MIT Online Course Materials

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hello All

I just saw a posting that MIT has published its course materials free for anybody to use at http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/. I'm just going through the history notes now. Hopefully somebody may find them useful.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan

[d_Guy]

Thanks for the link, Grumpy! This appears to be VERY interesting. Gad! Something else to while away my declining years!
Incidently many may be aware of Coursera which offers both paid and free courses from many universities world wide:
https://www.coursera.org

[fsn]

Hmmm ... I'm alway wary of US history. It tends to go something like:

"First there were the cavemen.
Then the Chinese discovered gunpowder.
Then something happened in Europe. We don't know what, but we'll show some pictures of some dorks from a 'Medieval Fayre'.
Mayflower.
Then we rebelled against our just and noble masters.
Then in 1794, Joseph P Cotton of Nowheresville, Mass invented a little hooky thing and gunpowder had arrived!"



Having said that there are some interesting courses in there.

[d_Guy]

Hmmm ... I'm alway wary of US history. It tends to go something like:

"First there were the cavemen.
Then the Chinese discovered gunpowder.
Then something happened in Europe. We don't know what, but we'll show some pictures of some dorks from a 'Medieval Fayre'.
Mayflower.
Then we rebelled against our just and noble masters.
Then in 1794, Joseph P Cotton of Nowheresville, Mass invented a little hooky thing and gunpowder had arrived!"



Having said that there are some interesting courses in there.

I think you have WAY over complicated things in your history summary:
Subdued a continent - threw out the Brits - won the Civil War - saved the world - saved the world - went to the moon - invented (some would say perfected) disco - saved the world.

[Leman]

Not too sure about the first and third saving of the World, unless you are talking about the Avengers. The first saving was a bit like arriving at a party at 2.30 am to discover half a bottle of wine, a few peanuts left and a rather fed up mariachi band.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

 

That's for both of you!

[d_Guy]

Not too sure about the first and third saving of the World, unless you are talking about the Avengers. The first saving was a bit like arriving at a party at 2.30 am to discover half a bottle of wine, a few peanuts left and a rather fed up mariachi band.

And we had to use French airplanes and British drill instructors! 
Still - I was purposely non-specific about what it was we saved the world from - more a projective test then a an absolute statement.
Possibly we saved the world from good manners and haggis?

BTW My apologies to GOM - who actually started a great thread with a very useful resource.

Thanks ML - to be mentioned in the same dispatch as M'Lord Runicorn is awesome!

[Ithoriel]

More like - exterminated the indigenous populations so had to import a workforce against it's will - supported US Brits against UK Brits - asses saved by the French - charged into wars with weaker opponents - arrived late for wars against the big boys - crashed the world economy twice - regularly supported terrorism - horrified to find tables turned so invaded a random selection of countries who had little or nothing to do with it but who were on the political s**t list - destabilised the world

Not that any of the worlds other empires have been noticeably better. Certainly UK history doesn't bear close scrutiny!

Perhaps I need to search Grumpy's link for courses on History .... Politics ... and Tact

[fsn]

I fear, gentle forum-mates, that my post has been somewhat repurposed as "let's bash the Yanks". While indeed this may have a place, and can on occassion be quite jolly good fun, I was gently teasing the habit of US "historical" tv programs to skip rapidly through hundreds of years of progress by many peoples until they can alight upon some often trivial aspect to which the stars and stripes can be firmly attached, and then raise loud "huzzahs" for  the developments of their countrymen.

This focus on their own nation is also reflected in the programs produced about particularly WWII. For example, D-Day, if one is to believe US history programs and Hollywood extravaganzas like "Saving Private Ryan", consisted of an attack by two airborne divisions (the 82nd and 101st) followed by an assualt on Utah and Omaha beaches. Rarely is the contribution of the Canadian, Free French or the British acknowledged, and (I'm sure you will correct me if I am wrong) the naval elements include Poles and Norwegians, Czechs and many other nations.

I'm sure all nations take a similar view, but we have access to so many more US programs that it seems more noticeable. 

I sought merely to add wimsey to the topic. I apologise if I have wafted any flames that did not need wafting.

[d_Guy]

Golly - I never took this as anything else then fun! As an ignorant hillbilly with abysmal spelling and grammar, missing several key pieces of dental work, I'm kind of used to bashing. Obviously I can't speak for other "Yanks" but we are all wargamers - a thick skin and a sense of humor are mandatory. (Man-date-or-e)!

Every team, tribe, nation, empire, etc. has its foundational myths - how else can we sleep at night.
Hope my rhetoric has  not given offense - will be happy to dial it back - otherwise:
Wait 'till July 4th Gentlepeople. 

[Leman]

Oh 'eck, now mandatory (manda- tory) is getting mangled.

[Ithoriel]

Not my intention to bash the Yanks, rather to point up the tendency we all have to believe "my country is the best in the world, because I was born in it!"

As said, our own historical record is nothing to boast about.

If my clumsy attempt to provide a somewhat tongue in cheek counter-view of American history has given offence then I apologise wholeheartedly.

[fsn]

Thank you, friends all.

It is gratifying to see that harmony can be wrought from heat and reason.


Now that we have concord among the English speaking nations (if not Lexington), let us unite and smite the French.

They bombed Gibraltar in 1940, they did. Diabolical liberty I calls it! My grand-dad, bless his blacked soul would never eat a pomme-frite on the strength of it.

[fsn]

(Man-date-or-e)!

That sounds like your offering a blossoming of the love that dare not speak its name, or a recreational drug. Is this the way you spend your weekends?

[d_Guy]

That sounds like your offering a blossoming of the love that dare not speak its name, or a recreational drug. Is this the way you spend your weekends?

Back in the forum annals (two n's) of January (or was it February) we discussed this very thing. Actually, no, most weekends are spent chasing down rabbits (hares?) and beating them with small bats (the sonar ones not the cricket ones) until they tell us where they hid the car keys.