1 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

Colonialism and empire and their relation to democracy are ancient themes. We begin the class by discussing these themes in Thucydides’ fourth century work, The Peloponnesian War.

Pericles’ Funeral Oration
Cleon’s speech in the Mytilenean debate

2 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

According to what is sometimes called the ‘imperial boomerang effect’, fascist brutality in a nation’s colonies has a “boomerang effect,” bringing fascist counter-insurgency methods to the home nation. In short, colonialism abroad leads to the normalization of fascism at home. In this class, we will provide evidence for the reality of the boomerang effect with German midcentury fascism.

Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism
Selections from Isabel Hull, Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany
Selections from Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost
Tadeusz Borowski, “The People who are Walking”, in Here in Our Auschwitz

3 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

Hannah Arendt’s analysis of the relation between colonialism and fascism in Origins of Totalitarianism is central to 20th Century philosophy. In this class, via selections from this text, we will acquaint ourselves with this analysis.

Hannah Arendt, Chapters 6, 7, 8 of Origins of Totalitarianism

4 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

In the 1950s, the Gikuyu tribe, Kenya’s largest ethnic group, led an insurgency against the British occupiers of Kenya. This insurgency was called by the British the Mau Mau rebellion, and the insurgents Mau Mau rebels. The Gikuyu called themselves the Land and Freedom Army. The British seized all the traditional Gikuyu land, including the best land for agriculture. They also brutally suppressed the traditional Gikuyu religion, its history, its cultural practices, and its native language. All of this was an effort, ultimately to extinguish Gikuyu identity. In this class, we consider forms of colonialism that seek to annihilate a country’s cultural practices, history, and language.

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, “Decolonizing the Mind”
W.E.B. Du Bois, “The White Masters of the World”

5 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

Continuing themes from the fourth class, we will explore the methods by which culture, history, and identity are destroyed by colonial and totalitarian powers.

Selections from David Wallace Adams, Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875-1928, selections
Victoria Amelina, “Nothing Bad Has Ever Happened”
Selections from Timothy Snyder, Black Earth: Holocaust as History and Warning

6 серпня

10:00 - 12:00офлайн

In this class, we will watch perhaps the classic anti-colonial movie, about the Algerian insurgency against the French occupiers of Algeria.

The Battle of Algiers (film)

7 серпня

18:00 - 21:00офлайн

Frantz Fanon is the 20th century’s greatest theorist of colonialism and anti-colonialism. We will begin this class with a discussion of his essay “On Violence”, about the role of nationalism in anti-colonial struggle (as well as the form nationalism must take after the anti-colonial struggle is successful, to prevent fascism arising in the formerly colonized nation). 
Frantz Fanon, “On Violence”
Selections from Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks

8 серпня

18:00 - 21:00офлайн

In this class, we will consider fascism as an ideology and a practice, beginning with the texts of fascism’s most famous 20th century leader.
Selections from Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf.Jason Stanley, One Hundred Years of FascismJason Stanley and Eliyahu Stern, Putin’s Fascist IdeologyJason Stanley, Trump’s Neofascism and American Racism