All 2017-2018 CHR lectures and seminars will meet from 3:00-4:30 p.m. in Dulles Hall, Room 168 unless otherwise specified.
Friday, Sept. 15: Jack Goldstone, Director of the Center for Public Policy, George Mason University: “Why Revolutions Persist – The Struggle for Freedom and Fragile Regimes” (Thompson Library 165)
Friday, Oct. 6: Vasileios Syros, The Italian Academy for Advanced Studies in America, Columbia University : “The Reason-of-State Tradition and Early Modern Political Discourse on Revolution”
Friday, Oct. 20: Aaron Retish, History, Wayne State University: “Russian Courts and the 1917 Revolution”
(Download paper.)
Friday, Nov. 3: Rob Parkinson, History, SUNY-Binghamton: “Making ‘the cause’ common: Race and Nation in the American Revolution”
(Co-sponsored by the Ohio Seminar in Early American History)
Professor Parkinson will discuss how political and communication leaders in the American Revolution linked anti-British stances to colonial fears and prejudices regarding enslaved Africans and Indians, in “Making ‘the cause’ common: Race and Nation in the American Revolution.”
Parkinson has written for the New York Times and his recent book The Common Cause: Race and Nation in the American Revolution (UNC Press, 2016), won the 2017 James A. Rawley Prize from the Organization of American Historians for the best book dealing with the history of race relations in the U.S.
Wednesday, Nov. 8: Steve Smith, Senior Research Fellow, Oxford University, and Michael David-Fox, History, Georgetown University, “Rethinking the Russian and Chinese Revolutions: A Centennial Conversation” (Thompson Library 165) (Co-sponsored by the Seminar in Russian, Eastern European and Eurasian History and the East Asian Studies Center.)
Steve Smith is the author of six books on revolution and society in Russia and China, including Revolution and the People in Russia and China: A Comparative History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008). His current work is on the ‘politics of the supernatural’ in the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China, as authorities tried to eliminate ‘superstition’ from daily life while ordinary people deployed religious and magical beliefs to deal with the turbulent changes that revolution brought.
Michael David-Fox researches modern Russian and Soviet history and a founding editor of the pathbreaking journal, Kritika. He has published widely on the political, cultural, and intellectual history of Russia and the Soviet Union, including Showcasing the Great Experiment: Cultural Diplomacy and Western Visitors to the Soviet Union, 1921-1941 (Oxford University Press, 2012). His new work is on the history of the Nazi occupation of the USSR during World War II.
Friday, Feb. 9: Valentine Moghadam, International Affairs and Sociology, Northeastern University: “Is the Future of Revolution Feminist?,” (Thompson Library, Room 165)
Friday, March 2: Suzanne Desan, History, University of Wisconsin: “Rebellions within Revolutions: ‘October Days’ in the French Revolution”
[Video not available.]
POSTPONED until Autumn 2018: Gil Joseph, History, Yale University: “The Once and Future Revolution: Social Upheaval and the Challenge of Rule during Mexico’s Long Twentieth Century”
POSTPONTED: Xiaowei Zheng, University of California at Santa Barbara: “Republican China before the People’s Republic: Republicanism and Constitutionalism in the Revolution of 1911”
Location: Dulles Hall, Room 168
Professor Zheng’s research interests include local history of the Qing dynasty and early republican political culture, with a focus on the emergence of popular nationalism and the potential of republicanism. Her most recent book The Politics of Rights and the 1911 Revolution in China, chronicles the 1911 Revolution and argues for its transformative effect. Her current project, tentatively titled The Unfinished Mission: Constitutionalism in China, examines Chinese political discourse on popular rights, sovereignty, and constitutionalism throughout the twentieth century.