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Back to The Modern World, Part One: Global History from 1760 to 1910

Learner Reviews & Feedback for The Modern World, Part One: Global History from 1760 to 1910 by University of Virginia

4.8
stars
2,866 ratings

About the Course

This is a survey of modern history from a global perspective. Part One begins with the political and economic revolutions of the late 1700s and tracks the transformation of the world during the 1800s. Part One concludes as these bewildering changes seem to be running beyond the capacity of older institutions to handle them. Throughout the course we try to grasp what is happening and ask: Why? And the answers often turn on very human choices....

Top reviews

DT

Mar 17, 2022

Excellent if concise overview of a fascinating period of Global History. Presented in a very engaging manner but with a logicakl structure to tie together what often appeared to be disparate strands.

MC

Nov 5, 2018

Dear Professor,

I am fascinated with week one, even though I work in the scientific side, also like history, nothing more rewarding than visiting and ancient place and know what happened... Thanks

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626 - 650 of 731 Reviews for The Modern World, Part One: Global History from 1760 to 1910

By Jisha

Aug 1, 2020

Good

By Synack12

Mar 9, 2018

test

By Lingning Z

Aug 17, 2019

挺不错

By Christine

Jul 28, 2021

a

By Tawabun N

Sep 5, 2020

I

By Andisiwe P

Aug 28, 2020

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By Mohammad I Q

Jul 7, 2020

e

By Luis A A N

Mar 25, 2016

9

By John M

Jan 4, 2016

T

By Linda

Nov 7, 2015

V

By Timothy K

Mar 17, 2020

This is the longest course that I have completed thus far on Coursera. I have to say, overall, this course was a comprehensive, intriguing and informative experience. The professor comes off as very engaging and knowledgeable. I would never tire of listening to his way of explaining things. He does a great job at breaking down events in history into digestible chunks that link together cohesively. He really made me see history as a series of events and decisions that all build up on one another. One particular aspect I appreciated was his use of art as examples. He did a great job selecting art pieces and contextualizing them to the topic we were covering. It definitely gave me a deeper sense of the concept that he was addressing. Moreover, I appreciated the fact that this wasn't as Euro-centric as a lot of world history courses tend to be. He introduced me to some things I either never heard of (King Leopold's atrocious plundering of the Congo) or things that have never really been fully fleshed out for me (the slave revolts in Haiti ). He does a great job at making those key connections that help you explain why it something happened. For example, how the Louisiana purchase was not just sold by France willy nilly but that it was due to their defeat in Haiti that led them to sell the territory to the United States.

Moving on to some cons that attributed to my 4-star rating, I'd like to point out two cons. The first is that I felt there wasn't much in the course besides watching the lectures. As insightful as they may be, I would have liked more reading material to follow up on topics discussed. Additionally, I would have liked discussion prompts here and there so the learner can make sense of the information by writing it out and discussing it with others. There were times I felt it was much too passive. I know there are discussion boards for this course, but it's not the same as them appearing after lectures like in other Coursera courses. Lastly, the other con that I'd like to mention is the way the quizzes are. A lot of the questions were about overly specific dry facts like numbers, percentages and dates. I would have appreciated more concept-checking questions to see because that's what can really help in assuring the content was received well.

Overall, I thought this is a great overview of some major transitions that all seem to lead into the significant clashes of the 20th century. I look forward to taking the follow up course and I thank the professor for taking his time to make all these lecture videos.

By Marianne

Mar 25, 2016

Very interesting and intriguing, quizzes are a bit hard because they cover so much material so if you are a working individual I feel it's almost impossible to accomplish but it's nice for general knowledge.

Two notes-

First, it would be nice if the professor wouldn't use "get yourself comfortable" in the beginning of EACH video - it is a bit annoying.

Second, on quizzes & tests it's recommended that you omit the sentence "in the presentation" that starts EVERY question/quizz/test because obviously it is based on what we are presented in the videos so it's just time consuming, in my opinion.

Besides that, great for general knowledge, awesome teacher, I really enjoyed this course, thank you!

By Deleted A

Aug 5, 2020

I thoroughly enjoyed this course for how history has been uniquely contextualized by the honorable professor. The reasons behind what happened have been enlightening. I am taking one 🌟 off from the rating for maybe involuntary but obvious downplaying of tyranny of colonialism and imperialism. The devastating effects of colonial era still continue in Africa, South Asia and Latin America; apparent from these regions being poorest in the world. Other than seemingly whitening of—or making appear less dark—the white man's black acts, the course is very informative.

By Steven H

Feb 9, 2023

Overall a good course, that managed to provide an overview of the designated world history. However, the course is structured thematically instead of chronically, making it a bit harder to get used to. Meanwhile, I would also suggest the prof set up a final exam of about 50 questions which covered the whole materials and also assigned some course reading, even some excerpts could be helpful. Personally, I found J.M. Roberts's "Penguin history of the world" helpful as complementary material for this course

By Orlando S

Apr 25, 2022

Even thought a bit "old" (dating to 2014) i just took the course and found it to be still a very welcoming and joyful set of lessons thanks to the professor. As a student you just have to assume it´s only an introduction, you´re not going to find much detail or thesis material or anything like that. This seems to be aimed to the courious ones who wants a taste of what history sounds like, the potential "history buffs"... and the professor certainly grabs your attention and helps to acomplish it.

By Kimberly S

Sep 19, 2016

Good presentations. Enjoyed the lectures, good information, and good illustrations and maps. I'm grateful to have this opportunity to learn about this period. Phillip Zelikow takes you through the history through time zones, while visiting various ideas and happenings around different parts of the world, and how they are interconnected. I would like to see some reading material for further understanding (not just suggested books). Overall, I would recommen

By Ila P

Oct 12, 2016

It took a little while to get interested in the course, but by the end of first week it began to get interesting. I liked the professor and his friendly style. It is definitely an overview of the major events of history. One can always find out details about events that one wants to know more about. This course gives a broad idea about world history and in a way helps us see what the future would be like. Because history does repeat itself.

By Kenneth D

Dec 3, 2020

[Audited only] A useful overview and revision of the period organized in terms of interacting forces of modernizing commercial, military and political developments.

Traditional social organization unsettled by technology, science and industrial production creates a succession of choices about how to adapt in changing circumstances viewed from varied perspectives of the contemporary observers and actors making those choices.

By Virginia C

Jun 18, 2017

Dr. Zelikow is a fairly engaging lecturer. I like his emphasis on the why things occurred and the focus on the situation and decisions people were making which made the course much more interesting than just reciting the facts. I would encourage him to consider making fuller use of the media available for online courses which I think could increase student engagement. I plan to take the second half of this course.

By Nigel C

Mar 26, 2022

This is a long course, necessarily given the breadth of the material covered. Mr Zelikow made it accessible, including a fair number of light hearted photos and informative diagrams. It was interesting, having been brought up on a diet of Anglo-centric history, how the perspective alters. I'm looking forward to continuimg with part 2 but will need to organise my time better if it is equally long.

By Alexandre R

Jun 2, 2023

The course is great, but deducting one star because some of the assessment questions throughout the course are out of date with the content in terms of the schedule, i.e. you have to answer questions about a piece of content that won't be presented until the following week. The ideal is to watch the content of the following week and then return and answer the previous week's questionnaire.

By Liane S L

Nov 30, 2017

Good lectures, analytical narration, with short quizzes at the end of each lecture. What I didn't appreciate (more about the Coursera platform) was needing to pay to take the final quizzes in order to count as having progressed to the next parts of the course. The quizzes themselves are a little too facts-based to be too useful as a marker of having understood the concepts in the lectures.

By rod a

Feb 13, 2016

Excellent overview and an inspired teacher....BUT:

1.A short bibliography for each week/session would be extremely helpful.

2.Response and interactive involvement by the teacher in the discussions would be appreciated.

3. Lecture notes and Illustrations in digital format would be wonderful as a reference for further work and non-native english speakers.

Thanks

Rod Allwright

By Cheryl L D

Feb 26, 2016

Another great course from a professor at UVA! Almost all of the lectures were engaging. He teaches history in an easily accessible way, using very good maps, diagrams, paintings, and clear illustrations of his topics. I would recommend this course everyone, but especially folks who find history to be a dry, dusty thing, as he breathes life into the material.

By Glen D C

Sep 27, 2015

Content is 5 for sure. The fact that they keep suggesting to go for a verified course however is a little bit annoyig, so 1 star off for that. I think it would be more appropriate to give an option to disable future asking similar to how ratings on Android work. That being said, the course is excellent I'm taking this for pure fun and it really is, ... fun! :D