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History 388 Modern Germany: From HISTORY 388 MODERN GERMANY: FROM UNIFICATION TO REUNIFICATION Semester: Spring 2013 Professor: Dr. Clayton Whisnant Time: MWF 10:30 – 11:20 Office: Main 105 Place: Main 007 Email: [email protected] Phone: x4550 Office Hours: MWF 2:00-3:30 Web Page: http://webs.wofford.edu/whisnantcj COURSE DESCRIPTION In this course, students will the process of political and economic modernization in Germany, a country torn between poles of democracy and dictatorship. Course Goals This course will examine several key themes as they apply to German history: the industrialization and modernization of Germany; social and cultural changes associated with modern twentieth-century life; the challenges of establishing constitutional government; the establishment and impact of modern dictatorships; the impact of the two world wars; and the relationship between Germany and the rest of Europe. Course Objectives To meet the goals of the course, students will take two exams to demonstrate their knowledge of a) key ideas, movements, and historical figures associated with the modern German history; b) important events and trends that helped to shape Germany in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; and c) the cause and effect relationships that help explain the flow of events from unification to world war, from Weimar democracy to Nazi dictatorship, and from the division of Germany to its eventual reunification. Students will also write three papers that prove that they have grappled with key themes of the course. Courses Relationship to Department Goals This course helps the history department reach its goals by covering the following dimensions of history widely perceived as crucial for a well-rounded view of the world: political developments; significant intellectual movements and debates; socio-cultural issues of class; race; and gender. Students will also gain some exposure to how history is practiced by learning how history is interpreted, and assessing and critiquing arguments made by historians. Technology Skills Students will need some basic knowledge of web browsers in order to be able to find and utilize material on the on-line version of this syllabus. They will also need some basic working knowledge of using a computer word-processor in order to write the papers for this class. Instructional Format This course will be largely a lecture-based course, with some time set aside for discussion of the text material. TEXTS Martin Kitchen, A History of Modern Germany (Wiley-Blackwell, 2006), ISBN: 978- 1405100410. Robert Gellately, Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany (Oxford University Press, 2001), ISBN: 978-0192802910 Mary Fulbrook, The People's State (Yale University Press, 2009), 978-0300144246. On-Line Packet. All the readings can be accessed separately by clicking on the hot text in the assignment column of the schedule below. Or, if you prefer, you can access all the readings by going to the Library's web page for this class. If you have any trouble printing these readings, see my troubleshooting tips. The readings listed under each day should be done before the assigned day. GRADING Attendance 5% Participation 5% Quizzes 5% 1 Midterm 10% 2 short papers (5-6 pages long) 20% each 1 long paper (10-12 pages long) 25% 1 Final Exam 10% Students are expected to attend the class regularly, to complete the reading on time, and to participate in class discussions. Failure to do each of these things will result in a lower participation grade. I reserve the right to give pop quizzes, though many of the quizzes will be announced beforehand. ATTENDANCE POLICY Students should be aware that regular attendance is part of the participation grade. Students are allowed one unexcused absence, but after that absences will seriously hurt the attendance portion of their grade. If a student misses too many classes, I may exercise my right to withdraw him or her from the class after a warning. Excused absences are those due to approved college-related activities (e.g. sporting events), documented illness, and family emergencies. Students have the responsibility to make up missed work. OTHER REMARKS Electronic devices (iphones, laptops, ipads, etc.) are not to be used during class. All cell phones must be turned off at the beginning of class. Do not, of course, take phone calls during class. Please be on time. If you must arrive late or leave early, do so as quietly and unobtrusively as possible. Of course, all work must be yours. Cases of suspected plagiarism and cheating will be handled by the Honor Council, as per Wofford College's Honor Code. Plagiarism, we should note, is defined in the following way: (1) the verbatim repetition, without acknowledgement, of the writings of another author; (2) borrowing without acknowledging the source; (3) paraphrasing the thoughts of another writer without acknowledgement; or (4) allowing any other person or organization to prepare work which one then submits as his or her own. You should pay close attention to the third definition, especially when referring to ideas borrowing from a website. For more information, please reference my handout "Living by Wofford's Honor Code". COURSE SCHEDULE SECTION I: UNIFICATION TO AFTERMATH OF WORLD WAR I Date Class Assignment Week 1 Feb 4 Introduction Welcome! Feb 6 Germany before Unification Kitchen: Ch. 4 Feb 8 The Emergence of Bismarck Kitchen: Ch. 5 Week 2 Feb 11 The Economy of the Gründerzeit Kitchen: Ch. 2 Feb 13 The Unification of Germany Kitchen: Ch. 6 Bismarck’s Germany Feb 15 Kitchen: Ch. 7 Map Quiz Week 3 Bismarck’s Foreign Policy Feb 18 Kitchen: Ch. 8 Kitchen: Ch. 9 e-reserve: Feb 20 Wilhelm II: Politics & Weltpolitik Geoff Eley, Reshaping the German Right: Radical Nationalism and Political Change after Bismarck (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980), 19-40. e-reserve: Michael Hau, The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany: A Social History (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003), 32-54. Feb 22 Wilhelmine Society Vernon Lidtke, The Alternative Culture: Socialist Labor in Imperial Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), 21- 49. Week 4 e-reserve: Feb 25 Wilhelmine Culture David Blackbourn, History of Germany: The Long Nineteenth Century (Oxford: Blackwell, 2003), 265-303. Feb 27 The First World War Kitchen: Ch. 10 The First World War Mar 1 Kershaw: Ch. 3 Get First Paper Topic Week 5 e-reserve: Mar 4 The Birth of the Weimar Republic Peter Fritzsche, Germans into Nazis (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1998), 85-136. Mar 6 The Weimar Era Kitchen: Ch. 11 Peter Gay, Weimar Culture: The Outsider as Mar 8 Weimar Culture Insider (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1968), 70-118. Week 6 March 11 Midterm Exam SECTION II: FROM NAZISM TO REUNIFICATION Kershaw: Chs. 5-6 Mar 13 The Birth of the Nazi Party Kershaw: Ch. 8 Mar 15 The Growth of Nazism Paper #1 Due Week 7 e-reserve: Jurgen Kocka, “German History before Mar 18 Interpretations of Nazism Hitler: The Debate about the German Sonderweg,” Journal of Contemporary History 23, 1 (Jan 1988): 3-16. Mar 20 The Nazi Coming-to-Power Kershaw: Ch. 10 Mar 22 The Nazi State Kitchen: Ch. 12 Week 8 e-reserve reading: Detlev Peukert, “Youth in the Third Reich,” in Life in the Third Reich, ed. Richard Bessel (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987), 25-40. Life under Nazism Mar 25 Shelley Baranowski, “Selling the ‘Racial Get Second Paper Topic Community’: Kraft durch Freude and Consumption in the Third Reich,” in Selling Modernity: Advertising in Twentieth-Century Germany, eds. Pamela Swett, Jonathan Wiesen, and Jonathan Zatlin (Durham: Duke University Press, 2007), 127-150. Discuss Gellately, Backing Hitler, chs. Mar 27 Gellately, intro, chs. 1-3 1-3 e-reserve: Mar 29 World War II: The Nazi Victories Ian Kershaw, Hitler: 1936-1945 Nemesis (New York: Norton, 2000), 283-337 Week 9 Apr 1 Spring Break Apr 3 Spring Break Apr 5 Spring Break Week 10 Apr 8 Catch-Up Read Gellately Discuss Gellately, Backing Hitler, chs. Apr 10 4-conclusion Finish Gellately e-reserve: Ian Kershaw, The Nazi Dictatorship: Apr 12 Europe under Nazi Occupation Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, 4th ed. (London: Hodder Arnold, 2000), 93-133. Week 11 No reading Apr 15 The Defeat of Nazi Germany Paper #2 Due Kitchen: Ch. 14 e-reserve: Apr 17 Cold-War West Germany David Clay Large, Berlin (New York: Basic Books, 2000), 445-487. Apr 19 Socialist East Germany (1949-1971) No reading Week 12 Apr 22 Catch-Up Catch Up if necessary The East German State Apr 24 Fulbrook, Chs. 8, 11. Get the Final Paper Topic e-reserve: Jeff Schutts, “Born Again in the Gospel of Refreshment,” in Consuming Germany in the Cold War, ed. David Crew (Oxford: Berg, 2003),121-150. Anne Kaminsky, “‘True Advertising Apr 26 Consumerism: East and West Means Promoting a Good Thing through a Good Form’: Advertising in the German Democratic Republic,” in Selling Modernity: Advertising in Twentieth- Century Germany, eds. Pamela Swett, Jonathan Wiesen, and Jonathan Zatlin (Durham: Duke University Press, 2007), 262-286 Week 13 Fulbrook: Ch. 6 e-reserve: Robert P. Stephens, “Drugs, Consumption, and Internationalization in Apr 29 Youth Culture: East and West Hamburg, 1960-1968,” in Consuming Germany in the Cold War, ed. David Creww (Oxford: Berg, 2003),179-206. Fulbrook: Ch. 7 e-reserve: May 1 Gender: East and West Myra Ferree, Varieties of Feminism: German Gender Politics in Global Perspective (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012), 53-82. e-reserve: May 3 Sexual Revolutions: East and West Josie McLellan, Love in the Time of Communism: Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 144-173. Clayton Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany: Between Persecution and Freedom, 1945-69 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 166-203.
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