The Middle Ages was more than knights and castles, swains and serfs. It was a period of power grabbing on a titanic scale, popes, emperors, kings, princes, cardinals, archbishops, mistresses, poi-sons, intrigues galore. In the end, modern Europe, as we know it, was emerging. Probes the origins of radical discontent in America from Colonial times to the New Left and student movements of the 1960s. Particular emphasis will be placed upon pre-Marxian utopian socialism, the Marxian socialist movement around 1900, socialist developments within the labor movement, and the history of the Communist Party of the U.S. Revolutionary tactics, major historical events, and ideologies receive approximately equal coverage.
Assignments illustrate particular radical viewpoints.
World War II is often seen as a continuation of the unresolved conflict of the 1914-18 war. The 1918 armistice that ended World War I failed to give a concrete victory to either side. The Treaty of Versailles not only failed to resolve the issues but compounded the problem by adding new injustices to the old ones. This course examines the origins, the outbreak, and the course of World War I to understand more clearly the Versailles Treaty and subsequent events. WWI and WWII are increasingly being viewed as one conflict interrupted by a 20-year truce.