HIST 377: The American Progressive Era, 1890-1920

This course covers a volatile period in which Americans came to grips with the social and political consequences of industrial and urban transformation. a generation of reformers and political activists reorganized cities, confronting issues of poverty and dangerous working conditions, and looking to government to regulate the unbridled power of large corporations. Artists challenged European traditions in art, music and literature. The period also saw racial polarization and a new, rights-oriented African American movement. Unprecedented immigration and the massive influx of so-called "new immigrants' from southern and eastern Europe stirred nativist and racial exclusionist sentiment.