HIS 101
Special Projects
 
 
Video review (50 points). Watch one of the videos listed below and write a review of the movie as if you were a critic.  Explain how the movie was (or was not) historically accurate.  You can suggest a different movie.
 
Cecil B. DeMille, Ten Commandments (1956); Robert Rossen, Alexander the Great (1956); Stanley Kubrick, Spartacus (1960); Joseph L. Mankiewicz, Cleopatra (1963); William Wyler, Ben Hur (1959); Moustafa Akkad, The Message (1975); Sergei Eisenstein, Aleksandr Nevskii (1938); Franco Zefirelli, Fratello Sole, Sorella Luna (Brother Sun, Sister Moon, 1972); John Boorman, Excalibur (1981); Anthony Mann, El Cid (1961); Ingmar Bergman, Det Sjunde Inseglet (The Seventh Seal, 1956); Akira Kurosawa, Shichinin no Samurai (Seven Samurai, 1954); Kenneth Branagh, Henry V (1989); Anthony Harvey, The Lion in Winter (1968); Daniel Vigne, La Retour de Martin Guerre (The Return of Martin Guerre, 1982); Cecil B. DeMille, The Crusades (1935)--consider a comparison to Ridley Scott's Kingdom of Heaven (2005) for extra, extra credit--Fred Zinneman, A Man for All Seasons (1966).
 
 
Book review (50 points). Write a review of the book. Do not just summarize the book's contents but also examine its strengths and weaknesses and place the book in its proper historical context.  You can suggest a different book.
 
Archibald MacLeish, J. B.; Aristophanes, Lysistrata; Herodotus, Histories; Homer, The Iliad or The Odyssey; Plato, The Republic; Sophocles, Oedipus or Antigone; Thucydides, The Peloponnesian Wars; Arrian, Campaigns of Alexander; Julius Caesar, Commentaries on the Gallic Wars; Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; Plutarch, Parallel Lives of the Greeks and Romans; Virgil, The Aeneid; Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy; Bede, Ecclesiastical History; Beowulf; Egil's Saga; Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy; Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologica; Umberto Ecco, The Name of the Rose; Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances; Giovanni Boccaccio, Decameron; François Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel; John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion; Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote; Alexander Dumas, The Three Musketeers; Sir Thomas More, Utopia; Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.
 
 
Vacation. 50 points. If, during this course, you vacation in some place that has significant historical importance (before 1600 ce), write and submit a short, two-page report, along with some pictures, in digital form if possible, about that place.  Consult your instructor for approval of your selection before proceeding.


Folger Shakespeare Library (75 points). Visit the Folger Shakespeare Library at 2nd and E. Capitol Sts., SE, and submit a short report describing Shakespeare's life and what you have seen at the Folger.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
National Gallery of Art (75 points). Visit the Renaissance collection at the National Gallery of Art and submit a brief essay explaining how certain specific paintings illustrate some of the characteristics of the Renaissance.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (75 points). Visit the Western Cultures Hall at the Museum of Natural History and submit a one-two page essay explaining what you discovered. Note some specific artifacts from the exhibit.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Renaissance, or Madrigal, concert (75 points). Attend a Renaissance concert, or fair, and submit a short report explaining what you heard and saw and how music was evolving during the Renaissance.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Walters Art Museum (75 points).  Visit the collections dealing with Egypt and the Ancient Near East at the Walters Art Museum and submit a brief essay explaining how certain, specific items illustrate some characteristics of life in the Ancient world.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Egyptian Building, Richmond, Virginia (75 points).  Visit the building, now a part of the VCU medical center and explain the building's unique history and its Ancient Egyptian style.  Please send a brochure, ticket or image (will not be returned)--you can also email this--as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Washington National Cathedral (75 points). Visit the National Cathedral at the corner of Massachusetts and Wisconsin Aves., Washington, D.C., NW, and submit an essay about its construction and how it is, or is not, similar to other Gothic cathedrals in Europe.  Please send a brochure or ticket (will not be returned) as evidence of your visit to:
Extended Learning Institute
ATTN:  HIS 101 (Put your instructor's name here)
Northern Virginia Community College
8333 Little River Turnpike
Annandale, VA 22003-3796
 
 
Architectural portfolio (100 points). Locate and document at least eight examples of buildings in the DC area that were modeled after pre-1600 architecture.  Submit photographs that you have taken and mounted on plain, white paper, with an explanation of your samples.  Check out outstanding examples of the architectural project done by Stacie Weiss (very large *.pdf file) and Lori Plunkett (large *.pdf file).
 
 
Note that if you have any other proposals for a project, such as a visit to an out-of-town museum like any of those located in New York, please contact your instructor for approval and point value before you begin.
 
 

This page is copyright © 2006, C.T. Evans
For information contact cevans@nvcc.edu