Family Secrets in US History

This fully online, writing-intensive course uses the theme of secrecy to examine the family as both an institution and an ideal at the center of debates over American identity and national belonging. We trace how diverse families, particularly those marginalized by the state, navigate their relationship to power and pass on essential, often hidden, knowledge about their identities and experiences across generations. Through weekly assignments, you’ll practice core skills like primary source analysis and historical argument construction. For the culminating project, students will conduct archival research or explore their own family history to produce a scholarly argument in the form of a research paper, creative narrative, or digital StoryMap. There are no prerequisites.