SPRING 2001
This information effective for Spring 2001.
Check with instructor the first day of class for any changes.
Instructor: Bruce Thompson
Office: 276 Stevenson, 459-3467
Office Hours: Monday, 12:30-1:30; Friday, 9:30-10:30
E-mail: brucet@cats.ucsc.edu
The best of times, the worst of times.... It was a century of extraordinary technological advances and, for many Europeans, of unprecedented prosperity. But it would have been difficult to guess in 1900 that Europe in the twentieth century would be devastated by two disastrous wars, that the socialist dream would issue in tragedy and failure, and that state-sponsored terror, torture, and genocide would appear in the heart of the continent. And who would have predicted, before 1989, that the Soviet Union and its satellites would collapse so completely and ignominiously? As we enter a new century, it is now possible to place these great and often terrible events in historical perspective. Drawing on historical texts, memoirs, literature, and the visual arts, History 30C offers a survey of European history from the outbreak of war in 1914 to the present.
1. The First World War (March 28-April 6)
2. The Russian Revolution (April 9-13)
3. Failed Stabilization (April 16-20)
4. Dark Times (April 23-27)
Midterm Examination, Friday April 27
5. War and Resistance (April 30-May 4)
6. Holocaust (May 7-11)
7. A Hard and Bitter Peace (May 14-18)
8. The Decline and Fall of the Soviet Empire (May 21-25)
9. Revolution and Regression (May 30-June 1)
Two of the following questions will appear on the midterm examination (Friday, April 27). You will be asked to write an essay on one of these questions. In planning your essay, please feel free to draw on a wide range of sources (lectures, texts, documents, films, drawings, etc.), but be sure to place the main emphasis on the course readings.
1. The First World War ended with the defeat of German militarism and shattering of the authoritarian monarchies and empires of Central and Eastern Europe. How then do you account for the ultimate failure of liberalism in the postwar era? What particular political, economic, and social factors tended to undermine the stability of European societies in this period?
2. The Bolsheviks, the Fascists, and the National Socialists created parties of a new type, designed less for electoral competition than for seizing and monopolizing political power. Choose any two of these three and compare and contrast them. You may wish to consider some (though not necessarily all) of the following factors: leadership, recruitment, structure, ideology, techniques of rule, sources of support.
3. Wars in 20th-century European history have set new standards for brutality and ferocity. Choose any two of the major wars we have studied (the First World War, the Russian Civil War, the Spanish Civil War), and consider the reasons for the severity and the duration of each, paying special attention to the sufferings of both soldiers and civilians.
4. Lenin and Stalin, Mussolini and Hitler - the great dictators have cast long shadows across the landscape of 20th-century European history. Choose any two of these leaders and compare and contrast their personalities and strategies. How did they achieve, consolidate, and use (or abuse) their power?
5. Why did certain regimes in the period between the wars systematically persecute, imprison, torture, and murder large numbers of their own citizens? Compare Stalin's terror with either Hitler's or Mussolini's.
Spring 2001
Instructor: Alice Yang Murray
Go to: http://humwww.ucsc.edu/history/history80i
Quarter: Spring 2001
Instructor: Edmund Burke, III
This course is the second in a two-quarter sequence on the history of the world and its interactions with the West. It explores the origins of the modern world from a new perspective. By 1750, Europe was on the verge of global hegemony as a result of far-reaching changes deriving from the industrial and democratic revolutions. The 19th and 20th centuries witnessed the export of this dual revolution to the rest of the world.
One result, despite continual resistance, was the establishment of an international division of labor and the incorporation of most world societies into the world economy. A second result was the division of the globe by the chief European states into spheres of influence, formal and informal empires, and the unprecedented expansion of white settlement in the Americas, Southern Africa, and Australia. How this occurred, and to what effect, forms the subject matter of this course.
Two concepts, nationalism and imperialism, will provide us with a way of discussing the interaction of the world and the West during the past two centuries. What is imperialism? What was its impact upon the old societies of Asia and Africa? What is nationalism? How did world societies seek to resist Western domination, and how were they eventually able to achieve independence?
Required Written Work: Three short papers, a midterm and choice of either a final exam or a term paper on an approved topic. (Term papers must go through two drafts.)
The following required books have been ordered by the Bay Tree Bookstore. All are in paperback. There will also be a Required Course Reader.
Recommended textbook: Peter Stearns, Stuart Schwartz, Michael Adas, World Civilizations, Vol. 2. (Harper-Collins)
a/o February 14, 2001
Instructor: Bruce Thompson
Office: 276 Stevenson, 459-3467
E-mail: brucet@cats.ucsc.edu
Office Hours MWF @9:30-10:30
Home Phone: (650) 326-3919
Among the major themes of this survey of modern European intellectual history are the development of new conceptions of modernity, and of language, sexuality, and personality at the end of the nineteenth century; the sequence of radical changes in the form and content of fiction, poetry, painting, and drama at the beginning of the twentieth century; the city as context and subject of modern art and social theory; and the impact of war, revolution, and totalitarianism on modern consciousness. The course will examine most of the major intellectual movements from the naturalism of the late nineteenth century through the structuralism of the late twentieth. Special attention will be paid to the relationship between marginality and creativity in modern European intellectual history. Examples include the contributions of exiles, emigrés, and expatriates to the genesis of modernism; the Jewish presence in Central and Eastern European literature and social theory; and the feminist critique of traditional gender roles.
I. March 28-30 THE GENESIS OF MODERNITY: NIETZSCHE AND BURCKHARDT
CITY: Basel
TOPICS: Nietzsche and the Death of God--Dead Metaphors: Nietzsche's Critique of Language--Burckhardt and the Genesis of the Modern--Burckhardt and Cultural History
READINGS: Nietzsche, "On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense" (1873)*; Burckhardt, chapters on "Personality," "Glory," in The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy*
II. April 2-6 GENDER WARS: IBSEN AND STRINDBERG
CITY: Munich
TOPICS: Ibsen, the Liberator--Family Legacies: Ibsen and Naturalism--Strindberg contra Ibsen: Fin de Siècle Misogyny--The Dance of Death: Strindberg, Wedekind, Munch
READINGS: Ibsen, A Doll's House (1878); Ghosts
(1881)
Strindberg, Miss Julie (1888) with Preface; The Father
(1887)
III. April 9-13 CASE HISTORIES: FREUD, SCHNITZLER, SIMMEL
CITIES: Vienna and Berlin
TOPICS: Vienna and the Agony of Liberalism--From Nora to Dora--Schnitzler and the Dance of Death--Simmel and the Metropolis
READINGS: Freud, Dora (1905); "A Special Type of Object Choice Made by Men"*; "On the Universal Tendency to Debasement in the Sphere of Love"*; "'Civilized' Morality and Modern Nervous Illness"*
Schnitzler, La Ronde (Hands Around), (c.1900)
Simmel, "The Metropolis and Mental Life"* (1904)
IV. April 16-20 THE SHOCK OF THE NEW: APOLLINAIRE, PICASSO, SEVERINI
CITIES: Paris and Rome
TOPICS: The Dreyfus Affair and the Intellectuals--Bohemia and the Avant-Garde--Modernism and Exoticism--Apollinaire, the Poet Assassinated--Cubism, Futurism, Surrealism
READINGS: Apollinaire, Calligrammes (c.1916)*
Gino Severini, The Life of a Painter (1983), chapters 1-4,
7-9*
V. April 23-27 WAR AND PEACE: RUSSELL & SASSOON; KEYNES & WOOLF
CITY: London
TOPICS: The Great War and Modern Memory--Russell and Aristocratic Liberalism-- Bloomsbury Liberalism--Bloomsbury Feminism
READINGS: Russell, Autobiography (selections)*
Sassoon, poems (1915-1918)
Keynes, Economic Consequences of the Peace (selection)*
Woolf, A Room of One's Own
VI. April 30-May 4 NIGHTMARES AND PARABLES: WEBER, MANN, BRECHT, KAFKA
CITIES: Berlin and Prague
TOPICS: The Iron Cage of Max Weber--Olympians and Bohemians in Weimar Culture: Mann and Brecht--Kafka: The Ghetto, the Court, and the Castle
READINGS:
Weber, "Science as a Vocation" (1919)*
Mann, "Disorder and Early Sorrow"; "Mario and the Magician"
(c.1924-1929)
Kafka, "Before the Law," "An Imperial Message" (c.1920)*
Brecht, poems* (1938-1940)
VII. May 7-11 COURAGE: ANNA AKHMATOVA AND NADEZHDA MANDELSTAM
CITY: St. Petersburg
TOPICS: A Generation that Squandered Its Poets--Akhmatova's Guest--Stalin's Terror-- Mrs. Mandelstam
READINGS: Akhmatova, poems (1935-1945)*
Mandelstam, Hope Against Hope (1970), chapters 1-3, 7-9, 11, 14, 19-21, 23, 25, 30, 32, 35-36, 47, 54, 56, 58, 60, 63, 67, 71, 73
Isaiah Berlin, "Meetings with Russian Writers" (1980)*
VIII. May 14-18 THE INTELLECTUAL RESISTANCE: SILONE, MILOSZ, HERBERT, SZYMBORSKA
CITIES: Rome and Warsaw
TOPICS: Silone and Fascism--The Picaresque Saint--The Poets of Poland
READINGS: Silone, Bread and Wine
Milosz, Herbert, Szymborska, poems*
IX. May 21-25 ENGAGEMENT AND ENSNAREMENT: SARTRE, CAMUS, BECKETT, WEIL
CITY: Paris
TOPICS: What is Existentialism?--Simone Weil: Gravity and Grace--Sartre vs. Camus-- The Theater of the Absurd
READINGS: Sartre, "The Wall" (1938); "Existentialism is a
Humanism" (1945)*
Camus, "The Myth of Sisyphus" (1944), "The Guest" (1950)*
Beckett, Waiting for Godot (1954)
Weil, The Iliad, Poem of Force (1939)*
X. May 30-June 1 STRUCTURALISM: LEVI-STRAUSS, BARTHES, FOUCAULT
CITY: Paris
TOPICS: What is Structuralism?--The Melancholy Science of Claude Levi-Strauss-- Roland Barthes Visits the Eiffel Tower--Foucault's Disciplines
READINGS: Levi-Strauss, "The Scope of Anthropology" (1960)*
Sontag, "The Anthropologist as Hero" (1968)*
Leach, "Levi-Strauss in the Garden of Eden" (1962)*
Barthes, "The Eiffel Tower" (1970)*
Foucault, "The Great Confinement" (1966)*
*Readings marked with an asterisk will be available either in the course reader or in the form of a handout.. A copy of the reader will be place on reserve at McHenry Library along with all of the other required texts.
Course requirements: participation in weekly discussion sections, and three papers of moderate length (approximately six pages each). If you are unable to attend any of the three discussion sections, then we'll ask you to write an additional paper.
Spring 2001
Instructor: Alexandra Stern
Go to: http://www.ic.ucsc.edu/~amstern/hist187
Spring 2001
Instructor: Alexandra Stern
Go to: http://www.ic.ucsc.edu/~amstern/hist196u