MODULE 1
From the Industrial Revolution to the Postmodern Crisis of Capitalism
Manchester: A Case Study in European History
A Gallery of Testimonials
The Industrial Revolution – Industrialization
Capitalism and Globalization
WHAT AND HOW?
Task:
To generate a testimonial gallery of scholars, thinkers and writers who
dealt with the problem discussed
Objectives:
 to generate of a multimedia archive
 to focus on thinkers’different ideas about
economic and social transformation processes
(The Industrial Revolution – Industrialization
Capitalism and Globalization)
 to learn how to synthesize in the English language
Materials: (texts, resources, videos, pictures, articles, Pc, the Internet,
teacher’s site)
Text types analysed: all the texts studied
Methodology: Group work (cooperative and collaborative learning)
WHY?
Language skills: speaking, reading,
writing, discussing, interacting,
public speaking
Study Skills and Knowledge: structure of argumentative text,
use of literary code, textual structural analysis, selection of
testimonials, quotations,connection with suitable context
study of resources, spoken and written production,
interaction
ICT skills: Office (.doc, .ppt), Internet surfing, pdf…, work
with images, Microsoft Picture Management)
What to do with the language  Competence: Use language
to generate a testimonial gallery
Testimonials
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Adam Smith
Alexis de Tocqueville
Charles Dickens
Karl Marx
Samule Smiles
Winston Churchill
John Keynes
Thomas Sowell
Joseph Schumpeter
Eric Hoffer
Deng Xiaoping
Thomas Friedman
Naomi Klein
Riccardo Bellofiore
Jeanette Winterson
Luigi Zingales
Adam Smith
(1723-1790)
Scottish social philosopher, pioneer of
political economy
 father of modern Economic Science
(liberalism) large production and
capitalism
"the great object of the Political Economy of
every country is to increase the riches
and power of that country".
Reference text: The Wealth of Nations
Focus: Capitalism
Cross cultural references: investigation of the
causes of wealth
Critical thinking: Capitalism, Political Economy,
causes of wealth
Alexis de Tocqueville
(1805-1859)
French Political thinker and historian
 Liberal position about democracy
Reference text:
Ireland(1835)
Journey to England and
Focus: Manchester
Cross cultural references: J. Bentham, A.
Tocqueville , A. Toynbee, K. Marx, F. Engels
Critical
thinking:
Alienation,
exploitation,
industrialization, unequal distribution of wealth, bad
working condition, double nature of capitalism,
Utilitarianism
Charles Dickens
(1812-1870)
English Victorian novelist
 remarkable characters
 superb telling technique
 symbolic portrait social class contrast
Reference text: Hard Times (1854)
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Utilitarianism
Focus: Coketown
Cross cultural references: J.Bentham, A.
Tocqueville , A. Toynbee
Critical thinking: social rift, industrialization,
wealth versus well-being, working class capitalists
Karl Heinrich Marx
(1818 -1883)
German philosopher, economist,
sociologist, historian, journalist, and
revolutionary socialist
 Critical of his contemporary economy,
politic, society and culture
Reference text:
Focus:
Das Kapital(1867)
Capitalism
Cross cultural references: A. Toynbee,
F. Engels, Luigi Zingales
Critical thinking: industrialization,
unequal distribution of wealth, money
creates wealth
Samuel Smiles
(1812 –1904)
Scottish author and reformer.
Reference text: Thrift (1875)
Focus:
Capitalism
Cross cultural references: K. Marx, E.
Hoffer, T. Sowell, J. Schumpeter
Critical thinking: Industrialization,
metaphor of the multi – faceted nature
of capitalism
Winston Churchill
(1874-1965)
British Conservative Politician
 statesman and orator, Nobel Prize for
Literature
 twice Prime Minister (1940–45 and 1951–55)
 officer in the British Army
 historian, writer, artist
 he received the Nobel Prize in Literature
Reference: Sir W. Churchill Quotes
Focus: Capitalism
Cross cultural references: powerful command
of the English language, literature
Critical thinking: capitalism, socialism, blessing,
industrialization, wealth versus well-being,
working class, army
John Maynard Keynes
(1883 – 1946)
British economist
 Founder of modern macroeconomics
 most influential economist of the 20th century.
 His ideas  basis for the school of thought
known as Keynesian economics
Reference text:
The General Theory of Employment
Interest and Money (1936)
Focus: Capitalism and direct interventions
Cross cultural references: R. Bellofiore
Critical thinking: industrialization, Keynesianism,
direct intervention on financial problems
Joseph Alois Schumpeter
(1883 -1950)
An Austrian American economist and
political scientist.
 Popularized "creative destruction" in
economics
Reference text:
and Democracy
Capitalism, Socialism
Focus: Capitalism
Cross cultural references: K. Marx, L.
Zingales, R. Bellofiore
Critical thinking: industrialization, the
European financial situation, creative
destruction
Deng Xiaoping
(1904 – 1997)
Politician and reformist leader of the
Communist Party of China. He led China
towards a market economy.
 led China towards a market economy.
Focus:
Capitalism
Reference: Deng Xiaoping quotes.
AVideo
Cross cultural references: K. Marx, E.
Hoffer, T. Sowell, J. Schumpeter
Critical thinking: market economy, to be rich
is glorious because it gives power and wealth
Thomas Sowell
(1930)
American economist, social theorist, political
philosopher, and author
conservative thinker of the late 20th century
America's leading philosopher
seminal study on the role of Race in history
explain the principles underlying modern economics
he advocates laissez-faire economics and writes from a
conservative and libertarian perspective.
 opposes Marxism,
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Reference text: Marxism: Philosophy and Economics.
Cross cultural references: J.Bentham, A.Tocqueville ,
A. Toynbee, K. Marx, F. Engels, Milton Friedman, George
Stigler, F. A. Hayek, Joseph Schumpeter
Critical thinking: pushiness, justice and equality, civil
rights, race and ethnicity
Thomas Friedman
(1953)
American journalist and author.
twice-weekly column for The N.Y. Times.
won the Pulitzer Prize three times.
Reference text: The Lexus and the Olive
Tree: Understanding Globalization(1999)
Focus:
Free-Market capitalism
Cross cultural references: J.Bentham,
A. Tocqueville , A. Toynbee, K. Marx, F. Engels,
L. Zingales
Critical thinking: global trade, the
Middle East, globalization, environmental
issues
Naomi Klein
(1970)
Canadian author and social activist
political analyses
criticism of corporate globalization
Reference text: The Shock Doctrine:
The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
(2007)
Focus:
Capitalism
Cross cultural references: K. Marx, E.
Hoffer, T. Sowell, J. Schumpeter
Critical thinking: frontier
capitalism shifting from crisis to
crisis
Riccardo Bellofiore
Full professor (University of Bergamo) in
 political Economy
 monetary economics
 history of economic thought
Reference text: article from “the
Guardian”(2011) A crisis of Capitalism
Focus: Italian Crisis and Eurozone
Cross cultural references: Karl Marx, Hyman Philip
Minsky, Yanis Varoufakis, Stuart Holland, John
Maynard Keynes
Critical thinking: actualization, financial problems
in Europe
Jeanette Winterson
(1959)
Contemporary English Writer
 adopted by Pentecostal parents
 boundaries of physicality and the
imagination, gender polarities, sexual
identities
Reference text:
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
Focus: Manchester
Cross cultural references: A. Toynbee, K. Marx,
F. Engels, C. Dickens
Critical thinking: industrialization, wealth versus
well-being, working class – capitalists, process of
change, contradictions inside society.
Luigi Zingales
(1963)
Italian economist and educator
 Winner of 2003 Germán Bernácer Prize to the
best European economist under 40 working
in macro-finance.
 Competition is not guaranted by the control
organisms
Reference text:
A Capitalism for the People:
Recapturing the Lost Genius of American Prosperity
(3 June 2012)
Focus:
Capitalism
Cross cultural references: Adam Smith, Thomas
Friedman
Critical thinking: actualization, financial problems in
Europe
SKILLS - STUDY PRACTICE FEED-BACK
Learning skills
 reading,
 manipulating differentstext types
 acquiring a specific vocabulary
 comprehension,
 textual analysis,
 group discussion,
 Selection skills,
 critical thinking,
 gathering of ideas,
 planning,
 drafting,
 redrafting,
 peer proof reading,
 image selection,
 reorganizing,
 generating a .ppt presentation
 generating a .pdf document
 public speaking
FEEDBACK
1. What you have learnt?
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The problems of capitalism and European’s current economic and social situation
Reading a Postmodern Novel
Studying essays and argumentative text about the problems
Studying and interpreting qiuotations from testimonial’s works
interacting in a workgroup
Selecting relevant data
Synthesizing concepts
Writing in English
Creating a .ppt presentaton
2. What could be improved?
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Our comunication skills, precision, time organization
3. Level of appreciation and usefullness of workshop:
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The work useful to learn new details about economy
Learning together offers deeper insights
Occasion to study and share discussion
Reading and speaking in English with a real purpose
WORKSHOP 7
CREDITS
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BALDO Sara
MONGERA Enrico
MONTANARI Veronica
TALIAN Lorenzo
ZANUTTA Riccardo