This class, like all History 201 courses, introduces the craft of history. Our goals are twofold: We will learn how historians operate; how they gather information, process that information, analyze their findings, and communicate their results to a wider audience. Toward that end we will spend most of our time learning how to read two particular sets of primary sources: literature and film. The second goal is a greater understanding of the process and art of historical writing. A significant portion of these course will dedicated to how historians produce their ideas in the written form. Toward this end, the writing assignments in this course are structured to reflect one of the most important writing strategies of historians – the exploration and expansion of an original idea. The requirements for this course are rigorous. The reward is a more careful understanding of the process of historical investigation.