Studies the United States during World War II, including the causes, politicians and personalities, military aspects, home front, and legacy of the war that defined the latter half of the 20th century and established the US as a world leader (1935-1945).
Goals, Topics, and Objectives
- From Neutrality to Assistance to Resistance
- America Mobilizes for War
- Creation of a Global Allied Strategy
- The War Against Germany
- The War Against Japan
- The Home Front: Cooperation and Conflict
- The War Affects and Changes American Culture
- The Impact of Science and Intelligence
- America and the Holocaust
- FDR and Allied Diplomacy for War and Peace
- The Atomic Bomb and the End of the War
- The Legacy of World War II
Upon successful completion of this course, students should be able to:
1. Outline time and chronology relating to America’s participation in World War II.
2. Identify, summarize, and analyze major elements of the relating to America’s participation in World War II.
3. Analyze cause and effect in American involvement during World War II.
4. Trace elements of change and continuity relating to the United States during World War II.
5. Emphasize parallelism by describing the impact of major domestic events, personalities, military operations, and places relating to American society during World War II.
Upon successful completion of this course, students should be able to:
1. Describe the impact of isolationism on the U.S. in the 1930s.
2. Identify the incidents, leaders, and forces in Europe and Asia that eventually drove America into mobilizing for war.
3. Analyze the efforts at diplomacy and the necessary military planning needed to formulate a strong Allied war strategy.
4. Identify and discuss the steps taken to develop an effective war strategy against Germany.
5. Identify and discuss the steps taken to develop an effective war strategy against Japan.
6. Identify elements of cooperation and conflict among fellow Americans on the Home Front during the war years.
7. Explain how wartime measures imposed by the American government impacted the American culture.
8. Discuss the impact of science and intelligence efforts that were implemented to win the war.
9. Describe the various American attitudes and reactions toward the Jewish people and toward the Holocaust.
10. Analyze the interwar and wartime diplomacy of FDR.
11. Distinguish between popularized accounts of World War II battles (such as Iwo Jima) and the actual strategies, dynamics, and results of this significant confrontation.
12. Identify the impact of the atomic bomb on the ending of the war in the Pacific.
13. Analyze and interpret the legacy of World War II in American History, culture, and society.
Assessment and Requirements
Assessment of academic achievement will be identified and implemented by the class instructor. Methods will include, but will not be limited to, individual projects, vocabulary, class participation (discussion and critiques), and tests.
These texts are only suggestions. Individual instructors may choose different texts: Mark A. Stoler and Melanie S. Gustafson, Major Problems in the History of World War II (Boston: Houghton Miflin, 2003). William L. O’Neill, A Democracy at War: America’s Fight at Home & Abroad in World War II (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2002). Robert S. Burrell, The Ghosts of Iwo Jima (College Station,Texas: Texas A&M University, 2006).
Outcomes
- Social Sciences
- Humanities and Fine Arts
- Civil Society and Culture - U.S. and Global
- Category 4: Social Sciences
- Category 5: Humanities and Fine Arts