After transferring from a community college, I found that my reading schedule increased dramatically. In today’s post, I thought I would share the books I read in my first semester at a four-year university. Although the amount of reading I had to do in school increased, the content I was reading became much more helpful. While in community college, the required books were very general and tended not to provide a variety of opinions in most cases. However, most books were supplemented with other articles and self-guided research. I will not show all of the reading material I read through because this would be a very long post, and some classes just gave me bits and pieces of different works. So here are the books I bought and studied in my sophomore-level college class at four-year.
In my first semester, I took six classes for 16-credit hours.
I took:
· Health 110
· First Year Seminar 112
· Intro to Music
· Intro to Egyptian Archeology 207
· Approaches to History 290
· History of the Second World War 319
For my Health and Music classes, I bought one book each, and they were online, and the materials were not as great as my other classes, so I will leave them out except to tell you I read one book each for them.
· First Year Seminar:
First Year Seminar was a writing class for me. Each week we would discuss a few sections of a book and write about world events and topics we talked about in class. I enjoyed this class but wrote over 20 pages in this first-year class. Fortunately, the papers were around different topics to keep things interesting. Also, the professor asked us about our majors and geared other papers around all of the student’s interests and studies, which is something I appreciated.
The book assigned for this class was Writing From The Center by Scott Russel Sanders. This collection of essays focuses on the unification of nature and humans. Sanders writes about the discord between these two forces and how the world is impacted by human actions. Still, he goes further and suggests that nature provides its force against humankind and that the only way for both parties to remain and succeed is for them to respect each other.
Although I did not agree with all of what Sanders wrote, I found the idea of this book quite interesting, and I am glad that my professor assigned this book because I am not sure I would have picked this book up on my own.
· Intro to Egyptian Archeology
I bought one book for this class: The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt by Ian Shaw. However, my professor used a lot of articles from oxfordreference.com, and I highly recommend checking this out if you have any interest in Egyptian history; it is free. I love it when professors give you free links, and they don’t make you pay for a book that you won’t read. We read the whole book and then used extra articles for topics that the book did not cover, such as women’s roles in Egyptian culture and a deeper look at religion.
· Approaches to History
This class was one of my favorite classes because, aside from the in-class reading, we got to pick a topic to research and study, so this was so much fun; of course, the topic I chose was the roles of women in areas of espionage and sabotage during the Second World War. So one of these books was one that I got to pick as everyone had to choose a book to review; of course, the professor had to approve it, but man, did I learn so much about picking books for research and review. So here are the books I was assigned for this class.
Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History
Textbook Got Wrong by James Loewen.
I wrote a review (here is the link https://savanahsplace.blogspot.com/2022/06/an-unknown-ignorance.html ) where I covered my thoughts on this book, but I loved this book and the class discussions. My professor had taught this class several times, so it was fun to see him pull parts of this book that are not the main topics that jump out at you when you first read it. Also. This book is very relatable to the world today; my classmates and I were always finding new things we didn’t know about history from this book.
Who Owns History?: Rethinking the Past in a Changing World by Eric Foner.
This is a collection of essays by the famous historian Foner. I enjoyed reading his writing style, and he brought up some fascinating ideas, but his introduction is the best part of this book, and I would have loved him to have written an autobiography.
A Students Guide to History by Jules R. Benjamin.
This book gave great tips on how to write and study history for majors; a lot of the information was fundamental. However, I learned a few new to me tips on writing and looking for academic work. I highly recommend getting this book if you are wanting to study history to give yourself a leg up in college.
Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean.
At first, I hated this book, but by the end of the class, I began to enjoy the reading experience. This book follows a retired English professor as he researches and writes about a forest fire that happened in the 1940s after the Second World War. When you first start this book, it is very literature-based, which is fine. It is just not something I was expecting. But as we get towards the end of the book, Maclean spends a great deal of time explaining how he did his research and the lengths he had to go to, so he could write this book.
Code Name Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy by Larry Loftis. This was the book I picked to write my review on, and I loved having this much control on my reading list. This was so much fun to write a talk about in class.
· The History of the Second World War
This class was the perfect fit for me since this is my area of interest. The professor is a student of the second world war and has written a book about the war in Evansville, Indiana, so he is very knowledgeable about this topic and had so many neat stories that he shared in class. Also, the professor’s classes were unique, and I loved them. He did not really lecture; instead, he would pose a few discussion questions, and we would read the chapters and discuss them in the next class. In other words, I freaking loved this class!!!!! Here are the books I read for this class.
The Second World War by John Keegan.
This was our main book for the class, and I was very impressed by his writing because he covers almost every aspect of the war. This book, however, is a typical textbook in that it is DRY, and I do mean DRY; I love reading books about the Second World War, but man, there were times that I started to zone out. But Keegan is a great writer, and the language he uses is incredible.
With the Old Breed by E. B. Sledge.
This book was so good and was a great representation of what the war in the pacific was like. In this book, we follow Sledge himself as he goes through everything from Bootcamp to combat and everything in between.
Evansville in World War II by Dr. James MacLeod (who was also my professor).
This is a neat book about a local community’s contribution to the Second World War. This is a short but very informative book, and I highly recommend reading it.
Survival in Auschwitz by Primo Levi.
This is the first-hand account of Levi’s time in Auschwitz; he does an excellent job of delivering the facts about living in the camp and providing even the littlest details of his time there. I wish everyone would read this book to understand the Holocaust and what people could do to others. But be warned that this book has some gruesome senses that are real and will make your stomach turn.
This is what I love about being a history and Archeology major, reading excellent books and talking about them with people that actually care about the topics. Yes, my reading schedule has increased since going to four- years, but I would not have it any other way. If you are considering a major in either history or archeology, I hope this list has encouraged you to follow your dream. These majors are very rewarding, and unfortunately, there are few people who care about these topics.
Thank you for sticking with me through this long post, so if you made it this far, please put your favorite historical figure in the comments.
Have a great day!
Savanah
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