Spring 2027

The American Military Experience to 1902

Survey of American military experience from the 16th century to 1902, examining the influence of warfare on American society and the development of a nascent empire.

no offering record for this termCredits unavailable
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 No instructors listed

Summary

1 / 3

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2018: 3.74 GPA, 90.3% A/AB (n=31 letter grades); Fall 2020: 3.86 GPA, 92.1% A/AB (n=38 letter grades); Fall 2021: 3.80 GPA, 90.0% A/AB (n=30 letter grades).

What you’ll be able to do

  • Identify and describe the diverse military traditions that collided in colonial America and how and why these different "ways of war" evolved to the dawn of the twentieth century.

  • Analyze the twin development of the American citizen-soldier tradition and the American profession of arms.

  • Explain how political, cultural, economic, and technological factors influenced American military institutions, decisions to go to war, and the conduct of military operations.

  • Explain how and why American military policies, institutions, and practices changed or remained consistent over time and assess if there are persistent themes or areas of continuity that constitute a distinctly "American way of war."

  • Analyze warfare as a human experience endured on the battlefield, at sea, in the sky, on the home front, at desolate outposts, and in councils of government.

  • Assess the relationship between national expansion (in physical, commercial, and ideological sense) and American military history.

  • Assess significant work in the historiography of early and/or nineteenth-century American military history.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

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average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
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Prerequisites

Course map

Sophomore standing. Not open to students with credit forHISTORY 345.

  • take all
HISTORY 427

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027

No instructors recorded for this selection.

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

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SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections.

Meeting source records

No records available.

Student experience

the class

Recent recorded grades — Fall 2018: 3.74 GPA, 90.3% A/AB (n=31 letter grades); Fall 2020: 3.86 GPA, 92.1% A/AB (n=38 letter grades); Fall 2021: 3.80 GPA, 90.0% A/AB (n=30 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

No workload feedback recorded.

Topics

  • American military experience from the 16th century to 1902.
  • Colonial American military traditions and competing ways of war.
  • The citizen-soldier tradition and the professionalization of American armed forces.
  • Political, cultural, economic, and technological influences on military institutions and operations.
  • Change and continuity in American military policies, institutions, and practices.
  • Warfare as a human experience in military, domestic, and governmental settings.
  • National expansion and its relationship to American military history.
  • Historiography of early and nineteenth-century American military history.

Skills

  • Identifying and describing diverse military traditions in colonial America.
  • Analyzing the development of the American citizen-soldier tradition and profession of arms.
  • Explaining how political, cultural, economic, and technological factors shape military institutions.
  • Assessing continuity and change in American military policies and practices.
  • Analyzing warfare as a human experience across battlefield, maritime, aerial, and home-front settings.
  • Assessing how national expansion relates to American military history.
  • Evaluating key historiographical works on early and nineteenth-century American military history.

Grades

Latest available · Fall 2021— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Fall 2021

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Fall 2021 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1154 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

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Selected offering source records

No offering records for the selected term.

Raw records 
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Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

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Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

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Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

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Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
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Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

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Model & dataset provenance 
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  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "5036f1e90059217e380e5d8843b4ab66459c1332ad3dcaf9b3a58c7b58bd87d3",
  "requirements_status": "needs_review",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}