A History of the World since 1300 | Coursera.
Free online University Courses, sponsored by TED. Here’s an example, and go look for other examples at Coursera. This one is from Princeton, but is a UofT grad..
This course explores the history of the modern world since Chinggis Khan. It focuses on the connections between societies from the time of the Mongol conquests and the gradual, but accelerating ways in which connections became ties of inter-dependence. The relations between societies are what will concern us. The forces pulling the world together vary from religious to economic, political to intellectual. These forces bring the world together, but they also create new divisions. Nowadays, we call this “globalization.” That term has tended to emphasize the drive to worldwide integration; the view of globalization taken in this course emphasizes disintegration as well as integration. We will tackle some very basic questions: How do we explain the staggering wealth of China in the centuries up to 1750, as well as China’s recent ascent? Where did the United States come from, and where is it headed? What are the significance and legacies of empire in the world? How have world wars and revolutions shaped the international system over time? What exactly is globalization, and how does today’s globalization compare with the past? How has the relationship between humans and nature changed over the centuries?
Jeremy Adelman is the Walter Samuel Carpenter III Professor of Spanish Civilization and Culture at Princeton University, where he is also the Director of the Council for International Teaching and Research. Educated at the University of Toronto, the London School of Economics, and Oxford University, he combines an interest in global history with Latin American history. Among his books are Republic of Capital: Buenos Aires and the Legal Transformation of the Atlantic World (1999), Sovereignty and Revolution in the Iberian Atlantic (2006), and a co-authored trend-setting textbook, Worlds Together, Worlds Apart: A History of Humankind from Beginnings to the Present (3rd edition, 2011). In 2013, Princeton University Press will publish his Albert O. Hirschman and the Soul of Reform: A Modern Odyssey. Adelman has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship and the Burkhart Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies.
