History 416
Eastern Europe after WWI
MW 8-9:50
Sonoma State University
Spring 2016
Professor Stephen Bittner
Stevenson Hall 2070 (664-2447)
Office Hours: MW 10-11, or by appointment
bittner@sonoma.edu
Books
Tadeusz Borowski, This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen
Kate Brown, Biography of No Place
Slavenka Drakulic, How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed
Milan Kundera, The Joke
Gale Stokes, From Stalinism to Pluralism
Library Reserve
Joseph Roth, Hotel Savoy
Habsburg Source Texts Archive (available via shared Dropbox folder)
Fritz Kreisler, Four Weeks in the Trenches
Tomas Masaryk, "Independent Bohemia"
"The South Slavs before the First World War"
Mark Twain, "Stirring Times in Austria"
JSTOR
Jan T. Gross, “A Note on the Nature of Soviet Totalitarianism”
Larry Wolff, “Voltaire’s Public and the Idea of Eastern Europe: Toward a Literary Sociology of Continental
Division”
Course Description
The peoples of Eastern Europe experienced many of the most pivotal events of the twentieth century: the
collapse of the Tsarist, Austro-Hungarian, and Ottoman empires; two world wars; the formation of nationstates; the Holocaust; the Cold War; the failed anti-Soviet uprisings of 1956, 1968, and 1980; and the
political upheaval of 1989. With primary and secondary historical texts and contemporary film and fiction, we
will explore the realities of life in twentieth-century Poland, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia,
Romania, Bulgaria, and their successor states. In the process, we will wrestle with a handful of questions
that are central to the history of the region. What is Eastern Europe? Is it merely a construct of the 20th
century? Or is it a product of a deeper schism that divides the continent? How does this schism resonate in
the daily lives of Eastern Europeans?
Successful completion of this course satisfies the European elective requirement for the history major.
Course Requirements
Your final grade in this course will be based on your performance on two essays, two detailed, in-class
quizzes, and your participation in class discussions. Please carefully review and heed the following:
1. Essays
Each essay should be 5 pages in length (roughly 1,500 words), double-spaced, and typed. You are
welcome to discuss the prompts with other students, but if you do so please indicate their names
on the cover of your essay. By turning in an essay, you acknowledge that you are familiar with
SSU's policy on cheating and plagiarism. Because I use take-home essays in lieu of in-class
1
midterm and final exams, I will not review drafts beforehand. If you are worried about the quality of
your writing, I encourage you to take advantage of the resources that the Writing Center offers.
I expect you to write at a level appropriate for juniors and seniors in college. Consequently, your
essay should be free of elementary grammatical errors. I also expect you to conform to
conventional essay format. Your essays must have an introduction that includes some sort of hook
for the reader, a clearly stated argument, and a description of the structure of the paper (or how
you will illustrate the argument). Likewise, you must write transitions between the different
components of your essay, and end with a conclusion that restates the argument. I encourage you
to consult my style guide (available on my website), where I have listed the most common
grammatical and stylistic snafus that I encounter in student writing at SSU.
You must use Chicago-style footnotes when quoting or paraphrasing the readings. If you are
uncertain what Chicago-style means, please consult the following link:
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html.
In addition, please be sure to use ibid. and shortened citations where appropriate, as demonstrated
here:
1
Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative and Other Writings (New York, 1995), 22-23.
ibid., 45.
3
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract (New York, 1968), 56.
4
Equiano, Interesting Narrative, 78.
2
Your life will be considerably easier and your blood pressure lower if you use the footnote function
in your word processing program.
No block quotes, please.
Finally, please identify yourself only on the cover page of your essay. The cover page should
include your name, the names of anyone with whom you discussed the question, and the title of
your essay.
2. Quizzes
The quizzes will require you to identify a handful of persons/places/events that we have discussed
in class, or respond to questions about the readings. Success on the quizzes requires that you
attend class regularly, take comprehensive notes, and stay current with the readings.
3. Class Participation
Class participation means what it says: you are required to participate in class discussions. It is not
sufficient merely to attend class. In general, every student begins the semester with a C- for class
participation; whether you go up or down from there depends on what you do during the remainder
of the semester. If you attend every class but say nothing, you will remain at a C-.
I take attendance semi-regularly, and almost always when it's clear that a sizeable number of
students are absent. If I notice that you are not attending class regularly, I will ask to meet with you
privately so you can justify your continued presence on my course roster.
Course Goals
If you are diligent about your work in this course, you will hone five essential skill sets that are easily
transferable to other academic disciplines and, upon your graduation, to the professional world. You will
learn to analyze and use primary and secondary sources to form arguments and make judgments. You will
gain a greater understanding of and appreciation for historical debate and controversy. You will familiarize
yourself with different and often contradictory historiographies, and see how present political and cultural
phenomena inform understandings of the past. You will learn how to marshal empirical evidence to illustrate
your arguments. And you will polish basic skills like written and oral expression that are at the core of any
university class.
Grade Distribution (in points)
2
Exams (2):
Quizzes (2)
Class Participation:
50
30
20
Final Grade Scale (in points)
93-100
90-92
87-89
83-86
80-82
77-79
73-76
70-72
67-69
63-66
60-62
Less than 60
A
AB+
B
BC+
C
CD+
D
DF
Other Important Information
I require that you show commonsense etiquette in class: turn your cell phone to vibrate, limit your computer
use to taking notes, do not send or read text messages during class, and treat your classmates and
professor with respect. Failure to show proper etiquette will result in exclusion from the classroom.
In all but the most extraordinary cases, I will penalize an exam a letter grade for each day that it is late.
Quizzes cannot be rescheduled under any circumstances without the appropriate documentation. If you
have a legitimate personal crisis, please let me know beforehand so we can make the proper arrangements.
I am happy to accommodate student with disabilities. Please contact Disability Services for Students
(Salazar 1049) if you have any concerns in this regard.
There are important university policies with which you should be familiar: the add/drop deadline, the
procedures for grade appeals, the diversity vision statement, and especially, the policy on cheating and
plagiarism. Plagiarism is a form of theft and has serious consequences. Penalties range from the grade of F
for the assignment or course to temporary or permanent expulsion. The Internet has made it easier for
students to engage in plagiarism, but it has also made it easier for professors to locate the provenance of
suspicious work. If you have any questions about what constitutes plagiarism, please feel free to ask me.
Class Schedule
Week 1
Jan. 25-27
Course Introduction
Twain, "Stirring Times in Austria" (Dropbox)
Week 2
Feb. 1-3
What Is Eastern Europe?
Larry Wolff, “Voltaire’s Public and the Idea of Eastern Europe: Toward a Literary
Sociology of Continental Division” (JSTOR); Stokes, From Stalinism to Pluralism,
217-23 (“Tragedy of Central Europe”)
Week 3
Feb. 8-10
The Experience of Empire
"The South Slavs before the First World War" (Dropbox)
Week 4
Feb. 15-17
WWI and the New States
Roth, Hotel Savoy, 155-83 ("The Bust of the Emperor," Library Reserve);
Kreisler, Four Weeks in the Trenches (Dropbox); Masaryk, "The Independent
Bohemia" (Dropbox)
Week 5
Feb. 22-24
Populations and Politics, I
Brown, Biography of No Place, 1-117
Week 6
Populations and Politics, II
3
Feb. 29-Mar. 2
Brown, Biography of No Place, 118-238
Week 7
Mar. 7-9
Occupation, Collaboration, Liberation
Gross, “A Note on the Nature of Soviet Totalitarianism” (JSTOR)
First Quiz (Wednesday)
Week 8
Mar. 14-16
Spring Break
No Classes
Week 9
Mar. 21-23
Film: “Everything Is Illuminated”
Midterm Essay Due (Wednesday)
First Essay Prompt
The UCLA historian Ivan Berend has referred to the interwar period in Eastern Europe as the
"decades of crisis." Basing your answer on the course readings, please describe the social,
political, and economic processes that resulted in "crisis." To what extent did these processes
originate in the fin-de-siècle? Did they help lay the foundation for the political extremism of the Nazi
occupation?
Please carefully review the requirements for essays, which I have listed earlier in this syllabus, for
information on appropriate length, format, style, and citation style.
Week 10
Mar. 28-30
Holocaust
Borowski, This Way for the Gas
Week 11
Apr. 4-6
Reconstruction and the Rise of Communism
Stones, From Stalinism to Pluralism, 9-77 (Part I: The Stalinist Moment)
Week 12
Apr. 11-13
Tito and the Yugoslavian Experience
Kundera, The Joke, parts 1-4
Week 13
Apr. 18-20
Dissent, part 1: Warsaw, Budapest, and Prague
Kundera, The Joke, parts 5-7; Stokes, From Stalinism to Pluralism, 79-134 (Part
II: The Marxist Critique)
Week 14
Apr. 25-27
Dissent, part 2: Solidarity
Stokes, From Stalinism to Pluralism, 135-215, 224-53 (Parts III and IV:
Antipolitics and the Retreat to Ethics, and The Return of Politics)
Week 15
May 2-4
1989
Drakulic, How We Survived Communism
Week 16
May 9-11
Nationalism Unleashed
Stokes, From Stalinism to Pluralism, 255-294 (Part V: After the Fall)
Second Quiz (Wednesday)
Second Essay Prompt
Eastern European communism officially collapsed in 1989. Yet a closer reading reveals that cracks
in the communist facade began to emerge as early as 1953, the year that Stalin died. Basing your
answer on the readings and films where appropriate, please trace the origins of the 1989
revolutions in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. Why did communism fail in Eastern Europe? Did its 40-year
existence hinge solely on the use of force? Or did communism promise (and ultimately fail to
deliver) something more progressive?
Please carefully review the requirements for essays, which I have listed earlier in this syllabus, for
information on appropriate length, format, style, and citation style.
4
Final exams will be due in my office at 9:30 a.m. on Monday, May 16 (which corresponds
with our designated final exam period). Due to the deadline for submitting final grades, late
exams will not be accepted under any circumstances.
5