Page 39. Paulo Bacigalupi sets a stage for Emiko, one of the four main characters in The Windup Girl that we read about this week. I don’t mean to suggest that we haven’t encountered problematic writing, character, character development, or plot conflict yet. I also don’t mean to suggest that there are not other interesting passages to […]
Today in class we were focusing a lot on Yod and how he wasn’t treated as if he had feelings or choices, but by what we have read it does seem that this cyborg makes his own choices. I wanted to address Yod and his “inability to understand the bonds of blood” because I feel […]
The part of this book that has stood out the most for me so far was chapter 9, revising the family album. There’s a lot of information and theoretical thinking here I feel between changing your gender even if it’s for a night and talking about Malkah and her past relationships. How you can be […]
Much of this book revolves around Jim and his own problems, but his travels bring him an understanding of the world he lives in. Jim seems to be raised in a considerably “normal” American household; Mom stays at home while Dad goes to work at a pretty well paying job. We don’t hear of any […]
I think we all have those immediate changes in personality that Jim displays in chapter 73, when we are accusing our parents of things when we are upset of don’t understand things. I don’t understand what my father does to support our family, or my mother for that matter. I know my dad is in […]
A common theme in these books we have been reading has been free love or societies where sex isn’t a big deal. I think Sierra in class today talked about how when people aren’t worried about who other people are sleeping with there is a lot more time and space in brains for information that […]
In class we were talking about the possibility of other universes and how each one would change based on each decision one makes. That being said, you and I are very different people and so each of my decisions create a new universe for each decision I make and each decision you make creates a […]
I thought it was interesting on page 53 how Janet was talking about taboos in her society, because it’s so different than here that I can’t see how anything can be taboo. I understand it is a thing but I think when I am trying to get the framework of a story or a new […]
Living today, I think one of the most important resources that we as humans should have access to is birth control. On the island in Huxley’s book, the people have a free love, attitude, and complete access to birth control. This prevents the island from creating a population than cannot reasonably be fed or clothed, as well as maintains […]
As of this class all I knew of the Ukraine was a recent conflict starting in the fall of 2013, and some issues with Soviet Union. As of that I didn’t know much about the conflict between Russia, Ukraine and the surrounding Slavic area going from the North Sea to Turkey, when in reality this […]
It’s hard to imagine antisemitism today, that individuals still have hatred toward the Jewish community… what I struggle to comprehend is why. I understand some people just hate because they do, but this problem was over 50 years ago. Showing us that history never really goes away, that one problem is truly never over it […]
Over the last few years Russia under the leadership of Vladimir Putin, has been displaying a number of aggressive forge policies in opposition to or simply without our regard to the wants or interests of the west. This can be seen in a number of political moves made both by and in Russia under Putin. […]
Off course, this is an opinion piece on Vladimir Putin’s power based on information read in C.J. Chivers. That is, Putin is proving to be a modern day Emperor in the classic style of the late Roman Republic, with more sprinkles of nostalgia’s for communism and Czar Rule. I never used to understand why people […]
DISCLAIMER: Nothing in this post is meant to express or imply the author’s affirmation or denial of the existence or nature of any God or Gods. In Pope Benedict XVI’s Europe’s Crisis of Culture, the author states quite clearly his deep concern for the moral well-being of Europe in this time. He laments the declining […]
In this class, we’ve gone over nearly 100 years of European history. We’ve covered wars, peace, politics, everyday life, and dramatic social change. The 20th Century was undoubtedly an incredibly dynamic period of history in Europe. It may be difficult to condense over 100 years of European history into one paragraph, but I think it […]
Europe’s Crisis of Culture, a lecture by Pope Benedict XVI address to the convent of Saint Scholastica in Subiaco, Italy, he mentions how the constitution for the European Union fails to mention anything about Christianity.[1] He states that the foundation of European civilization is built on Christianity. Why though does he state that Europe was […]
Much is known about the immigration crisis that the United States has. Thousands of illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America make the trip across the border and try to make a living in the United States. What many here may not know is that Europe is facing the same situation. Instead of immigrants from […]
“We’ll be remembered more for what we destroy than we create” Throughout the course of Europe of the 20th Century, we look at a whole different side of the world that typically we never hear about. Whenever we learn history, it is usually from the American perspective. But this time it was totally different. Instead […]
The readings and class discussion about Putin made me look around to see what was being talked about in current news concerning the Ukraine. On general American media it was nothing almost as if the situation was already considered irrelevant. The fact that American media has decided as long as something doesn’t directly threaten the […]
It is sad to think that anti-Semitism is becoming a larger problem in today’s world despite everything that has happened to the Jewish people in world history. As mentioned in class, the Jews are the scapegoat for people’s problems. This reminds me of people in the United States blaming Mexican immigrants for unemployment. The world […]
Recently whenever I turn on the news, I see more and more conflict around eastern Europe and Russia. As we discussed in class, these conflicts that are taking place in that part of the world seem to have their origins centuries back into our worlds history. How then, are these conflicts involving ethnic tensions and […]
Communism has been a major historical theme, since Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels popularized the communist ideology in their 1848 work,Communist Manifesto.Communism sounds like a good idea. In the purest form of communism, all people hold all land, factories and so on in trust, as it were. In this way, all goods are shared equally by the people. […]
All semester long we have been studying the rise and fall of European nations, ideals, and everything in between. But one thing still seems to remain – tensions between different ethnic cultures. We start off the 20th century with the First World War, one of major factors in it: minor ethnic groups wanting independence. This […]
Learning about Vladimir Putin today and even over the past couple weeks, it is a no-brainer to say he’s a mastermind. It’s said best when Professor Ganyard says that Putin is playing a game, and that’s he’s playing it very skillfully. It could be […]
During the 20th Century there were a number of acts that conflicted with European peace. Three major aspects that made it hard for Europe to stay peaceful with each other were, immigration, terrorist, and failing democracy. Within the European countries the new stream of immigration started to cause friction and tension. Many of the newcomers worked […]
The early 1990’s brought something new to the table in Europe, positive change. The twentieth century in Europe had consisted mostly of war, violence, and corrupt government. The European Union (EU), previously the European Community, was formally established in 1993. The EU is an international organization that regulates laws and policies to try over its […]
When starting a new book you never know what you’re going to get, and How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed is no different. I assumed it would be slightly like an autobiography, a person going through a short period of time (maybe three years). Not so much for Slavenka to go back and forth […]
Prior to reading Slavenka Drakulic’s well-written novel “How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed”, I was not aware of the daily trials that communism placed on those under the rule, namely the women. As I read, I saw a pattern that we discussed in class; the pattern of choice. Drakulic recalls an instance when her […]
While reading How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed by Slevenka Drakulić, one of the main points that stuck out was the populace’s lack of Choice under Communist rule. There is only prune compote left in the grocery story, you do not have a choice of anything else (1). You want to buy a torte? […]
I found it very interesting how Drakulic illustrates throughout the book ways in which communism stunted individualism for the people at this time. “Without a choice of cosmetics and clothes, with bad food and hard work and no spare time, it wasn’t hard to create the special kind of uniformity that comes out of an […]
The book touches upon the differences in worldview between the East and West quite a bit. One key split that stood out to me was chapter 13 during the conference on feminism. (1) I think it is often overlooked that our way of thinking isn’t the only one. One of the biggest factors that cause […]
Communism has been the common practice throughout European society in the 1980’s but it was on that not everyone always supported. It made everyone feel like they were the same to everyone around them and that they lacked individual qualities as well. In Slavenka Drakulic’s How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed, many of these ideas of individualism […]
I found the Novel How We Survived Communism and even Laughed to be a very insightful book about how people were treated and cared for in Communist Yugoslavia, an area of which I know very little outside of the wars that took place in the early 1990s. I found it very interesting how the author […]
Slavenka Drakulic’s book How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed is a great source for exploring the lives of women in Eastern Europe. Drakulic writes about women and many of the circumstances they lived through in a communist society. I find this book valuable because of the things discussed. I do not generally find myself […]
Culture differences stands out to me as a problem in the world. One great example of culture difference can be found in the book “How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed.” The book covers how different it was to live in the USSR with some comparisons to the U.S. culture and society. As discussed […]
Throughout women’s lives or really lack of a real life, they have been harassed through society. Not the only ones to go through this kind of treatment, men too have gone harassed if they did not fit the typical mans image… but that’s for another post. Through Slavenka Drakulic’s book “How we Survived Communism and […]
The limits of capitalism are shown vividly in Slavenka Drakulic’s book, How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed. She points out that there is so much waste in the west, while the amount of poor, beggars, and homeless happens to be very high. Drakulic’s trip to New York shows the difference between a capitalist society […]
When I was a kid I think my parents bought me hundreds of dolls. Barbie, Polly, etc. I remember having a vibrant imagination and creating expanse plots for the doll, which I usually decided was a non-realistic version of me. And no I don’t mean the two big mounds on the chest or the tiny […]
In her book How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed, Slavenka Drakulic demonstrates how the communist ideal of equality resulted in a loss of femininity for women. In the communist countries men and women were supposed to be seen as equal, but that ideal was taken to the extreme and the communist woman was […]
I found it incredibly fascinating that in the novel How we Survived Communism and Even Laughed by Slavenka Drakulic the women were unable to truly be angry at men who had done them wrong. The most striking instance of this is the woman whose husband cheated on her with a younger woman but still this […]
Since Yugoslavia was a Communist nation with a planned economy centered around industry, there was little in the way of consumer goods. Yugoslavian people had to make do with what precious few privately owned goods they had. Whether it was washing machines, which were often times owned as status symbols and conversation pieces instead of […]
Your laundry can say a thousand words, that is one thing that I learned from reading the book How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed by Slavenka Drakulic. In her book, Slavenka has such a deep understanding of life and circumstance and how they work together. I took a family trip my junior year […]
As I was reading Slavenka Drakulic’s book, How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed, one theme kept jumping out at me. That would be the feeling that everyone was the same. I thought that was quite a feeling until I realized that was the whole point of Communism, for everyone to be equal. One example […]
It is one thing to be complacent about the type of car one owns, the choice of fruit one picked at the grocery store, or even the type of hair dye one might choose at her local convenience store, but to be complacent when any one of these options aren’t choices within one’s society, it is an issue I […]
So after reading this book, which I highly enjoyed even though its main messages deal with political crap ideals, there was point I found interesting that she made. Not that Drakulic didn’t make MANY wonderful points, but this one I really liked aside from the “beauty” discussion we had on Tuesday. It’s from page 97, […]
“How we survived communism and even laughed” is a great book explaining what it was like for women in the time of Communism in Eastern Europe. The communist ideology was that everyone needs to be equal and that way there will be no rebellion against communism. Women in Eastern Europe didn’t have as many choices […]
While reading How we survived Communism and Even Laughed by Slavenka Drakulic, not many of the people their have a choice in anything. They are told what to do and they say “how high,” and not think of the other things they could do. Dr Ganyard mentioned in class the “Mind Culture Box,” if we […]
One of the first things that always comes to mind for me when I think of communism is uniformity. After all it is a socioeconomic system that is based on equality and having no different classes. However, after reading Slavenka Drakulic’s How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed, I was still stunned and surprised what people had […]
As of recently some of the readings I have found to be interesting but not capturing my attention like the books we read. What I did find interesting was the generation gap discussion we had during class. That for both generations they could not understand what they did or wanted. That this was the change […]
In the novel How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed written by Slavenka Drakulic illustrates what life was like for her growing up in a country influenced by communism. Throughout this novel there were many instances that surprised me that people during this time had to live with. The first most striking item to me was the washing process of clothes that […]
In the 1980s, Gorbachev tries to reform communism in the Soviet Union. Again the Soviet Union is obsessed with the agriculture industry. They have seen how the United States have been more successful with their agriculture so the Soviets have pursued this industry throughout the 20th century. The problem there is that the Soviet Union’s […]
The economic and social reforms that Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to implement in order to save the faltering Soviet economy and government, seemed to genuinely be attempts to bring about a more positive change in the Soviet state. For the first time since its creation the Soviet Union seemed to genuinely want to put the needs […]
“Frank Zappa was one of the gods of the Czech underground, I thought of him as a friend. Whenever I feel like escaping from the world of the Presidency, I think of him.”— Václav Havel Official opposition to Rock Music, particularly Western Rock Music, by almost all East-Bloc Communist governments is an established fact. […]
In Mikhail Gorbachev’s address “On Reconstructing the Party’s Personnel Policy”, he covered the many ways that the Party needed to reinvent itself, ranging from economic development to reinstating the Lenninist principles. One of his points of reconstruction that stood out to me was his idea that the lack of moral incentive among the people was […]
It is commonly thought that the NATO nations “won” the Cold War simply by outspending the Soviet Union through military buildup and technological research. While this was eventually the case the Eastern Bloc countries suffered from an even bigger problem. Both sides indeed tried to make a passable peace throughout the region of […]
Mikhail Gorbachev agreement with the west on disarmament was one of the single most important actions taken by a Soviet leader during the Cold War era. Without the agreement and forward thinking of Mikhail Gorbachev it might have taken years for the Cold War to finally end. In October of 1986, when Gorbachev and President […]
It seems strange to think that with the fall of the U.S.S.R Europe entered into a period of relative peace, the likes of which they had not felt since the beginning of the twentieth century. This must have felt very strange to the people who lived through it; […]
“Marxism Communism has never been implemented.” Dr Ganyard. So if Marx’s idea was never their so there is different types of Communism? Like any type of ism, there can be different versions since everyone has different views on ideology. Russia/Soviet Union has had different ideas of communism like Lenin’s idea of communism, then Stalin’s , […]
Gorbachev spoke of how the original socialist party revolution had the objective of putting the needs and interests of working man as the focal point of their agenda. Under this type of rule the socialist party thrived and achieved success in political, economic, social and cultural, and intellectual development. Initially it provided value to have […]
Vaclav Havel (1936-2011) was a political dissident in Czechoslovakia, who also became president in 1989, and helped influence other movements in Eastern communist countries during the 1970s and 1980s.1 In his speech, “The Power of the Powerless,” he explores how ideology deceives and appeases the people. He uses the example of a greengrocer who puts […]
Living in the communist society of the USSR as a political leader seems very complex and something I would not want to do. As an average citizen in USSR, braining washing through the use of propaganda, you are taught not to think. Whatever the leaders of the communist party say is the […]
Over many of decades throughout the 20th Century, the idea of Communism has always had it’s general idea but every ruler was quite different. To me it brought an idea of the sense that communism could never be a successful thing; at least not for a very long time. By the beginning the 1980’s, you […]
By the mid-1980s, the leadership of many Communist nations in Europe consisted of 60+ year-old men who lived through World War II and wanted to reform their nations’ shattered economies. Yugoslavia lost its great leader Tito in 1981, who successfully led bands of partisans to victory in WWII and managed to keep his patchwork nation […]
In 1985 Gorbachev comes into office and with him another form of communism, which was intentional on his part. It is stated by several different sources that he recognized a need for change in both politics and the economy. It is interesting to see how the type of communism he came up under influenced his […]
The USSR eventually lost the Cold War. America had the most money, power, and a better stable government. The USSR went through Perestroika which combined Russian Communism and Capitalism. Almost every 15-20 years a new type of Communism would evolve or change back. One of the new types was called Market Socialism. It kind of […]
As new ways were being adapted into European countries such as Americanizing. Many countries started to eliminate old ways of thinking and start following the ways of democracy and socialism. For the Soviet Union this process was the most challenging. The first thing that happened in the Soviet Union was the communication on nuclear weapons. Soviet Union believed […]
Mikhail Gorbachev foresaw the end of the Soviet Union. Rebellion and riots were taking place all over and he knew he must act quickly, or else it was doomed. He tried to save communism by doing anything he could. Many decent and somewhat noble changes were implemented bu Gorbachev to try and save communism. He realized that in […]
Perestroika means overcoming the stagnation process, breaking down the braking mechanism, creating a dependable and effective mechanism for acceleration of social and economic progress and giving it greater dynamism.Perestroika means mass initiative. It is the conference of development of democracy, socialist self-government, encouragement of initiative and creative endeavor, improved water and disciplined, more glasnost, criticism […]
“Divorce rates, suicide, bribery, corruption, blackmarketeering, absenteeism, theft, teenage drinking, “hooliganism”, and violent crimes rose in 1980″ 1. This quote from Eric Dorn Brose’s book entitled, A History of Europe in the Twentieth Century, truly depicts the lifestyle and status of the Soviet Union during the 70’s and into the 80’s. Although Western nations were […]
The terrorist organization called the Red Army Faction (RAF) is introduced in the visually stunning movie The Baader Meinhof Complex by Uli Edel. Not to sound like the back of a DVD release, but the movie really is way to pretty to be about terrorism. The RAF are made up of individuals that together share […]
Through the reading of “The Spy Who Came in From the Cold” by John Le Carre the idea of humanity and the relation of coldness when having a lack of humanity. By using Leamas to tell the story, Le Carre was able to put an emotional spin through his spy novel. What drew my attention was […]
At only five minutes into the film the amount of violence as well as downright craziness shows a glimpse at the rest of the film. The amount of violence that occurred in only a short amount of time is astonishing. Although a movie I believe that is still captured a lot of the horrendous acts […]
In class, we discussed the definition of terrorism. What is it? Were the RAF members from The Baader Meinhof Complex movie freedom fighters or terrorists? By definition, terrorists are a non-sovereign entity committing acts of violence meant to invoke terror. This means that terrorists’ targets are usually civilians, and they usually work with surprise attacks. […]
When reading the section in Eric Brose’s Europe in the Twentieth Century, The Irish Problem page378-380. I learned that there was two different types of terrorist IRA’s: The IRA and the Provincial IRA. One did more than the other, the difference is the leadership of the IRA weakened with a revolt, thus the younger generation […]
After World War II there was a booming economy in Europe. There were plenty of jobs for everyone in both the inner city and suburb areas. Plus, there wasn’t much education needed to get these types of jobs. Coal was a huge industry post World War II providing many jobs for the economy. However, technology […]
I find it quite interesting how the West German Government considered the Red Army Faction to be a terrorist organization while the RAF considered themselves a Marxist-Leninist term “faction” or anti-imperialists. The RAF was a group sharing a common political purpose in which they were such a small percentage and lacked much strength. The ideas […]
The difference between a man who faces death for the sake of an idea and an imitator who goes in search of martyrdom is that whilst the former expresses his idea most fully in death it is the strange feeling of bitterness which comes from failure that the latter really enjoys; the former rejoices in […]
The Baader Meinhof Complex was a rather interesting film in how it presents the issues within the 1970s in Germany. While viewing this film, I personally felt exhausted by the violence because it was constant and it seemingly did not change the circumstances in which the people were living. After contemplating the points discussed in […]
As we mentioned in class the Cold War is often seen as U.S.A vs U.S.S.R and that we overlook just how much of an impact that the choices made during the Cold War had on the world we know today. The movie, The Baader Meinhof Complex begins with the backlash to western nations supporting the […]
The similarities between the United States and Europe continue to be seen the further along we go into the 20th century. This time we see that the 1960s and 1970s were rather similar also. The economy was turning sour and the world was facing a new set of problems. By the mid-1960s, World War II […]
In history, the 1970’s goes to be unremembered. The 1970’s to me we was not only a decade we don’t remember, in Europe, it’s a decade they wish to forget as well. The economy during this time was quite rough. According to Eric Brose’s A History of Europe in the Twentieth Cenury, Britains workforce has […]
I honestly have no idea what to blog about for this week as the readings are becoming more and more dull, not to mention the years of the Cold War are by far my least favorite. But perhaps there is light at the end of the tunnel with Brose’s sections from chapter 9 about women’s […]
What I found interesting while reading Brose was how the change in environmental attitudes was changing as early as the late 1950’s through the early part of the 1960’s. Brose states that many scientist, politicians, and common people of the 1960’s wrote off such names as Elin Waegner and Rachel Carson as cranks for their […]
The film this week sparked an interesting discussion concerning the definition of terrorists and how that term is only relevant based on ones point of view. When considering this it is important to understand that the RAF served as a force of freedom fighters for many while those they were fighting against preferred to label […]
The German film “The Baader Meinhof Complex” was directed by Uli Edel and released in 2008.1 It chronicles the rise of the Red Army Faction (RAF) in West Germany during the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. It mainly focuses on the three early leaders of the movement – Ulrike Meinhof, Andreas Baader, and Gudrun […]
Semantics: One Person’s Terrorist is another’s Freedom Fighter I found the movie The Baader Meinhof complex to be very interesting, especially interesting when viewing the semantics of from the sides of West Germany and the Red Army Faction. To the Red Army Faction, they saw themselves as freedom fighters, people who were risking their lives […]
The R.A.F. saw the United States and Western Germany as imperialist powers. They disliked the fact that they went into other countries and imposed their will. So, their response was to attempt to impose their will through violence. Isn’t that kind of what they were complaining about? The idea that blowing up a department store, […]
Not even 136 years after the student revolutions that swept Paris, the city found itself again facing mass uprisings. Just as in Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables and the Revolution of 1848, students all over Paris took to the streets to loudly voice their displeasure against the government. Even though the students of 1968 protested against the Vietnam […]
The time following WWII was a time of great change. During the time from the 1940s to the 70s, minorities began to demand change from governments and peers, workers began to demand change from laws and employers, and citizens began to demand change from their governments. Where was the change for the women though? Throughout […]
Throughout the 1920s-1940s the idea of a democracy rule was an idea being passed around Europe, but many countries ended up choosing communism or fascism. Now that the Cold War is ending the idea of Democracy has influenced the European countries. Many Europeans have been Americanize, adapting the types of practices and styles that American […]
I found this movie to be quiet interesting, because of the way that this movie presents itself. This movie brings in many different emotions and it really drags you in. I think it was great that they made a movie about the side of the murderer and followed the story on why the murder was […]
It amazes me that in the 1960s, many of the adults who lived during World War Two, did not feel that punishing Nazis for their war crimes was necessary. In 1962, only 20% of West German’s agreed that a plot in 1944 to assassinate Hitler was justified. [1] This small number is absolutely mind-boggling. At […]
The 1970’s is normally lost to how important the 70’s was. The 1960’s and the 1980’s overshadows the 70’s. A new kind of music was created in the 1970’s. Punk Rock was made up starting with the band, “The Sex Pistols.” The Sex Pistols were viewed as a wild band. According to Eric Brose book […]
After watching the film titled, The Baader Meinhof Complex, I was educated on the circumstances of Europe and even the United States at this point in history. The continent was still in turmoil and many events occurred that truly seem remarkable in today’s society. After trying to unite Europe, nations such as France and Germany […]
Paris in much of 1968 was in turmoil. Civil unrest would be a simple way of describing how many students and workers felt in the country. It started in the month of May when some students took to some demonstrating by doing occupation protests. Eventually, the protest turned violent and the students were met my […]
Through the reading of “The Spy Who Came in From the Cold” by John Le Carre the idea of humanity and the relation of coldness when having a lack of humanity. By using Leamas to tell the story, Le Carre was able to put an emotional spin through his spy novel. What drew my attention […]
When people hear “consumerism,” they think about the Western World, and their advances in technology, especially after World War II. They think “Americanization,” and American goods being sold everywhere. It doesn’t occur to the average person that there was also a huge increase of consumerism going on in Eastern Europe. Production grew by 60% from […]
Communism in the East was losing the production of goods battle with the United States in the late 1950s. “The U.S. productivity and per capita consumer income stood two to three times higher (1).” So the Soviets looked to agriculture to solve this situation. However, there are problems with farming in the Soviet Union. The […]
In the mid-1900s the U.S. seemed to be at the center of the world. It became a world superpower after World War II and its influence spread everywhere, especially in Europe. The U.S. was an economic and industrial powerhouse. It was a time of cultural sharing where influences spread from one country to the […]
As I was reading Milovan Djilas’ document on the reality and state of Communist Parties in Communist nations, I couldn’t help but think of the present state of affairs right here in the “good ol’ USA.” Djilas states that in Communist nations, all power lies in the hands of the leaders of the one sanctioned […]
British invasion of the US though music. Many different bands have come a huge hit in the US during this era of the 1960’s like Rolling Stones, and the Beatles. But what was interesting was the give and take between the contents, not many of the European countries wanted Americanization but the US wanted British […]
We mentioned in class how there was an increase in new technologies during this period and the more I think about it the more I am amazed at just how many new appliances were introduced. There have been many points in history that saw booms in new innovations but I think the interesting thing about […]
In the text Brose discussed some of the many perspectives as to why many of the European nations in the 1960s seemed to reject Americanization. One thing that really stands out to me was Brose’s statement that historians of the period debated whether a process of “Americanization” was actually underway, or, rather, a kind of […]
What struck me about this week’s readings was that anti-German sentiment was still running strong roughly 20 years after the end of the Second World War. Brose recounts President Kennedy’s trip to Berlin in 1963 and remarks, “this residual anti-Germanism trickled down to White House staffers, who began making fun of the Berliners as the […]
Yugoslavia went harkened back to the original ideas of Karl Marx and produced an interesting economy which almost appeared to combine some aspects of socialism with capitalism. Many great changes occurred from 1950 to 1965 which created what could be considered market socialism. The ideal factory of Marx would be one in which the workers […]
During the time following WWII and during the Cold war there was also this unspoken Industrial war taking place. The 1950s were a time of great technological and industrial advancement, in great part because of the conflicts taking place before and during the Cold war. These advancements occurred much faster because the conflicts required countries […]
The debate of Americanization is something that can be looked at from many perspectives especially when considering the history of the European nations. These are countries that had dealt heavily with the experiences of war and being conquered. Due to this it made them very volatile towards anything that could be perceived as an invasion. […]
Americanization was seen as a way for which European countries to take American items from trade that they really enjoyed and expressed great gratitude for such ideas. In America, items such as Rock Bands, Lego’s, German cars, and many other goods were seen as just everyday things for Americans to enjoy. Yes, the U.S during […]
In the reading The New Class, Milovan Djilas, you see very critical comments about how communism has veered away from its overall goal of becoming a classless society. Djilas states that communism created a new class called “Political Bureaucracy.” The new class may be said to be made up of those who have special privileges […]
With the rise of communism, and the fall of the ruling classes of Russia and in the other communist satellite states and Yugoslavia, led to the emergence of a new dominate subsection of these societies, the bureaucracy. Djilas argues that the communist revolutions have not achieved their goals of equal class less nations; in fact […]
I find it interesting that so many countries were terrified of their culture becoming like another. The U.S. was scared of becoming like the Russians and having Communism. Russia wanted nothing to do with the United States. And the same went for other European countries. European countries were even worried about each other. Charles De […]
The Spy Who Came in from the Cold is a 1963 Cold War spy novel by British author John Le Carre. It has become famous for its portrayal of Western espionage methods as morally inconsistent with Western democracy and values. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold occurs during the heightened-alert politico-military tensions that characterised the late 1950s and […]
In the 1950s and 1960s, improved technology was making it faster and easier to ship things overseas. The United States, which was in the post-war economic boom, started to ship popular consumer items to Europe. Along with the new products, came new business models and practices too. Whether this was a good thing was to […]
One of the biggest factors and goals that played an important role in the Cold War was the race to gain a greater amount of advanced weapons. History could prove that the Cold War started before Germany even gave up in May of 1945. When the Russians were closing in on Germany, the U.S. and […]
Europe was rebuilding and America was making gains. The gains that were made in the US did not suffice however for the Americans. What we wanted was to expand our markets and expand we did. Although to the dismay of the French President, de Gaulle, who Eric Dorn Brose speaks of in his book, A History […]
While reading The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, I felt that there was a parallel between the characters of the novel and those mentioned in David Bowie’s song “Heroes.” In The Spy…, Alec Leamas and Liz Gold were caught up in a web of intrigue and spy vs. spy that pitted East vs. West and […]
Europe in the twentieth century did not always have the highest opinion of America. War tactics and lifestyles of the Americans were among the most common negatively viewed components of America for Europeans. Many Europeans opposed and condemned the use of the atomic bomb in World War II. This led many to the conclusion that […]
(this is an older blog from a few weeks ago-that I still wanted to do) Through the ending of Primo Levi’s time at Auschwitz a sense of loss become apparent. Although the War was coming to an end I felt as though Levi’s life was also partly gone. His innocence was stripped from him the […]
In The Spy that Came in From the Cold discusses the struggle that Leamas has to deal with as being a spy. Leamas as leader involved in the British Intelligent Agency with Control until one of his members Karl Riemeck is killed by a man named Mundt. After this happened Leamas thinks he is going to be fired […]
Layers of intrigue I found le Carre’s novel at first to be slow to engage me, it seemed like it was just going to be a cold war novel about spies set in a more realistic James bond style character. After reading further into the novel however, I began to truly appreciate just how Le […]
John LeCarré’s novel, The Spy Who Came In From the Cold, paints a picture of how manipulation is utilized to affect the world around us. The world that LeCarré has created is divided into two realities: the espionage world and the “real” world. Authors choose character names with immense consideration and it is no surprise that the […]
Who’s the Villain and who’s the Hero? Certainly None of You “Did it ease your Department’s conscience at all?… Exploiting… somebody in the Party, rather than just anybody? “Perhaps. They don’t really think in those terms. It was an operational convenience” (1) Le Carre gives us a world of reality and a world of […]
The Problem with War… Life Continues…. With a deeper analysis of John Le Carre’s The Spy Who Came In From The Cold the reader can expunge events of historically cultural significance. Events, that ranges from WWI into the cold war that plays out on the pages. We see the negative effects WWI soldiers experienced in […]
After World War I, Europe had experienced suffering and ruin that caused much struggle to the economy and people. So following World War II, Europeans didn’t want to have their people go through the pain of not having enough food or everyday needs like before, especially to the lower class. We see a huge introduction […]
Political nations do what they believe to be expedient to their own interests. Their actions are weighed against potential popular and international reaction to their deeds. Motives are usually spun to best justify their actions to potential opposition at home and abroad. In the case of powerful nations dealings with less powerful nations that did […]
While reading The Spy Who Came in from the Cold what really struck me was the marked difference between Leamas and the rest of the spy network. Leamas is a straightforward man with no time for the long winded, swirl of lies that mark Control’s speech. This can clearly be seen in the very beginning […]
When reading The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, I was struck by how the author talked about the surprise people experienced by the Berlin Wall going up.[1] I always assumed that it was something people were expecting and the actual building took place over a couple of months. But the book gave another […]
I found it surprising that much of the west resisted American control. Thinking about it makes perfect sense but I think we often see the cold war as the U.S vs. the U.S.S.R instead of looking at all the players. I found the reading on Western Europe’s issue with whether to Americanize or […]
The Berlin Wall was a physical and political symbol of the Cold War years from 1961 until 1989. Not on;y was this barrier put up to keep the “brain trust” of the the eastern bloc countries from escaping to the west, it was also a not so subtle symbol of ideological differences. After […]
With the ending of WWII, Germany was split up into 3 different sections that would be controlled by the 3 main powers of the Allied army. The 3 sections that were divided between Great Britain, U.S., and Russia. Eventually Germany would be split into 2 sides, the Capitalists west and the Communism east section. Berlin […]
The world of espionage as it exists within LeCarre’s novel, The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, rather muddled my brain as I was reading, and I felt the discussion in class about what was really going on was well needed. But a few names were brought up in class that I hadn’t read […]
In the era after WWII many governments were weakened and people took this opportunity to break free. A great number of nations gained their independence all across the colonized world and those that didn’t chose to fight for it. This came about because the allies were seen as the defenders of democracy and self-determination but how […]
When examining the life of someone who is a spy, you immediately notice that the reality in which their life is involved in is not the same as someone who leads an ordinary lifestyle. John Le Carre’s novel The Spy Who Came in from the Cold gives an inside view as to the many aspects of […]
Following the victory of the Soviet Army during World War II, the Soviet government was quick to establish Communist governments in the territories they conquered. With countries like Poland and the Czech Republic establishing governments-in-exile that existed even after V-E Day, the time was right for Stalin to install Communist-friendly governments in these nations to […]
One thing I didn’t know really about the Cold War was how paranoid Stalin was until this class but I had an idea after watching an episode of Warehouse 13. The basis of the episode to help someone sleep because of seizures affected by something else, the mention of Stalin came from the Sleep mask, […]
The Berlin wall was built to keep the residents of east and west Berlin separated. This was the first wall that was ment to keep people in, instead of keeping people out. The wall was also considered a loop-hole in Germany. People that lived in East Germany didn’t like living there. They would rather live […]
The time following WWII was a time of discovering identities when it came to the different nations of the world. Many countries began to gain independence when they saw the opportunity to fight for it, as in most cases the country that had control over them was preoccupied with rehabilitating from the war. However with […]
After reading the first half of John LeCarré’s novel, The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, I can appreciate the solitude with which a spy had to live. As we talked about in class, the espionage world is incompatible with a life of normality. The secret plans and the need to know what the […]
During the Cold War the Soviet Union had a lot of control and influence behind the Iron Curtain. When Poland ousted Stalinists in 1956 and appointed a new leader, they were allowed to function because they remained a Communist country.1 Hungary, on the other hand, was not so lucky. The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was […]
Women living in Europe during World War II were much like thier American counterparts. When the men went off to war, the women left their home and took jobs in factories. Brose notes that, “Nearly eight million women worked in 1943- and four of five wartime entries to the labor force were female”. (1) Things […]
It is logical to think that after serving in a long, victorious war that a soldier could return home to peace and not have to deal with many problems. However, that was not the case for Russian soldiers returning home from Berlin. Stalin had eased up a bit on his harsh style of ruling in […]
Once World War II, came to and end leading to new conflicts in the pre-war era. The major conflict that arose after the World War II was Russia wanting to spread communism all over the Europe continent. Though Russia did not succeed, many Russians believed and followed Russian’s leader Stalin. A couple years later, Russia […]
With World War II coming to an end Europe looked and succeeded in finding a new way of creating havoc within the continent itself. With the Cold War in effect citizens from opposing nations still looked to find ways to defeat one another. One of the most popular ways during this time period was through […]
At the end of the first World War, the Germans were shouldered with blame for the entire event. At the end of the Second World War they again faced the looming guilt. Not only was the Nazi party targeted, but the rest of the German population covered in the blanket of shame. I wouldn’t have […]
With the defeat of the Axis powers during World War II, another longer war was on the rise. This war was not knockdown, drag out fight, but more of a constant thought of war. The Cold War was on the rise with the West, countries such as The United States, Great Britain, France, and the […]
After reading The Second Sex, by Simone de Beauvoir, I don’t really feel I agree with her ideas. Based on the philosophy of existentialism she tries to explain that women need to become authentic individuals by becoming active in their own self-definition.1 She compares men and women in which she believes women are being oppressed […]
After reading in Europe in the Twentieth Century, I was struck by the fact that all the wars that the U.S. were involved in during the Twenty Century was due in part because of the involvement in War World one. After World War One, countries were still upset about the outcome of the war and […]
The post World War Two era was a significant culture change to all of Europe. People started to question the existence of a god (1). But could you blame them? Millions and millions of people died in this conflict leaving the entire continent of Europe in shambles. When a soldier that luckily survived the war […]
Brose states it perfectly when he says “the struggle between opposing politico-economic systems, glaring suspiciously at one another through the prism of incompatible worldviews, sped this breakdown as much as any other factor”.1 Indeed, the breaking apart of East and West was contributed to by this. The common enemy of Hitler and the Nazis was […]
The quick breakdown of the wartime alliances is something I never actually paid attention to before this class but to learn how almost immediately after Roosevelt’s death the Cold War started is jarring. It seems as though for the most part the atmosphere and tension that is associated with the Cold War was not present […]
The end of WWII created a very strange shift in national “friendships.” Germany was now split into two zones each becoming allied with former enemies after the allied powers cooperation began to fade. Western Germans found themselves allied with the very same people who had bombed their country during the war. Eastern Germans had to […]
With most of Europe in ruins and much of its population left to sift through the rubble and try to piece together their lives, many people asked some valid questions: what is there left to live for? For those who subscribed to its tenets, Existentialism gave some meaning to their shattered lies. For starters, the […]
I think that the title of the book Survival in Auschwitz, by Primo Levi, should have kept the original title of If This Be a Man, because the book is about what it means to be a human. Yes, the book does give a literal explanation of a story of a man trying to survive in […]
At the end of World War 2, Europe is at a high and a low in European history. In a sense, Europe just went through and then went back to it again with World War 1 and 2. The two greatest wars in our worlds history left many scars, including millions of people dead, thousands […]
It isn’t hard to imagine how or why people who had experienced the Second World War would question not only their faith but all faiths. The types of horror that people were forced to experience and amount of sheer psychological trauma that most in Europe faced during and after the war would most likely have […]
To be a German citizen in 1945 must have been rough. There were so many things that could have been going through their minds. I do not even know how they managed to sleep at night. Between the human destruction of war, Germans were also plagued by their consciousness too. Once again, Germans experienced the […]
When you mention the Cold War people immediately something along the lines of, “Oh that’s when the U.S. and Russia threatened to drop bombs on each other.” This is partially correct. Russia did not necessarily exist at the time. It was the U.S.S.R. Also, people don’t realize that the tensions between the U.S.S.R. and the […]
As I understand it, existentialists believe that people should take responsibility for their actions. People should consider their actions before taking them and determine for themselves whether those actions are good. People should consider whether their actions, if taken by everyone, would be good for everyone. Human beings determine who they are based on the […]
Europe started realizing how important it is too include and treat other European countries more equally after World War II. Europe plans to help out all nations who were effected by this horrible war. Eric Brose wrote that Churchill and President FDR wanted an Atlantic Charter which was mean’t for protection to “all states and […]
When reading “Survival in Auschwitz” it was brought up many times that he felt he was being treated like he was not human. When in the camps, the Jewish families were treated like they had nothing, and were treated like animals. By having everything taken away from them, they felt worthless. The Jews made sure […]
We grew up learning the terrors of the Holocaust and other genocides throughout the world, such as the Rwandan incident. And we always knew there was something eerie about the slaughter and dehumanization of the afflicted peoples. But now that we are older, now that we delve futher into our studies, we truly are able […]
“The countryside was so disrupted and devastated by modern war that food would continue to be scarce for years” 1. This quote by Brose is a clear depiction of the status many citizens of Europe faced once World War II had come to an end. The great continent of Europe laid in ruins and there was much […]
One thing I have come across frequently in my studies of World War II and even in this class is the common misconception that every German person knew about concentration camps and what was going on at the time. Firstly, one thing that is not discussed that much is that there were two types of […]
While reading the novel Survival in Auschwitz I realized that this was a hard novel to read through. This novel had many aspects of dehumanization. In this novel, both the Nazi soldiers had dehumanizing qualities and so did the Poles, Jews, Prison of War Americas, Greeks, and many other people. The Nazi soldiers had to look at […]
How do you get millions of people to deny what deep down they know is happening? It’s simple, really. Out of sight means out of mind. Cause a distraction, and make life better for people, and they’ll play ignorance, and forget all about the horrible crimes that are being committed. This is exactly what Hitler, […]
I’ve seen many photos of the atrocities of the extermination camps before. I thought it might be a good idea to look at some of the Auschwitz photos again before writing this blog. REALLY DISTURBING!!! It sickened me to see what human beings are capable of doing to one another. In writing this blog, I […]
This is my blog for March 11th, 2014. Heads up this isn’t Europe but it pertains to World War II. I had the honor of meeting one of the women from the WASP program at the play “Censored on Final Approach”, Her name: Elizabeth “Betty” Strohfus. This play is not only historical accurate in a […]
At the beginning of World War II, Hitler and the Nazis were gaining victory after victory. In the spring of 1940, Germany took care of Denmark and Norway (1). With victories left and right, Hitler had a vision that he and his army was unstoppable. The start of the downfall was his inability to defeat […]
The idea of blitzkrieg the Germans brought into the beginning of World War II is very fascinating. This was a new doctrine of lightning warfare that orthodox German commanders still had skepticism about[1], even on the eve of the invasion of Poland. The Germans had grouped together their panzer, or tank division and punched gaping holes […]
When I think of Auschwitz I do not think of survivors, it is not what comes to mind, but after reading the beginning of Primo Levi’s book Survival in Auschwitz, I was able to better understand what those unfortunate prisoners went through, and what they did not want to believe. As Levi is sent to the Ka-Be, where he […]
The lack of a support system in concentration camps would seem to be something that people couldn’t survive without and yet people did just that. The camps were set up in such a way that made trust almost impossible to develop between people and often it came easiest to those who had known each other […]
Its almost blind ignorance that the people living near the concentration camps didn’t know about what was going on. Moving people in those massive amounts must of created some type of attention, even with the SS around the smell and smoke must of made some people curious. Even with the propaganda and the threat of […]
Primo Levi’s account of surviving Auschwitz demonstrates how the Jews had to lose some of their humanity in order to survive. Levi describes how at first something as simple as washing began to seem futile to him in his current situation at Auschwitz. From Steinlauf, however, he realizes that the goal of the Nazis is […]
Antisemitism reached an all time high in 1941 when Jews were being rounded up and sent to “resettlement” camps. (1) Adolf Hitler used many strong phrases such as “Jewish racial tuberculosis” or the need to be “completely cleansed of Jews” to illustrate his discontent for the Jewish race.(2) While many did not necessarily believe that […]
There was something from the Diary of a German Soldier that really made me think. I was struck by how misinformed the confidence of the German forces was.The soldiers had the idea that taking Stalingrad would be easy, because they thought that the Russians forces were broken and would have to surrender. The diary exposed […]
I found the readings of the novel Survival in Auschwitz to be very insightful of just how the mental processes of a person in a German concentration camp degrade as their very soul and will to live is slowly but surely grinded into nothingness. I found it interesting to read just how stratified the hierarchy of […]
It is interesting that the Germans separated people in the concentration camp by what they were. Such as Jews, were clumped together, political prisons were together etc. Primo Levi describes that there was colors on the clothes that showed what they were. Like Political prisons were green, Jews were yellow, ect[1]. While it makes sense […]
For me… words are not enough, images are not enough, songs are not enough, history is not enough. Nothing will be enough to describe what happened around and in WWII, only the lesson. Will we listen? Do we really know? Many people finally, or should I say for the first time, have an insight of […]
It is hard to imagine that millions of people died during World War II. According to Eric Brose, the final estimates at the end of the war were about 60 million.1 The first thing that comes to mind is the Holocaust, which took the lives of over 6 million people. The Holocaust is always associated […]
In Primo Levi’s “Survival in Auschwitz”, Levi is telling his story behind the gruesome times in the death camp, Auschwitz. Primo Levi was an Italian Jew who was moved into the camp in December of 1943. Everyone knows what occurred at the camps; conditions unsanitary for anyone, worked all day, and forced to go on […]
While much of the attention towards the Axis Powers of WWII lies on Germany and Japan, it is important to understand the motives of the Italians during the war. Even before declaring war against the Allies, Benito Mussolini was itching for a fight, even though he knew he couldn’t go up against the might of […]
When we learn about Nazi Germany and World War II, even as early as grade school, one of the center points of the discussion is always the Nazi’s “solution to the Jewish question”. And usually the following question is “how can a person bring themselves to commit such atrocities”. The truth is that Antisemitism […]
Propaganda is a widely used technique that tries to garner support for a cause. Whether it is used during wartime, political ads, or other situations, propaganda leaves its followers feeling pretty good. In the case of William Howard though, propaganda was overused. It led him to have unrealistic expectations and made reality that much harder to […]
After reading “Survival in Auschwitz” really made me think that even though Jews were being sent to the Concentration Camps, the Germans running the camps didn’t say anything about how this might be wrong. I am always hearing things about how the Germans didn’t want to say anything about the camps because then they might […]
The Treaty of Versailles could be linked to why WWII happened after the Great War only years earlier. Germany lost WWI due to riots and the loss of the citizens interest for the war. France thought that since they won the war, they could blame Germany for WWI. France made the Treaty of Versailles […]
I may be deviating from the norm on this post but as a person very interested in the link between superstition, history and mythology, I couldn’t help but be intrigued when reading about Hitler’s suicide on April 30, 1945 at the end of chapter six (Brose, 264). What immediately came to my mind was the […]
The White Rose was an inspiring group to me. As a group of high school students together with their professor in Munich, Germany, sought to encourage other fellow Germans to resist Hitler and the Nazis. They knew of, and some witnessed first hand, the cruelty and inhumane crimes committed by the Nazis. Much of their […]
It is a thought that has crossed my mind before, but because of the world we live in today, it has never truly frightened me. The thought I am discussing is the thought of death. Death is a path no one truly wants to take, but for six million Jews during World War II, there were, […]
Life during World War Two was just as miserable as life during the Great War a couple years back. In World War Two, Germany started out as a very strong country that was determined to control as much of Europe that they could. The Germans introduced a new warfare called “Blitzkrieg.” This was an implemented doctrine of lighting warfare-Blitzkrieg” (1). This new […]
Brose brought up the unheard of man, Heinrich Himmler. It was quite interesting to me that we grow up learning of Hitler’s inhumanities against man, that he was the mastermind behind everything. But Brose points out that there were many men at Hitler’s disaposal that came up with ideas to solve the “Jewish question”. I […]
In the years leading up to the Second World War, chaos leftover from the First World War lead to a rise in Fascism, Communism, and the Nazi party. As a result, much of our attention focuses on those respective countries: Italy, Russia, and Germany. In those countries, the rise of the different dictatorships is easily […]
The humanities provide insight into the human condition in a way that hard sciences cannot. History gives a unique perspective that can never be ignored; indeed, those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. It is for this reason that History cannot be swept under the rug, especially when the darker periods […]
From the discussion in class, Hitler came to power because of the depression and how the people in government thought they could control him. Hitler was under estimated by the people in power, and they thought because of his small stature and funny looking mustache. Napoleon was also under estimated because of his shortness, and […]
After World War I, the United States decided not to enter the League of Nations. Without one of the super powers of the world not in the League, other countries didn’t have much confidence in maintaining peace and stability in the world. This gave Hitler an idea that he could try and take over Europe […]
As I was re-reading George Orwell’s Wigan Pier, I couldn’t help but notice a few striking similarities to the commonly released government figures and a slight resemblance to the ecomic state of America today. The most striking of these to me was the official misrepresentation of poverty and unemployment. The official U.S. unemployment rate last July […]
Hitler The name is full of rotted memory. Displaced grandeur and one of the most focused mass killings of human life throughout all of the studied and known history. I can barely inch out enough emotional distance to get a point across. But that’s just it, why was Hitler so successful within his rise to […]
Sometimes we think that concentration camps or forced sterilizations are works that originated with Hitler or Mussolini in Europe, because they are evil men. Men that are not like us smart, compassionate Americans. This isn’t true. America used concentration camps, albeit not as harsh as Nazi camps. America implemented forced sterilizations on its citizens that […]
While considering the readings for this week I couldn’t help but wonder what the impact of the Great Depression on veterans was. We learn about how it affected the country as a whole but never how it affected the soldiers who came back yearning for a better life. In class however I noted something interesting […]
Hitler was without argument, insane among many other things. He was however a genius politician. In 1928 the results of the election were the Nazis party only receiving 2.6 percent of the vote.[1] From this he learned that he was not going to get the popular vote by being anti-sematic so he toned down that […]
In Stalin’s push to catch up to the industrial capabilities of European countries he took the food from the region of the Ukraine and starved millions of people in a man-made famine. The famine, known as the Holodomor, killed off a quarter of the Ukrainian population in just two years. This death toll fell especially […]