History Commons^™

Losing Our Minds To Madness: Paradigm Changes In Western European Perceptions Of Mental Illness, James Michael Cecil

History

Academia and scholarship of the 20th-century bred a renewed interest in mental illness throughout history. Despite an increase in the literature within the discourse surrounding "madness," scholars have generally failed to understand how and why Western European societies have viewed mental illness in various ways throughout recorded history. This paper argues that there remains an inherent, human desire to reject anything different from humanity, particularly mental illness, which is nearly impossible to fully comprehend. This is especially true in the case of how societies have institutionalized, punished, and subjugated the "mad" individual.

James Petiver’S ‘Kind Friends’ And ‘Curious Persons’ In The Atlantic World: Commerce, Colonialism And Collecting, Kate S. Murphy

History

In 1695, James Petiver concluded the first ‘century’ of his Musei Petiveriani by observing that he had received the specimens described within it from his ‘Kind Friends from divers parts of the World’ and ‘Curious Persons…Abroad’. This essay examines Petiver’s network of such ‘Kind Friends’ and ‘Curious Persons’ in the Atlantic World. The composition of Petiver’s network reflected many of the broader patterns of English commerce in the Atlantic at the turn of the eighteenth century. Moreover, England’s growing overseas empire and its expanding commercial activity required a parallel expansion in maritime labour. Mariners were correspondingly central to Petiver’s work …

Modern Intolerance And The Medieval Crusades [Excerpted From Whose Middle Ages?], Nicholas L. Paul

History

Whose Middle Ages? is an interdisciplinary collection of short, accessible essays intended for the non-specialist reader and ideal for teaching at an undergraduate level. Each of twenty-two essays takes up an area where humans have dug for meaning into the medieval past and brought something distorted back into the present: in our popular entertainment; in our news, our politics, and our propaganda; and in subtler ways that inform how we think about our histories, our countries, and ourselves. Each author teases out the stakes of a history that has refused to remain past and uses the tools of the academy …

Whose Middle Ages?: Teachable Moments For An Ill-Used Past [Table Of Contents], Andrew Albin, Mary C. Erler, Thomas O'Donnell, Nicholas L. Paul, Nina Rowe

History

Whose Middle Ages? is an interdisciplinary collection of short, accessible essays intended for the nonspecialist reader and ideal for teaching at an undergraduate level. Each of twenty-two essays takes up an area where digging for meaning in the medieval past has brought something distorted back into the present: in our popular entertainment; in our news, our politics, and our propaganda; and in subtler ways that inform how we think about our histories, our countries, and ourselves. Each author looks to a history that has refused to remain past and uses the tools of the academy to read and re-read familiar …

Gender And Sexuality, Amy E. Randall

History

This chapter explores gender and sexuality during Stalin's rule. It considers femininities and masculinities, gender identities and relations, sexual norms and practices, and sexual politics and identities. The Stalinist gender and sexual order was not unchanging, uniform, consistent, or entirely new; it was inextricably linked to Soviet discourses and policies about national minorities, religion, class, and broader historical events as well as gender and sexual norms and identities in Imperial Russia and early Soviet rule, It consisted of emancipatory and "radical" as well as repressive and conservative policies. At its core, the Stalinist gender and sexual order was designed to …

Explaining America's Proxy War In Afghanistan: U.S. Relations With Pakistan And Saudi Arabia 1979–1989, Adelaide Petrov-Yoo

History

From 1979 to 1989, an international coalition led by the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan sent aid to Afghan guerillas known as the mujahideen. This thesis investigates the interests served by this aid by identifying key decision makers and identifying what they hoped to achieve by participating in the aid pipeline. In the United States, President Carter escalated the aid program in response to waxing Soviet influence and waning US influence in the region. President Reagan’s foreign policy approach, fighting the Cold War in other countries through proxies labeled “freedom fighters”, encouraged members of Congress and the Executive branch …

Belle La Follette’S Fight For Women’S Suffrage: Losing The Battle For Wisconsin, Winning The War For The Nation, Nancy C. Unger

History

A century ago, on May 21, 1919, the US House of Representatives voted difinitively (304 to 89) in support of women’s suffrage. Two weeks later, Wisconsinite Belle La Follette sat in the visitors’ gallery of the US Senate chamber. She “shed a few tears” when it was announced that, by a vote of 56 to 25, the US Senate also approved the Nineteenth Amendment, sending it on to the states for ratification.¹ For Belle La Follette, this thrilling victory was the culmination of a decades-long fight. Six days later, her happiness turned to elation when Wisconsin became the first …

At The Intersection Of Hope And Despair: Korea’S Uncertain Trajectory In The 1980s, Haley Noelle Cole

History

The 1980s in South Korea were defined by political factionalism and constant protest. The brief ecstasy afforded by the assassination of the dictatorial president Park Chung Hee in 1979 gave way to disillusionment with the policies of his successor, Chun Doo Hwan. Throughout Chun’s term, he sought to subvert popular perceptions of his authoritarian illegitimacy he earned through the bloody military coup with which he obtained power. Chun hoped to justify his presidency within the contexts of 1) the 1987 presidential election, wherein the country would witness its first peaceful transfer of power in the post-war era, and 2) the …

Post-Partition Sikh Immigrant Experiences In The United States, Athamjit Singh Dhaddey

History

The project titled, "Post-Partition Sikh Immigrant Experiences in the United States," begins to explore the different factors that contributed to the migration of Sikhs to the United States. Beginning during the first decade of the 1900s, Sikhs began to migrate to the United States for a variety of reasons. It wasn't until the partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 that we began to see these numbers increase dramatically. The main primary sources in this paper are oral histories from three of those immigrants during that time. With their stories, we are able to dive deeper into the different experiences …

Nuclear Families For The Nuclear Age: Disney's Part In Creating Gender Roles In The 1950s, Carlee T. Litt

History

The 1950s was a revolutionary period for American youth culture. The Walt Disney Company played an important role in forming and conveying a new image and set of ideals associated with childhood. My paper examines the Disney Company’s messages about growing up, in particular, the gendered expectations surrounding love that revolutionized the way Americans viewed family life. For both ideological and business reasons, Disney promoted an idealized concept of the nuclear family to children. My paper pays close attention to the conversation occurring between Disney and the American public by analyzing both 1950s Disney storylines, disseminated in multiple mediums such …

Legacies Of Belle La Follette’S Big Tent Campaigns For Women’S Suffrage, Nancy Unger

History

In countless speeches and articles in La Follette’s Magazine, Belle Case La Follette urged that women needed the vote to secure “standards of cleanliness and healthfulness in the municipal home,” and because “home, society, and government are best when men and women keep together intellectually and spiritually.” This range of often mutually exclusive arguments created an inclusive big tent. However, arguing that women were qualified to vote by their roles as wives and mothers while maintaining that gender was superfluous to suffrage also contributed to an uneasy combination that would continue the conflict over women’s true nature and hinder their …

Barren Lands And Barren Bodies In Navajo Nation: Indian Women Warn About Uranium, Genetics, And Sterilization, Marie Bolton, Nancy C. Unger

History

Founded by Native American women in 1974, "Women of All Red Nations (WARN) insisted that the ongoing Indian public health crisis could not be properly understood exclusively within the context of the exploitation and pollution of the physical environment. It required as well an understanding of the larger context of Indian health issues evolving out of past and present cultural and political changes. This article focuses on selected health, threats affecting the Dine, or "the People," as Navajo Indians call themselves, living in Dine Bikeyah (Navajo Nation) during the mid to late 20^th century. Navajo history is marked by …

Immigration, Incarceration, Deportation: Asian Americans In The Criminal Justice System, Agnes Mung

History

Asian Americans have been long overlooked in the United States for their contributions and have been restricted by ever-changing stereotypes and perceptions. Within the Asian American community, the incarcerated population and former criminals have been hidden because of cultural stigmas and missing statistics. In the 1980s, a large population of Asian American youth were becoming involved in criminal activity because of difficulty adapting to life in the United States after arriving at a young age. Gang membership and racial profiling increased the chances that Asian Americans would be arrested, although Asian Americans are less likely to be sentenced to prison …

The History Of High School Ethnic Studies Courses In California: A Case Study Of Santa Maria Joint Union High School District, Brian Gounod

History

Ethnic studies in California's high schools has a 51-year history, beginning in 1968. The growth of ethnic studies has occurred through this period and can be separated into four key time periods. The growth of ethnic studies across these time periods have been issues of ethnic segregation, ethnic self-determination, educational inequalities and immigration issues The greatest period of expansion for ethnic studies has been the 5-year period from 2014-2018, when numerous high school districts adopted new courses and requirements for ethnic studies.

One such high school district to expand its ethnic studies department was Santa Maria Joint Union High School …

Send Them Your Heart: Usa For Africa, The Eritrea Shallow Wells Project, And A Song That Defined American Pop Culture, Charlie Williams

History

No abstract provided.

難於登天 Harder Than Climbing To Heaven: Fighter Aviation In The Republic Of China Air Force (1928-1994), Jordan Andy Li

History

A study of the founding and evolution of the Republic of China (ROC) Air Force's fighter aviation from 1928-1994. Topics include Chinese Air Force during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), Chinese Civil War, and cross-Taiwan Strait relations throughout the Cold War.

Town And Gown: How Poly Royal And The Riots Shaped The Relationship Between Cal Poly And San Luis Obispo, 1960-1993, Halie Jinae Swanson

History

No abstract provided.

The Romantic Socialist Origins Of Humanitarianism, Naomi J. Andrews

History

“Humanitarian” (humanitaire) came into use in French contemporaneously with the emergence of romantic socialism, and in the context of the rebuilding of post-revolutionary French society and its overseas empire beginning in the 1830s. This article excavates this early idea of humanitarianism, documenting an alternative genealogy for the term and its significance that has been overlooked by scholars of both socialism and humanitarianism. This humanitarianism identified a collective humanity as the source of its own salvation, rather than an external, well-meaning benefactor. Unlike liberal models of advocacy, which invoked individualized actors and recipients of their care, socialists privileged solidarity within their …

75th Anniversary Of D-Day, Boise Public Library

History

Resources and Photographs of a display of government documents from Boise Public Library, Boise ID.