History Writing Assignment

Format: The expectation is a paper of 5-7 pages, double-spaced, written in 12-point font, with margins between 1 and 1.25.

Please write an essay of 5-7 pages on one (1) of the two (2) topics listed below. You will not be required to do any outside research for this assignment; all sources may be drawn from the assigned readings for the course, from Week 1 up to and including Week 10. If you would like to draw on sources not listed on our syllabus, please email me a list of these external sources prior to completing your essay.

In his groundbreaking work, The Columbian Exchange, Alfred Crosby re-writes our understanding of how European states expanded across the Atlantic, conquering large swaths of the Americas. Crosbys study de-emphasizes the military role played by Spanish conquistadors and stresses instead other forces that contributed to the rapid series of conquests. Beyond re-writing our understanding of how the conquest played out, Crosby also sheds light on the process of biological exchange inaugurated by Columbus first trans-Atlantic crossing in 1492.

Please write an essay describing what you consider to be the three most important cases of biological exchange that Crosby discusses in chapters 1-3 of The Columbian Exchange. There is no wrong answer to this question, as any reasonable person could make a strong case for different cases of biological exchange holding particular significance.

Your essay should open with a brief introductory paragraph that clearly lists the three cases of biological exchange your essay focuses on. In the body of your essay, you should devote enough space to each case so as to adequately describe the process of biological exchange, including citations with page numbers from the text. For each of your three cases, be sure to note whether you are describing an introduction of an Old-World species to the New World, or of a New-World (American) species to the Old World. You must explain how each instance of biological exchange affected the plant, animal, or human environments. Your concluding paragraph should include your arguments concerning why you feel that these three particular cases of biological exchange were especially significant or important, for the natural environment as well as for human inhabitants of the eastern and/or western hemispheres.

The following angle is not required, but for those of you who are feeling ambitious, you may also want to approach the topic of the Columbian Exchange by considering the extent to which this constitutes an example of the Anthropocene, and how it illustrates the complicated interaction of humans and our environment, and the extent to which human-driven environmental changes might or might not be considered anthropogenic.