An intensive introduction to global social history themes, covering early societies to the 20th century Covering early societies, the classical, postclassical, and modern periods, and the 20th century, and blending the great advances in historical research over the past quarter century, Experiencing World History represents an important addition to the teaching of world history. Focusing on major issues in social history in the context of world history and divided into five chronological sections that highlight the mixture of change and continuity, the volume traces key aspects of society over time, among them gender; work and leisure; state and society; culture contact and population patterns. Truly global in scope, Experiencing World History includes deep coverage of all the major areas including Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. A brief introduction ties the social history themes to more conventional world history coverage, and an epilogue after each of the five sections suggests overarching themes and connections.

Volume I offers historiographical surveys and general overviews of central topics in the history of world sexualities. Split across twenty-two chapters, this volume places the history of sexuality in dialogue with anthropology, women's history, LGBTQ+ history, queer theory, and public history, as well as examining the impact Freud and Foucault have had on the history of sexuality. The volume continues by providing overviews on the sexual body, family and marriage, the intersections of sexuality with race and class, male and female homoerotic relations, trans and gender variant sexuality, the sale of sex, sexual violence, sexual science, sexuality and emotion, erotic art and literature, and the material culture of sexuality.

Volume II focuses on systems of thought and belief in the history of world sexualities, ranging from early humans to contemporary approaches. Comprising eighteen chapters, this volume opens with a chapter on the evolutionary legacy and then delves into the sexualities of ancient Egypt, the Near East, Greece, and Rome, continuing with pre-modern South Asia, China, and Japan, Africa, the Americas, and Oceania. Chapters include an examination of sexuality in the religious traditions of Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and also look at more recent approaches, including scientific sex, sexuality in socialism and Marxism, and the intersections between sexuality, feminism, and post-colonialism.

Volume IV examines the intersections of modernity and human sexuality through the forces, ideas, and events that have shaped the modern world. Through eighteen chapters, this volume examines connections between sexuality and the defining forces of modern global history including capitalism, colonialism, migration, consumerism, and war; sexuality in modern literature and print media; sexuality in dictatorships and democracies; and cultural changes such as sex education and the sexual revolution. The volume ends with discussions of the difficult issues we in the modern world continue to face, such as restrictions on reproductive rights, sex tourism, STDs and AIDS, sex trafficking, domestic violence, and illiberal attacks on sexuality.

The third edition of Merry Wiesner-Hanks' prize-winning survey of women and gender in early modern Europe. The updated edition features an entirely new chapter on gender and race in the colonial world; expanded coverage of eighteenth century developments including the Enlightenment; and enhanced discussions of masculinity, single women, same-sex relations, humanism, and women's religious roles within Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. All of the chapters incorporate the newest scholarship and the book preserves the clear structure of previous editions with its tripartite division of mind, body, and spirit. Within this structure, other themes include the female life-cycle, women's economic roles, artistic creations, education and witchcraft. Coverage is geographically broad, including Russia, Scandinavia, the Ottoman Empire, and the Iberian peninsula. This is essential reading for all students of early modern Europe and gender history and is accompanied by a website featuring extensive updated bibliographies, weblinks and primary source material.

Volume 5 of the Cambridge World History series uncovers the cross-cultural exchange and conquest, and the accompanying growth of regional and trans-regional states, religions, and economic systems, during the period 500 to 1500 CE. The volume begins by outlining a series of core issues and processes across the world, including human relations with nature, gender and family, social hierarchies, education, and warfare. Further essays examine maritime and land-based networks of long-distance trade and migration in agricultural and nomadic societies, and the transmission and exchange of cultural forms, scientific knowledge, technologies, and text-based religious systems that accompanied these. The final section surveys the development of centralized regional states and empires in both the eastern and western hemispheres. Together these essays by an international team of leading authors show how processes furthering cultural, commercial, and political integration within and between various regions of the world made this millennium a 'proto-global' era.

Christianity and Sexuality in the Early Modern World surveys the ways in which people from the time of Luther and Columbus to that of Thomas Jefferson used Christian ideas and institutions to regulate and shape sexual norms and conduct, and examines the impact of their efforts. Global in scope and geographic in organization, the book contains chapters on Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, and North America. It explores key topics, including marriage and divorce, fornication and illegitimacy, clerical sexuality, same-sex relations, witchcraft and love magic, moral crimes, and interracial relationships. The book sets its findings within the context of many historical fields, including the history of gender and sexuality, and of colonialism and race. Each chapter in this third edition has been updated to reflect new scholarship, particularly on the actual lived experience of people around the world. This has resulted in expanded coverage of nearly every issue, including notions of the body and of honor, gendered religious symbols, religious and racial intermarriage, sexual and gender fluidity, the process of conversion, the interweaving of racial identity and religious ideologies, and the role of Indigenous and enslaved people in shaping Christian traditions and practices. It is ideal for students of the history of sexuality, early modern Christianity, and early modern gender.

How did gender figure in understandings of spatial realms, from the inner spaces of the body to the furthest reaches of the globe? How did women situate themselves in the early modern world, and how did they move through it, in both real and imaginary locations? How do new disciplinary and geographic connections shape the ways we think about the early modern world, and the role of women and men in it? These are the questions that guide this volume, which includes articles by a select group of scholars from many disciplines: Art History, Comparative Literature, English, German, History, Landscape Architecture, Music, and Women's Studies. Each essay reaches across fields, and several are written by interdisciplinary groups of authors. The essays also focus on many different places, including Rome, Amsterdam, London, and Paris, and on texts and images that crossed the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, or that portrayed real and imagined people who did. Many essays investigate topics key to the 'spatial turn' in various disciplines, such as borders and their permeability, actual and metaphorical spatial crossings, travel and displacement, and the built environment.

Covering European history from the invention of the printing press to the French Revolution, the third edition of this best-selling textbook is thoroughly updated with new scholarship and an emphasis on environmental history, travel and migration, race and cultural blending, and the circulation of goods and knowledge. Summaries, timelines, maps, illustrations, and discussion questions illuminate the narrative and support the student. Enhanced online content and sections on sources and methodology give students the tools they need to study early modern European history. Leading historian Merry Wiesner-Hanks skillfully balances breadth and depth of coverage to create a strong narrative, paying particular attention to the global context of European developments. She integrates discussion of gender, class, regional, and ethnic differences across the entirety of Europe and its overseas colonies as well as the economic, political, religious, and cultural history of the period.

Covering European history from the invention of the printing press to the French Revolution, the third edition of this best-selling textbook is thoroughly updated with new scholarship and an emphasis on environmental history, travel and migration, race and cultural blending, and the circulation of goods and knowledge. Summaries, timelines, maps, illustrations, and discussion questions illuminate the narrative and support the student. Enhanced online content and sections on sources and methodology give students the tools they need to study early modern European history. Leading historian Merry Wiesner-Hanks skillfully balances breadth and depth of coverage to create a strong narrative, paying particular attention to the global context of European developments. She integrates discussion of gender, class, regional, and ethnic differences across the entirety of Europe and its overseas colonies as well as the economic, political, religious, and cultural history of the period.

Christianity and Sexuality in the Early Modern World surveys the ways in which people from the time of Luther and Columbus to that of Thomas Jefferson used Christian ideas and institutions to regulate and shape sexual norms and conduct, and examines the impact of their efforts. Global in scope and geographic in organization, the book contains chapters on Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, and North America. It explores key topics, including marriage and divorce, fornication and illegitimacy, clerical sexuality, same-sex relations, witchcraft and love magic, moral crimes, and interracial relationships. The book sets its findings within the context of many historical fields, including the history of gender and sexuality, and of colonialism and race. Each chapter in this third edition has been updated to reflect new scholarship, particularly on the actual lived experience of people around the world. This has resulted in expanded coverage of nearly every issue, including notions of the body and of honor, gendered religious symbols, religious and racial intermarriage, sexual and gender fluidity, the process of conversion, the interweaving of racial identity and religious ideologies, and the role of Indigenous and enslaved people in shaping Christian traditions and practices. It is ideal for students of the history of sexuality, early modern Christianity, and early modern gender.

Volume 5 of the Cambridge World History series uncovers the cross-cultural exchange and conquest, and the accompanying growth of regional and trans-regional states, religions, and economic systems, during the period 500 to 1500 CE. The volume begins by outlining a series of core issues and processes across the world, including human relations with nature, gender and family, social hierarchies, education, and warfare. Further essays examine maritime and land-based networks of long-distance trade and migration in agricultural and nomadic societies, and the transmission and exchange of cultural forms, scientific knowledge, technologies, and text-based religious systems that accompanied these. The final section surveys the development of centralized regional states and empires in both the eastern and western hemispheres. Together these essays by an international team of leading authors show how processes furthering cultural, commercial, and political integration within and between various regions of the world made this millennium a 'proto-global' era.

The era from 1400 to 1800 saw intense biological, commercial, and cultural exchanges, and the creation of global connections on an unprecedented scale. Divided into two books, Volume 6 of the Cambridge World History series considers these critical transformations. The first book examines the material and political foundations of the era, including global considerations of the environment, disease, technology, and cities, along with regional studies of empires in the eastern and western hemispheres, crossroads areas such as the Indian Ocean, Central Asia, and the Caribbean, and sites of competition and conflict, including Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Mediterranean. The second book focuses on patterns of change, examining the expansion of Christianity and Islam, migrations, warfare, and other topics on a global scale, and offering insightful detailed analyses of the Columbian exchange, slavery, silver, trade, entrepreneurs, Asian religions, legal encounters, plantation economies, early industrialism, and the writing of history.

The era from 1400 to 1800 saw intense biological, commercial, and cultural exchanges, and the creation of global connections on an unprecedented scale. Divided into two books, Volume 6 of the Cambridge World History series considers these critical transformations. The first book examines the material and political foundations of the era, including global considerations of the environment, disease, technology, and cities, along with regional studies of empires in the eastern and western hemispheres, crossroads areas such as the Indian Ocean, Central Asia, and the Caribbean, and sites of competition and conflict, including Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Mediterranean. The second book focuses on patterns of change, examining the expansion of Christianity and Islam, migrations, warfare, and other topics on a global scale, and offering insightful detailed analyses of the Columbian exchange, slavery, silver, trade, entrepreneurs, Asian religions, legal encounters, plantation economies, early industrialism, and the writing of history.

This book tells the story of humankind as producers and reproducers from the Paleolithic to the present. Renowned social and cultural historian Merry Wiesner-Hanks brings a new perspective to world history by examining social and cultural developments across the globe, including families and kin groups, social and gender hierarchies, sexuality, race and ethnicity, labor, religion, consumption, and material culture. She examines how these structures and activities changed over time through local processes and interactions with other cultures, highlighting key developments that defined particular eras such as the growth of cities or the creation of a global trading network. Incorporating foragers, farmers and factory workers along with shamans, scribes and secretaries, the book widens and lengthens human history. It makes comparisons and generalizations, but also notes diversities and particularities, as it examines the social and cultural matters that are at the heart of big questions in world history today.

This fourth edition of Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks's prize-winning survey features significant changes to every chapter, designed to reflect the newest scholarship. Global issues have been threaded throughout the book, while still preserving the clear thematic structure of previous editions. Thus readers will find expanded discussions of gendered racial hierarchies, migration, missionaries, and consumer goods. In addition, there is enhanced coverage of recent theoretical directions; the ideas, beliefs, and practices of ordinary people; early industrialization; women's learning, letter writing, and artistic activities; emotions and sentiments; single women and same-sex relations; masculinities; mixed-race and enslaved women; and the life course from birth to death. With geographically broad coverage, including Russia, Scandinavia, the Ottoman Empire, and the Iberian Peninsula, this remains the leading text on women and gender in Europe in this period. Accompanying this essential reading is a completely revised website featuring extensive updated bibliographies, web links, and primary source material.

How did gender figure in understandings of spatial realms, from the inner spaces of the body to the furthest reaches of the globe? How did women situate themselves in the early modern world, and how did they move through it, in both real and imaginary locations? How do new disciplinary and geographic connections shape the ways we think about the early modern world, and the role of women and men in it? These are the questions that guide this volume, which includes articles by a select group of scholars from many disciplines: Art History, Comparative Literature, English, German, History, Landscape Architecture, Music, and Women's Studies. Each essay reaches across fields, and several are written by interdisciplinary groups of authors. The essays also focus on many different places, including Rome, Amsterdam, London, and Paris, and on texts and images that crossed the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, or that portrayed real and imagined people who did. Many essays investigate topics key to the 'spatial turn' in various disciplines, such as borders and their permeability, actual and metaphorical spatial crossings, travel and displacement, and the built environment.

This collection brings together selections from Martin Luther's extensive writings on women, the vast majority of which are translated here into English for the first time. It includes chapters on Eve and the nature of women, the Virgin Mary, Biblical women, marriage, sexuality, childbirth, Luther's relations with his wife and other contemporary women, and witchcraft. Merry Wiesner-Hanks and Susan Karant-Nunn provide a general introduction to each chapter, and Luther's actual texts add fuel to the debate concerned with whether the Protestant Reformation was beneficial or detrimental to women.

This collection brings together selections from Martin Luther's extensive writings on women, the vast majority of which are translated here into English for the first time. It includes chapters on Eve and the nature of women, the Virgin Mary, Biblical women, marriage, sexuality, childbirth, Luther's relations with his wife and other contemporary women, and witchcraft. Merry Wiesner-Hanks and Susan Karant-Nunn provide a general introduction to each chapter, and Luther's actual texts add fuel to the debate concerned with whether the Protestant Reformation was beneficial or detrimental to women.