The introductions in this anthology are meant to be just that: a basic overview of what students need to know before they begin reading, with topics that students can research further. An open access literature textbook cannot be a history book at the same time, but history is the great companion of literature: The more history students know, the easier it is for them to interpret literature.

This is an excerpt from "Tomb Robbers." Ch’in Shih Huang Ti was the first emperor of China. He had a great fear of his own death. He kept searching for a secret that would let him live forever. He also began to build his own tomb. It took 30 years. There are many legends about what the tomb contains. Some stories say it has 270 small copies of Shih Huang Ti’s palaces. Others say it has rivers of mercury. Still others say it has weapons—crossbows—waiting to shoot anyone who tries to enter. For years, the tomb was covered with earth. Then, in 1974, a peasant was plowing a field. He found a life-sized statue. Many more statues were found later. They were part of the emperor’s “spirit army,” which was supposed to serve the ruler in the next world. No one knows yet if the tomb has been robbed. Chinese archaeologists are still digging up the area. They are working very slowly and carefully. (McDougal Littell The Language of Literature, 2002)

This lesson was created as part of the Anthology Alignment Project, during which teachers created CCSS-aligned lessons for existing literary and information texts in anthologies. All page numbers and unit/week designations found in this lesson relate to the edition of the anthology named above. If you are using a trade book or different edition of this title, the page/unit/week references in this lesson will not match. Consult the content referenced in the body of the lesson to determine appropriate page numbers for your text.

This course is an introductory survey of world history. It will offer a historical overview of major processes and interactions in the development of human society since the emergence in Africa of Homo sapiens, or modern humans, some 200,000 years ago. The course should enable students to treat world history as an approach to the past that addresses large-scale patterns as well as local narratives, and though which they can pursue their interest in various types of knowledge.The course is intended for undergraduate students in all majors. For this wide range of students, the course not only provides background on globalization today, but reveals the contrasting processes of large-scale social interaction which take place rapidly (such as technology) as compared with those that take place slowly (such as social values). For majors in History, the course will provide an initial step in the interactive and interdisciplinary study of the past that they will explore in more detail at advanced undergraduate levels. For those considering a career in teaching, this course provides strong background for the world-history curriculum that is now taught in most secondary schools.

This course will survey the conditions of material life and changing social and economic conditions in medieval Europe with reference to the comparative context of contemporary Islamic, Chinese, and central Asian experiences. Subject covers the emergence and decline of feudal institutions, the transformation of peasant agriculture, living standards and the course of epidemic disease, and the ebb and flow of long-distance trade across the Eurasian system. Particular emphasis will be placed on the study of those factors, both institutional and technological, which have contributed to the emergence of capitalist organization and economic growth in Western Europe in contrast to the trajectories followed by the other major medieval economies.

This resource is a pacing guide for a course in Global Studies that includes nine units. Each unit contains information on its historical content, written content, time frame, and skills or projects related to the unit material. 

This sourcebook offers a carefully-honed selection of Latin authors, predominately from classical antiquity, and supplemented by texts from later periods. The sourcebook purposefully includes both prose and poetry, and a range of genres, including epic, epigram, history, oratory, the letter, and the philosophical essay. Most of the core texts include supplemental notes that will elucidate key grammatical and cultural information for intermediate-level Latin students, as well as provide questions to guide their reading and contextualizing essays on the authors, texts, and ideas with which students are engaging. The book will also include a range of pedagogical resources for students at this level that have been developed and tested through over 15 years of educational practice.

This subject traces the evolution of ideas about nature, and how best to study and explain natural phenomena, beginning in ancient times and continuing through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. A central theme of the subject is the intertwining of conceptual and institutional relations within diverse areas of inquiry: cosmology, natural history, physics, mathematics, and medicine.

World History: Cultures, States, and Societies to 1500 offers a comprehensive introduction to the history of humankind from prehistory to 1500. Authored by six USG faculty members with advance degrees in History, this textbook offers up-to-date original scholarship. It covers such cultures, states, and societies as Ancient Mesopotamia, Ancient Israel, Dynastic Egypt, India’s Classical Age, the Dynasties of China, Archaic Greece, the Roman Empire, Islam, Medieval Africa, the Americas, and the Khanates of Central Asia.

It includes 350 high-quality images and maps, chronologies, and learning questions to help guide student learning. Its digital nature allows students to follow links to applicable sources and videos, expanding their educational experience beyond the textbook. It provides a new and free alternative to traditional textbooks, making World History an invaluable resource in our modern age of technology and advancement.

This peer-reviewed World Literature I anthology includes introductory text and images before each series of readings. Sections of the text are divided by time period in three parts: the Ancient World, Middle Ages, and Renaissance, and then divided into chapters by location.