AP World History

Course Text and other Reading: Main Text: Bentley and Ziegler. 2010. Traditions and Encounters, 5th ed. United States: McGraw-Hill.

Primary Sources:

• Students will read and analyze selected primary sources (documents, images, and maps) in Andrea, A. and Overfield, J. 2000. The Human Record: Sources of Global History, vols I & II. Houghton Mifflin College Division. and » Spodek. 2000. The World’s History, 2nd edition. Prentice-Hall.

• Students will analyze quantitative sources through study and interpretation of graphs, charts and tables » Stearns. 2008. World Civilizations: The Global Experience. Pearson. » from Document Based Questions released by the College Board
Secondary Sources [CR1c]

• McNeill, J.R. and McNeill, W. H. 2003. The Human Web. Norton & Co.
• Pomeranz, K. and Topik, S. 1999. The World that Trade Created. M.E. Sharpe.
• Friedel, D. and Schele, L. 1991. A Forest of Kings. Quill.
• Pomeranz, K. 2000. The Great Divergence. Princeton.
• Goldstone, J. 2008. Why Europe? The Rise of the West in World History. McGraw Hill.

The AP World History course is organized around five overarching themes that serve as unifying threads throughout the course, helping students to relate what is particular about each time period or society to a “big picture” of history.

The themes also provide a way to organize comparisons and analyze change and continuity over time. Consequently, virtually all study of history in this class will refer to these themes by utilizing a “SPICE” acronym.

Social
Development and transformation of social structures
Gender roles and relations
Family and kinship
Racial and ethnic constructions
Social and economic classes

Political
State-building, expansion, and conflict
Political structures and forms of governance
Empires
Nations and nationalism
Revolts and revolutions
Structures and organizations

Interaction between humans and the environment
Demography and disease
Migration
Patterns of settlement
Technology

Cultural–Development and interaction of cultures
Religions
Belief systems, philosophies, and ideologies
Science and technology
The arts and architecture

Economic–Creation, expansion, and interaction of economic systems
Agricultural and pastoral production
Trade and commerce
Labor systems / Industrialization
Capitalism and socialism