HIST3400 Modern European Intellectual History: Ideas and Society

This course examines the relationship between ideas and social changes in modern Europe. It will also explore the impact of modern European thoughts on contemporary culture in a cross-cultural perspective.

Week 1: From Traditional Europe to Enlightenment Europe

Week 2: Europe and slavery

Texts: The Encylopedie entries on Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Negroes [note: do not use the term “negro” when speaking]

Links: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=did;cc=did;rgn=main;view=text;idno=did2222.0000.114

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=did;cc=did;rgn=main;view=text;idno=did2222.0000.667
https://quod.lib.umich.edu/d/did/did2222.0000.028/–negroes?rgn=main;view=fulltext;q1=slavery

Week 3: Europe’s Internal Others

Texts: Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Women (Selections); Zalkid-Hourwitz, Vindication of the Jews

Links: http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3420/pg3420-images.html – introduction, chapters 1 & 4

https://revolution.chnm.org/exhibits/show/liberty–equality–fraternity/item/573

Week 4: Post-Revolution Europe: proletariats and liberals

Texts: Blake, London, Jerusalem; Mill, On Liberty

Links: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/Blake_London.jpg

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/54684/jerusalem-and-did-those-feet-in-ancient-time
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/34901/34901-h/34901-h.htm – Intro, chapters 2 & 4

Week 6: Socialism and Communism

Text: Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto; Engels, The Principles of Communism
Links: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/index.htm
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/11/prin-com.htm

Week 7: Nietzsche & Freud

Texts: Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals, 1:10-13, 16. Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/52319/52319-h/52319-h.htm 
Beyond Good and Evil, 2:44; 5:202-203; 9:257, 260. Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4363/4363-h/4363-h.htm 

Twilight of the Idols, “Maxims and Missiles”. Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/52263/52263-h/52263-h.htm#MAXIMS_AND_MISSILES

Sigmund Freud, Introductory Lectures

Link: https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.273302/2015.273302.Introductory-Lectures_djvu.txt or https://freudianassociation.org/en/wp-content/uploads/Sigmund_Freud_1920_Introductory.pdf
Chapters 7, 11, 16-20

Week 8: Socialist Revolutions

Texts: Lenin and Luxemburg, selections ( The text for Lenin could be seen on Blackboard)
Links:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch05.htm

https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch06.htm

https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch08.htm

Week 10: Totalitarianism
Text: Hannah Arendt, On the Nature of Totalitarianism: An Essay in Understanding
Link: Uploaded on Blackboard

Week 11: Feminism, Existentialism
Text: Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex
Link: https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/ethics/de-beauvoir/2nd-sex/introduction.htm (introduction)

Week 12: Stalinism and Post-Stalinism
Text: Havel, The Power of the Powerless
Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20120107141633/http://www.vaclavhavel.cz/showtrans.php?cat=clanky&val=72_aj_clanky.html&typ=HTML

Week 13: Anticolonialism
Text: Amee Cesaire, Discourse on Colonialism
Link: https://libcom.org/files/zz_aime_cesaire_robin_d.g._kelley_discourse_on_colbook4me.org_.pdf

The HIST 3400 tutorial will be held on Wednesdays and Thursdays from 12:30 to 14:15, with two sections available: one on Wednesday and one on Thursday. You will be assigned to only one of these two sections. The tutorial will take place over four sessions throughout the semester, and the exact dates and locations will be announced later.

Attention is drawn to University policy and regulations on honesty in academic work, and to the disciplinary guidelines and procedures applicable to breaches of such policy and regulations. Details may be found at http://www.cuhk.edu.hk/policy/academichonesty/.

With each assignment, students will be required to submit a signed declaration that they are aware of these policies, regulations, guidelines and procedures.

• In the case of group projects, all members of the group should be asked to sign the declaration, each of whom is responsible and liable to disciplinary actions, irrespective of whether he/she has signed the declaration and whether he/she has contributed, directly or indirectly, to the problematic contents.
• For assignments in the form of a computer-generated document that is principally text-based and submitted via VeriGuide, the statement, in the form of a receipt, will be issued by the system upon students’ uploading of the soft copy of the assignment.

Assignments without the properly signed declaration will not be graded by teachers.

Only the final version of the assignment should be submitted via VeriGuide.

The submission of a piece of work, or a part of a piece of work, for more than one purpose (e.g. to satisfy the requirements in two different courses) without declaration to this effect shall be regarded as having committed undeclared multiple submissions. It is common and acceptable to reuse a turn of phrase or a sentence or two from one’s own work; but wholesale reuse is problematic. In any case, agreement from the course teacher(s) concerned should be obtained prior to the submission of the piece of work.