3rd Year History main exam- HY310 Europe in the 19th & 20thCentury.

Shay09

Basically i have this exam in 5 days. I haven't a clue what to study:(. I know the lecturer gave hints. I was just hoping there might be someone on here that could help!?
Much appreciated!:pac:

GEKKO135

I'm pretty much in the same boat! My original plan was to to have 4 essays prepared (2 for each section) and that just aint guna happen seeing as i only have one essay done and 5 other exams to study for.

I've only really looked at Q2 so far and i'm guna study post WWII Russia and the break up of Yugoslavia. Fascism would be a good bet too. I'm not too sure about Q1 though...maybe WW1 and Versaille Treaty. I think if you cover 2 parts of each question your pretty safe imo.

Good luck

Shay09

Thanks for the reply,

Yeah i'm thinking of covering WWI, Fascism and not sure what else. I think the lecturer gave a cut of point on what to study, i think it was everything between 1900-1975. Hope your exam goes well.:D

Liber8or

Some ideas I am running with:

- Covering two topics 25 years on either side of 1939.
- WW1.
- WW2.
- The Cold War in Europe, e.g Berlin Wall.
- The rise of fascism in Italy, Spain.
- Russia.

Ideally, with the topics mentioned above, if you can draw upon examples from different nations, I think you would be doing really well. Comparative studies would be excellent.
Ofcourse, we can expect the odd straight answer type questions, e.g How did the Allies win WW1 or WW2?
But, the comparative ones might suggest examining the rise of Fascism in two states, or the effects of the Cold War on the East and West of Europe.

IMO, just be familiar with the general events which occurred between 1914 and 1964. The wars, who was involved, the outcomes, various ideological theories (communism, fascism), and the Cold War. From this general knowledge, then focus on two nations in each prominent event. Russia would be a good start, then followed by Germany or Great Britain.

Also, don't look over the essay titles during the semester. Almost guaranteed we won't see a repeat of them coming up, so with that knowledge is there much else the lecturer's can ask? Doubt it, and that makes it easier to prepare.

Hope this helps!

Edit: Check out Richard Crockett's "The Fifty Years War" - available on Ebrary. Perfect for analysing everything on the Cold War, including various European states.

XxMCRxBabyxX

Would any of you as 3rd years have tips for a lil 2nd year for HY210 - Early Modern World: Europe & Global Expansion?

Starting to get very stressed here! And have an awful lot on my plate right now!

Shay09

Thanks Liber8or...that narrows it down perfectly. Will have a look at that article. Good Luck in the exams.:D

2nd Year: From what i remember last year the past exam papers follow a pretty predictable trend:). You can almost guarantee what has come up will again. Good luck.

Liber8or

XxMCRxBabyxX wrote: »

Would any of you as 3rd years have tips for a lil 2nd year for HY210 - Early Modern World: Europe & Global Expansion?

Starting to get very stressed here! And have an awful lot on my plate right now!

When it comes to the short terms here is what I suggest:

Type them all down on to a Word Document, and I mean every one of them. Should look like this:

Reformation:

Absolutism:

Thomas Hobbes:

Edict of Nantes:

etc, etc.

Then go through as many as you can and flesh them out. Write what you know to fill in the details. Obviously, it won't be enough. Then filter through the ones you think have a greater chance of coming up. The method I used was this -

4 Periods: Reformation, Exploration, Absolutism and Enlightenment. If we assume, for the sake of balance, that at least 2 out of the 10 to come up will be from each period, then that makes 8 so far out of ten. The remaining two possibilities will be random.

So, IIRC, the 100+ overall terms had roughly 25 in each period. As in, when David Lederer covered Reformations, roughly 25 terms were referred to in the lectures. Pick out those 25, then refine them down by what you THINK are more likely to come up. For example, Transubstantiation is one of those highly probable terms. Another, might be Council of Trent. The obscure ones you can choose to ignore because even if one or two dodgy ones come up, you still have 8 others to choose from.

After doing this method, in roughly 2 hours you should have about 40-50 terms relatively fleshed out. But most importantly, you the fleshed out ones will be the ones you are quite familiar with and have some sort of knowledge about. At this point you can choose to walk away and move on to Section 2 of the paper. 40-50 terms gives you a very strong possibility of getting a good grade in Section 1. But, for the obscure ones, and to give yourself more confidence, try tying terms together. For example:

Lets say you did Transubstantion, but didn't do Council of Trent, and Council came up in the exam. You can twist your answer. YOu can talk about how the Council was a reaction to Luther's teachings, then talk about those teachings, such as lutheran's not believing in transubstantiation, and this being a major difference between catholics and reformists, etc. This can be done to many, many of the terms. Linking them together and drawing upon the information you learned on another one can really help you out, if you get stuck by a term you didnt prepare.

Section 2: Essay.

I found the essay section was in direct relation to the essays you have done during the year. In which case, I did State Building and Machiavelli with regards to Italian principalities. A friend did reformation and brought in erasmus etc. So, decide which book you enjoyed the most or know the most of - The prince, in praise of folly, lt. nun, candide. Then examine what they are dealing with - religion, war, colonialism. Then read around those subjects, lets say colonialism. Read up on Spain, know the monarchs, know the territories they took, know the benefits and gains associated with it. But most importantly, KNOW HOW IT AFFECTED OTHER EUROPEAN STATES.

On that last note, that is probably the best advice I can give. This is a thematic module. It requires you to know the various political, social and economic problems facing European states, but if you can link two states together, compare and contrast problems, or argue that diplomatic problems were a result of tensions and a conflict of interests then you will be hitting high marks. E.g Treaty of Tordesilas, dividing South America between Portugal and Spain by an imaginary line by the Pope, which didnt even consult other European states, etc.

I know, I ranted a lot, but I really enjoyed this module and I hope this helps you out!

FanillaIce

HY210 tips:

I did the HY210 exam two years ago, I had been very sick in the weeks after xmas and so was literally studying from my bed so necessarily had to cut down on what I could study so here is some advice on how to do well when you can't cover everything you'd like to!

I basically focused almost entirely on the key terms. They are usually overlooked and are usually where people lose their marks but they are a handy way to gain marks as are easy to study and unlike essays you know they will come up. I wrote out definitions for every term and then tried to establish links between them. Lederer really likes if you bring in the tutorial books into your essay argument where relevant so I just reminded myself of the main themes in them and made a note of what sort of questions they could fit into.
I didn't actually prepare specific essays as I usually would as I didn't have the time but I figured that my study of the key terms would give me enough knowledge of the whole period of the course to be able to answer on anything.
And it worked. Most people had prepared essays on the Reformation but it didn't come up so they were in trouble but I was able to write an essay on the relationship between europe and the rest of the world even though I hadn't intended writing an essay on anything like that but I had enough general knowledge to see me through.
So despite the circumstances in which I prepared and sat the exam I got the mark I hoped for.
Lederer likes some originality and you showing that you have thought about the course and have drawn connections between topics and he will reward that so even if you haven't covered everything its still possible to do very well.
Don't panic when you see the questions if there is nothing there you have prepared. You'll be able to find an angle on a Q that will allow you to use what material you do know.

Hope all this helps and best of luck with it!

XxMCRxBabyxX

You guys are heroes! Thank you so much!

Fanilla Ice being sick is my exact problem. It's making study really hard!

CnaG

HY310 Europe in the 19th & 20th Century - I remember that exam from last year so well. It was my last January exam and I was knackered and hadn't studied for it. I nearly failed. Only that I could remember stuff from the Leaving Cert I would have. I walked out of the exam hall actually convinced I had failed (for the first time in my life), as I'd only written 5 or so pages in total, for the 2 essays.

I got 54%. And still managed to get a first overall. You'll be grand.*



*Disclaimer: I takes no responsibility if you aren't grand