen Whitmer Shows the Danger of Private Militias," The New York Times, 10/08/2020
	"The Precedent, and Perils, of Court Packing," The New York Times, 10/12/2020
	"The Electoral College Explained," The New York Times, 10/12/2020
	"Five Myths About the 25th Amendment," The Washington Post, 10/09/2020
	John Paul Stevens: "The Supreme Court's Worst Decision of My Tenure," The Atlantic, 05/19/2019
	"The Weaponization of the Free-Exercise Clause," The Atlantic, 09/18/2020
	"'Originalism' Isn't What You Think it is," CNN, 10/21/2020
	"In the Messiest Contested Election, One Man Saved the System From Itself," The New York Times, 11/03/2020
	Barack Obama: "A President Looks Back on His Toughest Fight," The New Yorker, 11/02/2020

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