Making History: Adventures in Archives, Museums, and Films

History is who we are. But how do we make meaningful sense of the past, and how do we share important stories with the world? Students will find out by exploring Terre Haute’s wicked past as America’s “Sin City,” the life and legacy of union leader and Socialist Presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs, and the harrowing experiences and inspirational outreach of Holocaust survivor Eva Kor. In addition to digging into these topics through primary sources, documentary films, recent scholarship, exhibitions, and interviews with authors, filmmakers, and museum directors, seminar participants will also get hands-on archival experience by collaboratively researching real medieval manuscripts at the ISU Library’s Special Collections. Family and friends visiting the class on Saturday morning will be treated to the discoveries we make about these fascinating artifacts, many of them over 700 years old!