The final exam is not cumulative. It will cover the lectures from March 25 through May 4 (the immediate aftermath of 10 August 1792 through the overthrow of the Directory). The structure will be the same as the midterm. You will choose five terms to identify from a list of ten, as well as answer one essay question.
You have a considerable amount of time to take a fairly limited test, so make good use of that time: think carefully about your responses before you begin writing. Use the back of the exam paper to outline your essay or jot notes to yourself about key points that you don't want to forget. You might consider using the first several minutes of the exam period to think about the documents you read in Mason & Rizzo and writing some notes to remind yourself of which documents you could include in your essay. I would say that the most common problem with the midterms was the lack of any evidence that you had done the reading. (Just writing something like, "According to Popkin, the French Revolution started in 1789..." doesn't cut it.)
I will ask essay questions about the following topics:
- The sans-culottes as a political force
- The Terror (origins through aftermath)
- The transfer of political power from one faction to another (think coups and the like)
