Fall 2006

History 114—Fascism

 

Annemarie Sammartino

Rice Hall 311

Email: annemarie.sammartino@oberlin.edu

Office phone: 775-6572

Office Hours: Monday 10-12; Wednesday 11-12

 

Course Description:

 

Sixty years after the defeat of Nazi Germany, fascism remains a source of fascination for everyone from academic historians to History Channel devotees. Americans of various political stripes use fascism to refer to everything from “Islamofascists” to George W. Bush’s America. In this seminar, we will seek to disentangle these later attributions from the historical experience of fascism in early twentieth century Europe. We will examine the ideology and practices of the fascist state as developed in Italy and Germany, focusing in particular on an examination of life under fascist regimes. This course will then explore the policies of occupation and extermination practiced during the Second World War, including the creation of fascist regimes in France and elsewhere. Finally, we will discuss the memory of fascism and the potential for a fascist revival.

 

This course is intended to introduce second year students to both the study of fascism specifically and the issues and methodologies involved in the study of European history more generally. As a small colloquium, the success of this class depends on your engaged and informed participation.

 

Prerequisites and Requirements:

 

There are no prerequisites for this class, although it will be helpful if you have a basic background in the major events and issues of European History. If you do not possess this background, let me know and I can suggest some outside readings.

 

Your grade in this class will be determined as follows:

 

35%                 Participation & Attendance

20%                 Primary Source Critique (5pp.)

20%                 Monograph Review (5pp.)     

25%                 Final Paper (5pp.)

 

All written work must be turned in to receive credit for this class.

 

All written work should be double-spaced, in 12-point Times New Roman font on paper with 1” margins. Unless otherwise directed, you MAY NOT turn in papers online but rather, must drop them off at my office or in class on the day it is due. Papers must be stapled. Also, while your grade for any paper is primarily based on its content, errors in grammar or citation style can figure into the grade, especially if such errors are egregious. The page limits for these papers should be taken as relatively strict. While I don’t want you to cut off a thought in mid-sentence to fit the limit, I will not read more than one page past the assignment limit (i.e. for a 5 page paper, I will not read past the 6^th page).

 

ALL late papers will be downgraded 1/3 of a grade for every day that they are late. If you are late or do not attend class on the day a paper is due, that paper is automatically an additional one day late. If you turn in a paper draft late, the lateness penalty will be assigned to the final paper.

 

You will have a total of four “screw-ups” to use over the course of the semester. A “screw-up” can allow you to take a 24 hour extension for a paper (this applies to either the actual paper or, in the case of the first paper, the draft) or it can be used to take an unexcused absence from class. So, for example, you could take a 48 hour extension on a paper and miss two classes. If you wish for one or several “screw-ups” to apply to a late paper, please indicate that on the first page of the paper when you (finally) turn it in.

 

All work for this class is governed by the honor code. You must write and sign the honor code pledge at the end of each paper and exam. We will talk briefly about the honor code in class, but if you have further questions, please go to: http://www.oberlin.edu/students/student_pages/honor_code.html.

 

Readings/Films:

 

The following required books are available for purchase at the Oberlin College Bookstore:

 

Allen, William Sheridan. The Nazi Seizure of Power. The Experience of a Single German

Town. Danbury CT: Orchard Books, 1984.

Browning, Christopher. Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland. New York: Harper Collins, 1992.

Kaplan, Marion. Between Dignity and Despair. New York: Oxford UP, 1999.

Levi, Primo. Survival in Auschwitz. New York: Touchstone, 1995.

Roth, Philip. The Plot Against America. New York: Vintage, 2005.

Silone, Ignazio. Bread and Wine. New York: Signet, 1977.

 

These books are also on reserve at the Oberlin College Library.

 

Readings marked with an * are available on ERes.

 

The films we are viewing for this class have additionally been placed on reserve.

 

Schedule of Readings & Discussion Topics

 

September 5                Introduction: What is Fascism?

 

The Origins of Fascism

 

September 7                Nineteenth Century

 

            *Roy Palmer Domenico, “Liberal Apex and Crisis,” Remaking Italy in the Twentieth           Century (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002), 1-30

            *Stefan Berger, Germany (London: Hodder Arnold, 2004), 77-110

 

September 12              World War I and the Birth of Italian Fascism

 

            Benito Mussolini, “What is Fascism?”: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/mussolini-fascism.html         

           

September 14             The Great Depression and German Fascism

 

            Allen, The Nazi Seizure of Power: The Experience of a Single German Town, part I (pp. 1-147)

            “25 Points”: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/25points.html

 

September 14              Isabel Hull, “Military Necessity and Mass Killing in the German Imperial                                        Army,” Wilder 101, 4:30pm

 

September 15              Christopher Browning, “Holocaust History and Survivor Testimony: The                                        Starachowice Factory Slave Labor Camps,” Wilder 101, noon

 

Fascist Society

 

September 19              Fascist Ideology

 

            *Simonetta Falasca-Zamponi, Fascist Spectacle (Berkeley: U of California Press, 1997), 42-88

            *Ian Kershaw, “The ‘Hitler Myth’: Image and Reality in the Third Reich,” Nazism and German Society, David Crew, ed. (New York: Routledge, 1994), 197-218

 

September 21              NO CLASS

           

September 26              The Fascist Aesthetic

           

            *Alessandro Pavolini from Critica Fascista (1926) in A Primer of Italian Fascism, 212-218

            *Massimo Bontempelli (1926) in A Primer of Italian Fascism, 218-220

           

September 28              The Fascist Aesthetic

 

            *Richard Taruskin, “Orff’s Musical and Moral Failings,” New York Times, May 6, 2001, 1-4.

            Carl Orff, Carmina Burana (1936)—on reserve at con library

            Primary Source Critique—DRAFT Due at the Start of Class

 

October 3                    Fascist Society: Atomization, Consent & Control

 

            Allen, Part II (pp. 152-303)

 

October 5                    Fascist Society: Workers

 

            *Alf Lüdtke, “What Happened to the "Fiery Red Glow"? Workers' Experiences and German Fascism,” in Alf Lüdtke, ed., The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1995), 198-251.

 

October 9 (Monday): Primary Source Critique Due 5pm At My Office (311 Rice)

 

October 10                  Fascist Society: Gender

 

October 12                  Fascist Society: Youth

 

            Film: Hitlerjunge Quex (1933)

            *Victoria de Grazia, How Fascism Ruled Women, 116-165

 

FALL BREAK

 

October 24                  What is Resistance?

 

            Ignazio Silone, Bread and Wine

 

October 26                  NO CLASS

 

October 31                  Eugenics & the Volkskörper in Nazi Germany

 

            *Detlev Peukert, “The Genesis of the "Final Solution" from the Spirit of Science,” Nazism and German Society, David Crew, ed. (New York: Routledge, 1994), 274-299

 

November 2                Anti-Semitism and the Jews

           

            Film Screening: Jud Süss (1940)

            Monograph Critique DRAFT Due at the Start of Class (Optional)       

 

November 7                Anti-Semitism and the Jews

 

            Marion Kaplan, Between Dignity and Despair, 9-72; 94-145

 

World War II

 

November 9                The Lead-up to War

 

November 10 (Friday): Monograph Critique Due 5pm At My Office (311 Rice)

 

November 14              Occupation & Collaboration

 

            *J.E. Talbott, “Vichy and Resistance France,” in William B. Cohen, ed., The            Transformation of Modern France, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997), 207-224.

 

November 16              The Eastern Front

           

            *Omer Bartov, Hitler’s Army, 12-28;106-178

 

November 21              The Holocaust—Perpetrators

 

            Christopher Browning, Ordinary Men

 

November 23              THANKSGIVING

 

November 28              The Holocaust—Victims

 

            Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz

 

After Fascism

 

November 30              1945

 

            Film: Die Mörder sind Unter Uns (1946)     

 

December 5                 Coming to Terms with the Past

 

            *James Young, Texture of Memory, 17-48 & 81-112

 

December 7                 The Radical Right in Europe

 

December 12               Could it happen here?

 

            Philip Roth, The Plot Against America

 

December 14               Final Discussion

 

Final Paper Due Tuesday, December 19^th, 2pm