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Description: |
This course examines the diverse history of socialist ideology as lived-experience across Europe. It beings with the first theorists of socialism and places their ideas in the context of a rapidly industrializing Europe in Germany, France, and Great Britain. From the Paris Commune to the Iron Curtain, the course explores the surprising varieties of socialist socieites that emerged in the 19th and 20th centuries. This course asks students to consider: how were these societies ruled and why did they fail? To what extent were they influenced by the political philosophies of the 19th century? To what extent were they a product of geo-political conflicts and the failures of capitalism in the 20th? How did socialist leaders and citizens imagine the future of socialist development? What was the every-day lived experience of secret police and state force, but also of food, fashion, music, literature, and film? |