The Great Courses

America’s relationship with alcohol is a fraught and inconsistent one.

In the six lectures of A Short History of Role-Playing Games, gaming consultant and avid gamer Jamin Warren will take you on a whirlwind tour of role-playing games, tracing a fascinating story of community-building, technical innovation, and, occasionally, cultural backlash.

While the lectures cover an enormous range of key thinkers and ideas, they always focus on the most important ideas....

In the six lectures of Who Was Jane Austen? Sorting Fact from Fiction, you’ll join literary scholar Stephanie Insley Hershinow to explore some of the most enduring myths surrounding Austen and her work.

Was King Arthur a real person? What about Robin Hood? Is the Holy Grail a cup, or something else altogether? Did Europeans really burn millions of people at the stake for witchcraft? These are just a few of the questions you will explore with the help of medieval scholar Dorsey Armstrong....

Even after deciphering its hieroglyphs, and marveling at its scarabs, mummies, obelisks, and sphinxes, Egyptian civilization remains one of history's most mysterious....

From Halloween costumes to patriotic parades to belly-busting meals, every holiday tradition tells a unique story—one encoded in symbols and layered meanings that stretch back over the centuries....

How the Earth Works takes you on an astonishing journey through time and space. In 48 lectures, you will look at what went into making our planet - from the big bang, to the formation of the solar system, to the subsequent evolution of Earth....

The world has utterly transformed over the course of the last 2,000 years. Many of the norms, rules, and expectations of the ancient world can feel strange to our 21st century sensibilities.

The stuff of conspiracy theories makes for great, entertaining stories in movies, books, and television. And there is no shortage of subjects: from who really killed JFK to the truth behind 9/11...

Here, you will meet the fascinating, ancient polytheistic peoples of the Mediterranean and beyond, their many gods and goddesses, and their public and private worship practices, as you come to appreciate the foundational role religion played in their lives....

In 10 riveting episodes, paleoanthropologist Elen Feuerriegel takes you on an unrivaled tour of the human fossil record in search of the biological and behavioral underpinnings of our very “humanness”....

We can learn a lot about American history and culture by looking at the horror films of the 1980s.

In the nine lectures of Slow Down: How Doing Nothing Makes Us Better Humans, Constance Kassor, of Lawrence University in Wisconsin, shows you how to do what so many of us desperately need: Take a step back, reassess your priorities, and take some time for yourself.

In a field known for startling ideas, the Many-Worlds Interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics may take the prize. It holds that parallel to our own world are a large number of other universes, almost identical to ours but with small variations....

While American history spans not much more than two centuries, it is filled with a wealth of leaders, wars, movements, inventions, and ideas....

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a collection of techniques for managing moods and modifying behaviors. Build a robust self-improvement toolkit with this expert guidance....

The past truly comes alive as you take a series of imaginative leaps into the world of history's anonymous citizens....

Hidden treasures. Secret societies. War and plunder. You’ve heard the stories, seen the movies, pondered the conspiracy theories. You know that the Knights Templar are said to be connected with the Holy Grail, the Ark of the Covenant, the Freemasons—even Oak Island, off the coast of Nova Scotia.

Beginning with the witch hunts of the early 15th century, Professor Jennifer McNabb takes you on an eye-opening exploration of witchcraft and superstition in Witchcraft in the Western Tradition....