The Laboratory Atop the Graveyard: Research Seminar in 20th Century Europe

The democratic welfare states that we take for granted are in fact the far from inevitable recent outgrowths of chaos and upheaval. Twentieth-century Europeans across the political spectrum had to come to terms with an age of the masses: political mass movements, mass production of commodities, mass media. Europeans drew new mental and physical boundaries among themselves and came to dominate the globe, even as they nearly destroyed themselves in wars of unprecedented destruction. The real victors were two rival systems of modernity: American consumer capitalism and Soviet communism. In 1989, it seemed clear that the former had triumphed. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the future looks less clear. Although the age witnessed great violence and despair, it also brought forth great hopes and achievements in social thought, the arts, and technology, many of whose effects we are still pondering. Intended for Division II and III students.