Lemon Syllabus Atlantic History Seminar

Race, Sex and Conquistadors
Emory University
Prof. Jason Lemon
Fall 1998

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Required Texts:
Lockhart, Spanish Peru
Cope, Limits of Racial Domination
Forbes, Africans and Native Americans
Martin, Daughters of the Conquistadores
Seed, To Love, Honor, and Obey in Colonial Mexico
Schroeder, Wood & Haskett, Indian Women of Early Mexico
Trexler, Sex and Conquest
Cook & Cook, Good Faith and Truthful Ignorance
Stepto, Lieutenant Nun

All of the texts are available at the Emory University Bookstore and are on reserve in the Woodruff Library at the dirculation desk. All texts are required. In addition to the above texts, you will have occasional photocopied reading assignments on reserve in the library, and handouts in class.

Course Objectives
This course will explore the European conquest of the New World, and specifically, within that time and place, the elements of race and race mixing, gender and sex roles and politics. Though this course is designed to sample the range of scholarship and research rather than summarize its entirety, we will discuss who,
what, where, when, how, and why it matters -- all in reference to the above texts and their relevance to the Spanish invasion of the New World.

Course Grading

Three essays, 60%
Class presentation, 10%
Final exam, 20%
Attendance & Participation, 10%

Writing Assignments
In order to excel in this course, you must write three book review essays (no less than 2000 words » 7 double spaced pages). All papers are due at the end of class on the day indicated by the course calendar. These essays will review, compare, and contrast the three previous texts on the syllabus. These are not research papers. You
will need to engage the material presented in the texts, demonstrate your understanding of it and review it. I encourage you to find other review articles in scholarly periodicals if you have any questions about the style and form of these assignments. If you have any questions about your writing you will want to consult guides like Strunk and White's The Elements of Style or visit the Writing Lab on campus.

The due dates for the writing assignments are on the course calendar – the same day as the class presentations and panel discussions. I will deduct one-third of a letter grade for each calendar day they are late. I will not receive papers more than one week late. There will be no make-up papers or extra credit. If you want to receive a good grade, plan to do so from the first day of class rather than hope to redeem your grade near the end of the semester.

Class Presentations
Periodically, after several weeks of in-class discussion of the assigned books, students will have the opportunity to present at least one focused and detailed review of one of the assigned texts for the course. This report can be drawn from the material prepared for the review essays, but should not be limited to that. Several student presentations will form a panel to present the individual reviews on the same day. The panel will be responsible for setting out the common or contrasting areas of the books reviewed and raising themes, topics, and questions that will shape the classroom discussion for the remainder of the class period.

Class Participation
You must complete all reading assignments prior to attempting to discuss the assigned reading in class. A large part of your grade will depend on your ability to explain and analyze the required reading assignments. This does not mean that the more you talk the better your grade will be, it means that speaking clearly and
intelligently each class period about the topic under discussion will guarantee your receipt of full marks for this portion of your grade. If I feel that your participation, as a class, reflects a lack of preparation I will use in-class quizzes to determine your class participation grade. If you don't attend class there is no way for me to give you an acceptable class participation grade.

Honor Code
Because your assignments are review essays and class presentations, they will focus on your ability to discuss and present your ideas and you will not need to do extensive research beyond the assigned readings. However, any work that you include in your essays that is not your own needs to be documented either by footnote or
parenthetically. The Emory College Honor Code states "A writer's facts, ideas, and phraseology should be regarded as his property. Any person who uses a writer's ideas or phraseology without giving due credit is guilty of plagiarism." The Honor Council has decided that ignorance of proper documentation procedures is not a legitimate excuse for committing plagiarism. The Honor Code will be in effect during all sessions of this
course. "In paraphrasing you are expressing the ideas of another writer in your own words. A good paraphrase preserves the sense of the original, but not the form. It does not retain the sentence patterns and merely substitute synonyms for the original words, nor does it retain the original words and merely alter the sentence patterns. It is a genuine restatement. Invariably it should be briefer than the source." (see Watkins,
Dillingham, and Martin, Practical English Handbook, 3rd ed. [Boston, 1970], p. 245). So make it your business to know what you are writing about and how you are presenting your ideas. Students may not work together when writing papers, nor may they use the same paper for two different classes.

Class Meeting Schedule
Sep 2
First day of class, syllabus and introduction
Sep 9
Lockhart, Spanish Peru
Sep 16
Cope, Limits of Racial Domination
Sep 23
Forbes, Africans and Native Americans
Sep 30
Class presentations and panel discussion
Oct 7
Martin, Daughters of the Conquistadores
Oct 14
Seed, To Love, Honor, and Obey in Colonial Mexico
Oct 21
Schroeder, Wood & Haskett, Indian Women of Early Mexico
Oct 28
Class presentations and panel discussion
Nov 4
Trexler, Sex and Conquest
Nov 11
Cook & Cook, Good Faith and Truthful Ignorance
Nov 18
Stepto, Lieutenant Nun
Nov 25
Class presentations and panel discussion
Dec 2
Review for Final Exam
Dec 14
Final Exam, 8:30am to 11am