What are/were your comprehensive exams?

[ManifestMidwest]

I'm merely a first year in my PhD program, but I was wondering what everyone did for their comprehensive exams.  You don't have to share your reading lists, but it'd be interesting to see everyone's fields.

[AP]

I took the compulsory Colonial and Modern exams of my field, and then I put together a Spatial History field.

[dr. t]

Late Antique Mediterranean, Medieval Europe, Early Modern Church History

[RevolutionBlues]

Modern Europe, Early Modern Europe, and Political Economy/History of Capitalism.

[ManifestMidwest]

On 10/31/2016 at 10:34 PM, AP said:

I took the compulsory Colonial and Modern exams of my field, and then I put together a Spatial History field.

Are you doing United States history, Latin American history, or somewhere else?

[jayray11]

I'm preparing for them now (to be taken in April or May). I'm doing Colonial Latin America, Modern Latin America, Early America (North but broadly defined with someone who studies the future US), and Race and Slavery in the Atlantic World.

[kyjin]

Japan, Pre-Modern China, Japanese Education and Pedagogy 

[AP]

22 hours ago, ManifestMidwest said:

Are you doing United States history, Latin American history, or somewhere else?

Latin American

[betwixt&between]

On 10/31/2016 at 10:34 PM, AP said:

I took the compulsory Colonial and Modern exams of my field, and then I put together a Spatial History field.

Would you be willing to recommend some titles in the Spatial History field? I have recently come across this topic, and am interested in learning more about it.

[nevermind]

I'm also a first year...I'm in a joint program, so two of my comps are already determined (there's not a lot of leeway in meeting the req's for both fields). Mine will be History of Science (major), Science Studies (minor...interdisciplinary methods), and one more minor field which will be TBD, but something like History of Technology in the (modern) Middle East.

 

Edited December 16, 2016 by nevermind

[AP]

2 hours ago, betwixt&between said:

Would you be willing to recommend some titles in the Spatial History field? I have recently come across this topic, and am interested in learning more about it.

Absolutely.

My list had a lot on space, place, landscape, borders, representations of space, and environmental history. A friend on mine's had a more agricultural history-heavy list. And another friend did a mix between Spatial History and Atlantic World. I included two or three books on methodology (which often yields something related to Digital Humanities), but I know that a friend included more about this. In conclusion, because it is such a new field you can tailor it to your interests. 

For the more theoretical sections, Homi Bhabha, David Harvey, Henri Lefebvre (I could never spell this), Edward Casey, Edward Soja, Yifu Tuan, Michel De Certau, Denis Cosgrove (not so theoretical), James Scott, Mike Davis. A good place to start is Key Thinkers on Space and Place and Space, Place, and Power in Modern Russia.

I then moved to "classics" and new scholarship in the Americas: Richard White, Mark Carey, Raymond Craib, William Cronon, Alfred Crosby... and I included other parts of the world, but this was less dogmatic (I didn't read classics and new scholarship, I just read). 

Hope it helps!

[TMP]

Jewish history (1492-1980s), Modern European history, History of Gender/Sexuality/Family

Fun.... times.

[betwixt&between]

On 12/16/2016 at 4:33 PM, AP said:

 For the more theoretical sections, Homi Bhabha, David Harvey, Henri Lefebvre (I could never spell this), Edward Casey, Edward Soja, Yifu Tuan, Michel De Certau, Denis Cosgrove (not so theoretical), James Scott, Mike Davis. A good place to start is Key Thinkers on Space and Place and Space, Place, and Power in Modern Russia.

I then moved to "classics" and new scholarship in the Americas: Richard White, Mark Carey, Raymond Craib, William Cronon, Alfred Crosby... and I included other parts of the world, but this was less dogmatic (I didn't read classics and new scholarship, I just read). 

Hope it helps!

This is a great list, thank you! I was actually stumbled into spatial theory doing research for a paper. My first introduction was through Soja, Lefebvre, and Thirdspace which is so interesting as an applied theory!!! I've just ILL'd Key Thinkers, but I suspect that I may break down and purchase it eventually. I'm really excited to start looking at the other authors! 

[thebeachbum]

Early and Modern U.S. (roughly pre-Civil War and post-CW), public history, history of technology (19th/20th c. U.S.), history of medicine in the Atlantic world

[rising_star]

On 12/16/2016 at 1:36 PM, betwixt&between said:

Would you be willing to recommend some titles in the Spatial History field? I have recently come across this topic, and am interested in learning more about it.

In addition to @AP's wonderful list, I'd like to suggest you check out the work of Stuart Elden. He also is a pretty prolific academic blogger, with a number of posts you might find of interest. Of particular note is this one, which is a guide of where to start with Henri Lefebvre. If you're interested in maps or cartography, then read anything by Mark Monmonier. Other potential names of interest include Halford Mackinder, Friedrich Ratzel, Doreen Massey (her quintessential text is For Space), and Carl Sauer.

I wouldn't recommend Mike Davis as a starting point, if only because his work has been quite controversial. If you're going to read David Harvey, it's worth reading Social Justice and the City to get a sense of how his thinking evolved before you read some of his later work (Limits to Capital; Justice, Nature, and the Geography of Difference; The New Imperialism). One of Harvey's star students, Neil Smith, is an acclaimed thinker, particularly for his work on urban space (Uneven Development and The New Urban Frontier). 

This next set of resources will point you more toward geography as an academic discipline, but are still useful for spatial history IMO. Geographical Imaginations and The Colonial Present by Derek Gregory are both great reads (see here for a brief explanation of the geographical imagination). Tim Cresswell's book on geographic thought provides a sound introduction, as do David Livingstone's The Geographical Tradition: Episodes in the Contested History of an Enterprise and Richard (Dick) Peet's Modern Geographic Thought.

We could probably add more suggestions if you narrow down what it is about spatial history you're interested in learning more about.