HIST 3631: America and the Middle East in the Age of Empires

Course Description

This course examines the history of American engagement with the Ottoman Empire and Iran from ca. 1700 to 1920s. Even before the United States became a superpower, it had military conflicts, trade agreements, and an expanding missionary, diplomatic and economic presence in the Middle East. It is in this period that we find the roots of American interest in Zionism, the oil industry in the Middle East and the strategic importance of the Middle East to American interests. In a parallel fashion, America begins to shift in Middle Eastern societies’ thinking from being at the margins of their responses to European imperialism to being either a model ally or a new threat. (YR).