Invitation to Ph.D. Course Ideologies, Ideas, and Values during the Industrial Revolution 20-25 May 2010, Gothenburg

Why was Europe the first region to develop economically and why did Britain lead among the European nations? Recent years have seen a number of important contributions to the field of economic history trying to deal with the issue from new perspectives, using new empirical evidence. The course will study some of scholarly contributions.

The course will be taught by Deirdre Nansen McCloskey, Distinguished Professor of Economics, History, English, and Communication, University of Illinois at Chicago, and Professor, School of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg.

The department of Economic History at Gothenburg University, Sweden, invites PhD student in economic history, economics and/or history, or similar disciplines within social science and the humanities to take part in this one week course in Gothenburg.

Participants are expected to write short reviews of the books on the reading list, to be discussed in class in the morning of each day of the course. Participants will also present a paper on their own research in afternoon seminars, and get feedback from other participants of the course and from Professor McCloskey.

Applications for participation in the course should be sent latest 1 March 2012 by mail to Anna-Helena Wiechel, Dept. of economic history, University of Gothenburg: anna-helena.wiechel@econhist.gu.se.

Applicants should give a short description of the research fi eld of their doctoral thesis. Since the number of participants will be limited, a selection may be necessary. The result from such selection will be sent to the applicants in mid-March.

For further questions regarding the course, please contact course organizers Anna-Helena Wiechel or Carolina Lindqvist:
anna-helena.wiechel@econhist.gu.se, carolina.lindqvist@econhist.gu.se

Reading list
• Deirdre N. McCloskey, Bourgeois Dignity: Why Economics Can’t Explain the Modern World, Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 2010, paperback
• Jack Goldstone, Why Europe? The Rise of the West in World History 1500-1850, Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2008,
paperback.
• Jack Goody, The Eurasian Miracle, Polity: Cambridge, 2010. Paperback, 159 pages.
• Janet L. Abu-Lughod, Before European Hegemony: The World System A.D. 1250-1350. Oxford University Press,
1991. pp. 464. ISBN 978-0195067743
• Andre Gunter Frank, ReORIENT: Global Economy in the Asian Age. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University
of California Press, 1998. (Paperback)
• Prasannan Parthasarathi, Why Europe Grew Rich and Asia Did Not. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2011, paperback
• Roy Bin Wong, China Transformed: Historical Change and the Limits of European Experience. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1997, 337 pp.