SWARTHMORE COLLEGE

DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY

HISTORY 31: REVOLUTIONARY ICONOCLASM

SPRING 2008

Bob Weinberg Office Hours:

Trotter 218 Mondays 11-12

8133 Tuesdays 1:30-3:30

rweinbe1 Thursdays 1:30-3:30

By Appointment

This course focuses on the dynamics of revolutions in Europe since the seventeenth century and the efforts of revolutionaries to transform their societies and cultures. In particular, we will examine the struggle for rights of citizenship and the various ways Europeans have sought to achieve rights of citizenship through social and political upheaval. The following themes--revolutionary ideologies, class conflict, the woman’s question, and the cultures, representations and mythologies of revolution—play a critical role in our exploration.

Course Requirements

Attendance and active participation

Two 5-page papers

Class Presentation on Final Paper

10-page final paper (prospectus due April 15)

Final Exam

All students are expected to read the College’s policy on academic honesty and integrity that appears in the Swarthmore College Bulletin. The work you submit must be your own, and plagiarism will be penalized. I will submit papers suspected of containing plagiarized materials to the College Judiciary Committee. Finally, unexcused absences will result in a lower final grade.

The following books are on reserve in McCabe and are available for purchase in the bookstore:

Paul Buhle, Wobblies!

Fedor Gladkov, Cement

Jennifer Heuer, The Family and the Nation: Gender and Citizenship in Revolutionary France, 1789-1830

Semen Kanatchikov A Radical Worker in Tsarist Russia

William Sewell, Work and Revolution in France

Mark Steinberg, Voices of Revolution

All other readings are on Blackboard (BB).

January 22:Introduction to Course

January 24: What is the “Moral Economy?”

William Everard, “The True Levellers’ Standard Advanced” BB

E. P. Thompson, “The Moral Economy of the English Crowd” BB

January 29: Defining the Citizen--1789 and the French Revolution

Abbe Sieyes, “What is the Third Estate?” BB

Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen BB

Text selection on French Revolution

January 31: Citizenship in Action--1789 and the Women’s Question

Heuer, Jennifer Ngaire, The Family and the Nation : Gender and Citizenship in Revolutionary France, 1789-1830

Louis Prudhomme, “On the Influence of the Revolution on Women” BB

Discussion of Citizenship under the Proposed New Constitution BB

Olympe de Gouges, “The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen” BB

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Emile” BB

Gaspard Chaumette, “Speech at the General Council of the City Government of Paris Denouncing Women’s Political Activism” BB

February 5: Citizenship in Action--1789 and the Jewish Question

Zalkind Hourwitz, “Vindication of the Jews” BB

Debate on the Eligibility of Jews for Citizenship BB

Berr Isaac Berr, “Letter of a Citizen to His Fellow Jews” BB

Count Mole, “Napoleon’s Instructions to the Assembly of Jewish Notables BB

February 7: Citizenship in Action--The Potential for Tyranny

Robespierre, “The Principles of Revolutionary Government” and “The Republic of Virtue” BB

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “The Social Contract” BB

Saint-Just, “A Justification of the Terror” BB

Jean Sellon, “The Crime of Indifference” BB

February 12: Making Revolution--The Marxian Variant

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, “The Communist Manifesto” BB

February 14: Making Revolution--1789 and Workers in 1848

William Sewell, Work and Revolution in France

February 19: Making Revolution--The Paris Commune, 1871

Documents on the Paris Commune BB

February 21: And Still Other Ways of Making Revolution

Eduard Bernstein, “Evolutionary Socialism” BB

Rosa Luxemburg, “Reform or Revolution” BB

Emma Goldman, “Syndicalism: Its Theory and Practice” and “Anarchism: What It Really Stands For” BB

Mikhail Bakunin, “ The Paris Commune and the Idea of the State“ and “Revolutionary Catechism” BB

February 26: Karl Marx in the Russian Context

Vladimir Lenin, “What is to be Done?” BB

Leon Trotsky, “Peculiarities of Russia’s Development” BB

February 28: The Making of a Revolutionary--From Peasant to Bolshevik

Semen Kanatchikov A Radical Worker in Tsarist Russia

March 4: Making Revolutions in Russia

March 6: Class and Citizenship in 1917

Mark Steinberg, Voices of Revolution

March 18: Using the Library

March 20: Transforming Society and Culture after the Revolution

Alexandra Kollontai, “Theses on Communist Morality,” “The Family and the Communist State,” and “Make Way for Winged Eros” BB

P. Vinogradskaia, “The `Winged Eros’ of Comrade Kollontai” BB

Nadezhda Krupskaya, “What a Communist Ought to be Like” BB

Leon Trotsky, “Habit and Custom,” “The Struggle for Cultured Speech,” and “`Thou’ and `You’ in the Red Army” BB

March 25: Revolution Off-Course?

Emma Goldman, Excerpts from My Disillusionment in Russia BB

“The Kronstadt Revolt: What We Are Fighting For” BB

March 27: Transforming Society and Culture after the Revolution

Fedor Gladkov, Cement

April 1: Race, Nation and Citizenship

Adolf Hitler, Excerpts from Mein Kampf BB

Benito Mussolini, “The Political and Social Doctrine of Fascism” BB

Jakob Graf, “Heredity and Racial Biology for Students” BB

April 3: Making Revolution in the US

Paul Buhle, Wobblies!

Film: The Wobblies (90 minutes)

April 8: Revolution and the Cult of Personality

Film: Triumph of the Will (115 minutes)

Baldur von Schirach, “The Sun as a Symbol of Dedicated Youth” and “The Hitler Youth” BB

Otto Dietrich, “A Flight Through the Storm and Hitler’s Mission,” BB

“Ilich Will Wake Up Soon” BB

April 10: Nazi Culture

Film: The Architecture of Doom (119 minutes)

“Hitler Defines Culture in Defining Art” BB

April 15: The Fate of Women under Fascism and Communism

“The New Family Ideal” BB

Hanns Anderlahn, “National Socialism Has Restored the Family” BB

Ludwig Leonhardt, “The German Volk Is an Interlacing of Families” BB

Hermann Paull, “Marriage, Morality, and Property” BB

Adolf Hitler, “The Tasks of Women” BB

Alfred Rosenberg, “Emancipation from the Emancipation Movement” BB

Joseph Goebbels, “The Female Bird” and “Women That We Can Love” BB

April 17: The End of Revolutionary Dreaming--The Stalinist Aesthetic

Maksim Gorkii, “Socialist Realism” BB

“Stalin’s Social Ideal” BB

“The First Cruise” BB

M. Ilin, The Story of the Great Plan BB

“Muddle Instead of Music” BB

April 22: The Rejection of the West

Muslim Brotherhood

“Documents of Imam Khomeini” BB

April 24: Citizenship and Revolution in Retrospect

April 29 and May 1: Presentations

Final Paper Due by Noon on May 17