Last Lecture: The History of the European Union

In today's lecture, our final one of the course, we looked at the specific steps by which Europeans turned their backs on the history of virulent nationalism that had wracked Europe for so long. Beginning with the European Coal and Steel Community in 1950, they constructed an ever-expanding union which ultimately surpassed the original goals of wealth creation and economic development.

Vodcast of Last Lecture: The History of the EU

PDF Handout for The Cold War and the European Union

Below is a link to a pdf handout of the slides from today's lecture and the two lectures before that, on the Cold War (complete) and the European Union. I hope that it--and all the other handouts found on WebCT Vista--will help you study for the Final exam. The date for the Final exam is on the calendar found on your WebCT site.

Handout for the Cold War and the European Union

Lecture 23: Cold War (Conclusion) and the EU

Today we concluded our overview of the Cold War and saw how and why it ended not with a bang but with a whimper (or, rather, a celebration). But, above all, it ended peacefully. We first looked at the intensification of the Cold War, leading to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the aftermath when both sides began the long road to detente. Finally, we looked at the nature of the European Union in general, as a backdrop to tomorrow's discussion of the historical development of the EU.

Cold War (Conclusion) and the EU

Lecture 22: The Cold War: Dangerous Years

In today's lecture we looked at the Cold War's early, very dangerous years (1943-1962). As these dates suggest, the Cold War began in World War II, when suspicions between the Soviet Union and the U.S. were ignited by wartime strategy of the Big Three. Other sources of the Cold War are discussed, as well as its domestic impact upon the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Lecture 22, The Cold War: Dangerous Years

URL for World War II, The Web Site

Click on the link below for the web site on the Second World War, discussed in class yesterday and described below.

Link to Web Site on World War II

Lecture 21: World War II, The Web Site

Today I took the class on a tour of my web site for World War II (after a brief PowerPoint overview of how the war actually began). Students will need to study at least the front page of this web site because it contains all of the lecture information that I would normally deliver in class on the subject of World War II, and for which you are responsible for the exams. Pay particular attention to the information on the six stages of the war, the reasons for the failure of Holocaust rescue, and the ways in which the war planted the seeds for the Cold War.

Lecture 21: Vodcast of World War II, The Web Site

Lecture 20: Stalin's Russia, Fascism and the Rise of Hitler

The geopolitics of the 1920s and 1930s cannot be understood without an appreciation for the momentous changes that occurred in the Soviet Union and Germany. To comprehend these, we had to look as much at personality as ideology. Although we defined and analyzed the ideology of Fascism and saw its takeover of Italy and Germany, we also examined the biographies of Hitler and Stalin and how these shaped the history of the interwar years and affected a world careening toward a second global conflict in the twentieth century.

Vodcast of Stalin's Russia, Fascism and the Rise of Hitler (Video Ipod format)

PDF of Short Lecture: By Popular Demand

Today some of you inquired about the availability of a pdf file of the PowerPoint presentation of the lectures on World War I and the interwar years. By popular demand, here it is. Remember that the vodcasts for this expanded lecture are in the posts just below this one. For the pdf, either right-click on the link to the pdf below and choose open or just click on the link. One or the other method (or both) should permit you to open and view the pdf of this lecture.

PDF of World War I and the Years Between the World Wars

Short Lecture: Background to Appeasement, 1930s

Because we finished watching The White Rose (1982) today, we has very little time for a lecture. But we did spare nearly nine minutes for a discussion of the obstacles that the Western democracies faced in the 1930s in confronting a resurgent Germany. These numerous obstacles rewarded Hitler's expansionist foreign policies, which were reckless in the extreme, with a degree of success that they never would have had in "normal" times. But the times were far from normal. In today's lecture, we saw how.

Vodcast on Short Lecture, Background to Appeasement

Description of Your White Rose Assignment

Also today I introduced your assignment for the essay on the White Rose. Remember that you can always find the Learning Module for the assignment on the WebCT home page. The vodcast below provides you more description of what you need to do in the essay. In sum, you need to describe how each document tells the story of the White Rose differently, AND which of the three influences upon a history document is (or are)revealed by each of the six documents. If you have questions, do not hesitate to ask them in class.

Vodcast of the In-Class Description of the White Rose assignment

Lecture 19: War, Revolution and the Interwar Years in Depth, 1919-1939

Today we looked at the conclusion of the Great War, including the Russian Revolution and its aftermath. Europe emerged from the war battered, broken, in the grips of revolution, and rendered hopeless by the slaughter of the preceeding years. The Treaty of Versailles made the situation even worse, paralyzing the democracies and emboldening the parties on the far right for years to come. We also defined two leading conditions of the 1920s and 1930s, anomie and appeasement.

Vodcast of Lecture 19, War, Revolution and the Interwar Years

Lecture 18: The Lamps Extinguished: The Great War and its Consequences

In today's lecture we looked at the final causes of the Great War, including the reactions to the new ideas of relativity, the Alliance System and the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo. The main focus of the lecture, however, was THE BIG PICTURE of the war's impact on the mind, map and political structure of Europe between the two world wars. At the conclusion of the lecture we began looking at the course of the war (THE LITTLE PICTURE), but we got no further than the early months of the war, culminating in the first Battle of the Marne (1914). By the end of today's lecture, however, the listener will be in a position, when hearing of significant wartime events, to anticipate their impact on the interwar period (1919-1939).

Vodcast of Lecture 18, "The Lamps Extinguished"

Lecture 17: Irrational Ideas and the Long Fuse to War

During the fin de siecle period before World War I, an intellectual revolution took place that may have had something to do with the causation of that war. Isaac Newton's optimistic worldview was de-throned, and a far darker Darwinian vision of inherently irrational impulses gained ascendance. Nietzsche, Freud and Einstein were among the luminaries that defined the age and the popular understanding as well as misunderstanding of what they discovered left a bitter after-taste that may have had something indefinable to do with a world of nation-states careening out of control. This brief vodcast touches on the era.

Vodcast of an Age of Irrationalism, 1880-1914

Lecture 16: Nationalism, the New Imperialism and the Long Fuse to World War I

Today we examined the factors that propelled Europe toward political suicide in the form of the Great War of 1914-1918. The roster of factors that are candidates for this list is a long one: unfulfilled nationalism, irrational ideas, alliances, an arms race, and the New Imperialism among them. We examine here the nature of multinationalism and irredentism as problems with nationalism as well as the role and course of the New Imperialism. All other factors are merely introduced here, to be developed at greater length in the next lecture.

Vodcast of Lecture 15, Nationalism and the New Imperialism

Lecture 15: German Unification and the Long Fuse Introduced

Today's lecture is reproduced here in an audio podcast only (mp3). We surveyed the process by which Germany because a unified nation-state and its implications for the future. Although Otto von Bismarck cobbled together the factors and supplied his own crucial motive force (statecraft and war), many things happened before he became Prussian Prime Minister in 1862 that set the process in motion: the Confederation of the Rhine, Prussian militarism, the Zolverein, and the revolutions of 1848 among them. At the end of the podcast, I introduce the story of what Leonard Lafore called "the long fuse" to World War I, the developments between 1871 and 1914 that brought the curtain down on the nineteenth century and triggered the Great War.

Audio podcast of the unification of Germany and intoduction to the "long fuse"

Lecture 14: Marxism (Conclusion) and the Unification of Italy

In this lecture we conclude our discussion of Marxism by analyzing Marx's predictions and the stages of history that he envisioned. The flaws and internal contradictions of the theory are also discussed. Then we turn to the story of the unification of Italy and how it reflects the evolution of nationalism post-1848 and post-Darwin.

Vodcast of Lecture 14, Marxism (Conclusion) and the Unification of Italy

Lecture 13: Darwin, Marx and the 19th Century

This lecture surveys Europe and the European mind in the watershed year of 1848. Starting with the significance of the revolutions of that year and how they changed the perspective of the middle-classes on the very idea of revolution, we survey the ideas of Darwin and Marx. How the ideas of the nineteenth century reflected the spirit of that century and reverberated across the years is the focus of this lecture.

Vodcast of Lecture 13

Lecture 12: Romanticism, Revolution and Industrialism's First Century

In this lecture, which is part two of our survey of the Industrial Revolution, we look at how Industrialism impacted the spirit of Romanticism and the political revolutions of 1830 and 1848. During the first century of the Industrial Revolution, government completely neglected the harsh effects of industrialism, partly as a result of the ideology of Classical Economics. These harsh realities were made still worse by the cultural baggage with which the first generation of workers entered the factories. Many romantics recoiled from the results and bacame more romantic still. Industrialism created a new class, the proletarians, and a new conflict, that between the latter and the middle-class. If the conflict was not as inevitable or controlling as Karl Marx alleged, it did play a role in shaping the changing character of political revolutions between 1830 and the watershed year of 1848.

Vodcast of Lecture 12, The Industrial Revolution, Part Two

Lecture 11: The Industrial Revolution

When we look at the early nineteenth century (1815-1848), we are often dazzled by the storms and stresses of its outward appearances: its political revolutions (of 1830 and 1848), diplomatic machinations (of the Congress of Vienna) and romantic trappings (the art and literature of the period). We often lose sight of its underlying influences. Chief among these by far was the Industrial Revolution. Invisible to all but the most careful observers, the Industrial Revolution was going to transform the cast of characters that fought for and against revolution and bring the curtain down on the character of pre-1848 Europe. What would it put in its place? Part one of our discussion of the Industrial Revolution follows.

Vodcast of The Industrial Revolution, Part One

Vodcast of Remarks on Your Upcoming Book Review

Your Review of the Bauer book, Rethinking the Holocaust is due next week. In this vodcast, I make some remarks on where you should be in your preparation for this book review at this point in the calendar. I also present some suggestions on what difficulties you may be having and how you might be able to overcome these difficulties. Remember that there is a learning module on the WebCT site that should help you with your book review. This vodcast shows you the leanrig module while I make my remarks about your preparation for writing the review.

Vodcast of Remarks on Your Upcoming Book Review

Lecture 10 Vodcast: The Politics of Reaction

This lecture covers the period from the Congress of Vienna to the revolutions of 1848, primarily as a general overview of the climate of ideas that shaped the period.
Beginning with the influence of Edmund Burke upon the leaders of the Congress of Vienna, it looks in some details at the reasons for the failure of the Congress in the revolutions of 1820 and 1830, the reign of Louis XVIII and Charles X and the Reform Bill of 1832.

Vodcast of Lecture 10: The Politics of Reaction, 1815-1848

Lecture 10 PDF: The Politics of Reaction, 1815-1848

Below is a pdf of Lecture 10 on the political upheavals following the Congress of Vienna, part of the failed attempt to restore the Old Regime leading up to the revolutions of 1848.

PDF of the Politics of Reaction

Lecture 09: Napoleon at Home and Abroad

Napoleon transformed France as First Consul from 1799 to 1804, and then he transformed the world through the Napoleonic wars. Sometimes the transforming was quite the opposite of what he had in mind, as when his ability to transfer his charisma to the idea of nationalism spurred the people he conquered to resist his rule. This video podcast also introduces the Congress of Vienna and how it represents the real start of the nineteenth century.

Vodcast of Lecture 9, Napoleon at Home and Abroad

PDF of Lecture 8

Click here for a PDF of Lecture 8, A Tale of Two Revolutions

Lecture 08: A Tale of Two Revolutions

This lecture continues to explain why the French Revolution occasioned so many disasterous results and why it parted company with the American Revolution that had such a happy ending. The reasons for the fall of the Middle Class, the rise of the Jacobins, the reign of terror and the levee en masse, the Thermidorean Reaction and the dictatorship of Napoleon are all discussed. The vodcast version below does not contain quiz questions, as promised. A version of this vodcast (with questions) may be posted later.

Vodcast of Lecture 08, A Tale of Two Revolutions

PDF of Lecture 08

Lecture 07: Introducing the French Revolution

In the 1970s, a famous Chinese leader stated that it was still too early to assess the significance of the great French Revolution of 1789. What were the important ramifications of the French Revolution? How did it shake the world and why does it continue to mold the world more than two centuries later? We started looking at these questions today, taking the long view of the revolution. Our focus was the central paradox of the revolution: a revolution that began as an effort to make the world over for the benefit of all men produced instead some truly horrendous results. We look at the details of the revolution next time. Today was the big picture.

Lecture 07 Vodcast, "Introducing the French Revolution."

PDF of Lecture 07, "Introducing the French Revolution."

How to Use This Page

I thought I would post this one-minute vodcast which gives you the briefest of overviews of the purposes, nature and content of this blog. We will discuss its uses at greater length, of course, in class.

Vodcast: How to Use This Blog

Your Identification and Significance Exam Today

I hope that you did well on your first I.D. exam today. You can always find your grade for this on the WebCT site. Please remind me on Monday to set the exam so that you can see the questions and correct answers. That way you can see which questions you got wrong.

PDF of Lecture 06

Lecture 06 PDF

Lecture 06: Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau

This is one of my favorite lectures, the story of how three men accomplished a political revolution paralleling the scientific revolution of Copernicus, Galileo and Newton. These three men were the Englishmen Thomas Hobbes and John Locke and the Swiss-Frenchman, Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The ideas that united them (Enlightenment ideas) and the concepts that divided them are related in this podcast, and I think that you will find them equally intriguing and formative of the future.

Lecture 06 Vodcast This video podcast has been compressed for faster download.

Lecture 06 PDF

Questions to Consider in Rethinking the Holocaust

In class today we discussed the Bauer book,Rethinking the Holocaust. Click on the following link for an mp3 recording of our discussion. Does the Holocaust exist inside history? Why does it matter? What was the cause of the Holocaust, according to Bauer? And how do genocide and Holocaust differ? These are some of the questions you need to consider for your book review. And they are discussed in this recording.

Audio Recording of our Discussion of Some of the Issues in the Bauer Book

Lecture 05: The Encyclopedie and the Enlightenment

In lecture 05 we look at some specifics regarding the Enlightenment, particularly the life of Voltaire and the way in which the famous French Encyclopedie reflected the positive and negative sides of the Enlightenment. Did you know that Forest Gump was based on the story of Candide? Or that Voltaire was the first to mobilize public opinion behind a cause that shook a government? How did the Encyclopedists manage to spread revolutionary ideas in a country saddled with an all powerful Church and an ancien regime? This vodcast provides insight into these questions.

I am disabling the link for this podcast because it was pasword-protected and not easily accessible via iTunes. In the future all the lectures will be available without the requirement of a password, so this one will have to remain inaccessible.

Lecture 04: The Enlightenment Introduced

Lecture 04 introduces the subject of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment and its connections to the seventeenth century, among other introductory topics. We look at the roots of the Enlightenment in the scientific revolution wrought by Copernicus, Galileo and Newton. We also examine two definitions of the Enlightenment, as well as who the "philosophes" were and how they looked at the world. We look at these questions in general, however. I am leaving until Lecture 05 a look at the specific philosophes of the Enlightenment (Voltaire and Franklin) as well as its specific products (the Encylopedie and the political theories of Locke, Hobbes and Rousseau). But this lecture at least provides an overview of the protean thing called the Enlightement as well as the many things in general for which it is both praised and criticized.

I am disabling the link for this podcast because it was pasword-protected and not easily accessible via iTunes. In the future all the lectures will be available without the requirement of a password, so this one will have to remain inaccessible.

Lecture 03

We begin the third lecture with an overview of the learning module on the WebCT site, which helps you with your book review of Rethinking the Holocaust. Then we launch into an overview of the process by which the British established their own form of nation-state, constitutional monarchy. While the English and French stories had somewhat different outcomes, as far as the kind of nation-state that was ultimately established, both were stories of politiques in conflict with fanatics, and religious conflicts giving way to national unity and the dawn of an age of political revolution.

I am disabling the link for this podcast because it was pasword-protected and not easily accessible via iTunes. In the future all the lectures will be available without the requirement of a password, so this one will have to remain inaccessible.

Lecture 02

In this lecture we discuss the reign of Louis XIII and Louis XIV, and how they completed the establishment of the French nation-state. Why they chose absolutism, and how absolutism reflected the modern world in formation, is also discussed. This lecture helps you understand the video on "The Age of Absolutism," by Eugen Weber, which we screened in the class.


I am disabling the link for this podcast because it was pasword-protected and not easily accessible via iTunes. In the future all the lectures will be available without the requirement of a password, so this one will have to remain inaccessible.

Have some Questions about HIST 1112?

Your questions are most likely answered in my Frequently Asked Questions section. Click here for the Answers!

Lecture 01

In this lecture you learn about the syllabus and the Web CT site for the course.

Download the mp3 podcast of the lecture.

Welcome to our main course page for HIST 1112

About this Site

This site is largely a repository for podcasts and vodcasts (video podcasts) of the lectures for this course, with directions for other course material.