SPRINGFIELD — The University of Illinois Springfield is offering a free online course about the Emancipation Proclamation.

This open course uses the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 to explore what happened in the United States before emancipation, how emancipation worked once proclaimed, and what happened in politics, economics and society in the century and a half afterward. It will also serve as a forum for participants to discuss the concept of emancipation in states and systems earlier than that of the United States and since to today.

The class will be taught by political science professor Matthew Holden and legal studies assistant professor Gwen Jordan. The class begins Jan. 28.