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Full-Text Articles in History

Rider Of The Black Horse, Theodore Schenck Jan 2024

Rider Of The Black Horse, Theodore Schenck

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This article explores the actions and ideology of the Russian revolutionary and terrorist Boris Savinkov through his final novel, The Black Horse. I argue that the book represents its author's attempt to come to terms with a world in which he feels politically homeless with the victory of his enemy, the Bolsheviks. Savinkov reckons with his fate through the liberal use of Biblical allusions and apocalyptic imagery.


“Into The Sea Of Forgetfulness”: An Analysis Of Anna Komnene’S Alexiad In Relation To The First Crusade, Breya D. Scarlett Jan 2024

“Into The Sea Of Forgetfulness”: An Analysis Of Anna Komnene’S Alexiad In Relation To The First Crusade, Breya D. Scarlett

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Anna Komnene’s account of the First Crusade in her work The Alexiad provides invaluable insight into the Byzantine perspective of this pivotal event defining the 11th century. While shunned in a monastery, she wrote her celebrated work known as The Alexiad. Anna’s primary motivation for writing the biography stems from her desire to emphasize the accomplishments of her father, especially in regards to protecting the Byzantine Empire against invaders, both Latin and Turkish. For Anna, the crusade functions as a Western pretext for taking land away from the Byzantines. Comparing specific sieges in the First Crusade to their Latin …


Heroes, Victims, And Future Citizens: Representations Of French Children During World War I, Megan R. Outtrim Jan 2024

Heroes, Victims, And Future Citizens: Representations Of French Children During World War I, Megan R. Outtrim

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The effects of total war society in France during WWI dramatically altered the daily lives of both adults and children, witnessing increasing levels of patriotic rhetoric, wartime propaganda, and anti-German sentiment. Children were often made the focal point of this propaganda, as they represented the future of the nation. As such, three specific representations of children emerge from WWI propaganda in France: the heroic child, the victimized child, and the malleable future citizen. Some of these representations were depicted in propaganda meant for children specifically, while others were depicted in propaganda meant to mobilize adults in the name of children. …


The Rise Of Russian Peasant Witchcraft: A Response To Social Unrest In Imperial Russia, Katrina Sommer Jan 2023

The Rise Of Russian Peasant Witchcraft: A Response To Social Unrest In Imperial Russia, Katrina Sommer

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Imperial Russia became home to a unique form of witchcraft from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century. Combining its religious history, patterns of imperial expansion and governance, and social hierarchies, witchcraft accusations arose during especially troublesome economic and political times. Differing from eighteenth-century America Witchcraft trials, these trials were not only femicide. Targeting anyone who might subvert established social or cultural norms, these accusations often led to violent expungement, ending with a ritual of communal bonding.


Interpreting The Intentional Inaccessibility Of The Early Modern Roman Catholic Church, Kristen P. Quesada Jan 2023

Interpreting The Intentional Inaccessibility Of The Early Modern Roman Catholic Church, Kristen P. Quesada

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Many may wonder why, in the modern day, the Roman Catholic Church continues to incorporate Latin, a now barely extant language, into its canonic religious rituals and public services. However, to understand whether there is a latently malicious intent lurking beneath this esoteric tradition, we must look back to the 1545 Council of Trent, in which these traditions were first canonized. This choice on the part of the Catholic Church helped incense the Protestant Reformation’s criticisms against the Church for exclusivizing the very religion its followers were practicing. This paper investigates the origins of the Catholic Church’s suppressive practices against …


Lord Northcliffe And The Fall Of The Liberal Party, Jonathan Briffault Jan 2023

Lord Northcliffe And The Fall Of The Liberal Party, Jonathan Briffault

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The decline of the Liberal Party following their 1906 triumph has prompted countless historical analyses. Despite their significant majorities, popular agenda, and divided opposition, the Liberal Party was unable to convert its support into political success. This paper suggests, through an analysis of the papers and writings of Lord Northcliffe, that the rise of New Journalism and, in particular, Lord Northcliffe’s dominance of the press, laid the foundation for the Liberal Party’s demise. Lord Northcliffe, through his monopolization of the press, offered a coherent and unified opposition to the Liberal agenda, successfully splintered the Liberal leadership, and guided the Conservative …


Soviet Commemoration And Myth-Making Of The Nazi Extermination Camps: Case Studies On Treblinka, Sobibór, And Majdanek, Isaac Bluestein Jan 2023

Soviet Commemoration And Myth-Making Of The Nazi Extermination Camps: Case Studies On Treblinka, Sobibór, And Majdanek, Isaac Bluestein

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The Nazi extermination camps of Treblinka, Sobibór, and Majdanek, all located in Eastern Europe, are understudied, underdiscussed, and undermemorialized in public and scholarly memory. In this paper, I seek to conduct case studies of these three camps, their histories, and their commemoration efforts. Ultimately, four main factors prevented these camps from achieving the solemn recognizability they deserve and from having their victims’ stories adequately told; little remains of these camps compared to concentration camps in Germany, fewer individuals survived them to emphasize their importance, the Soviet Union possessed near complete control of their study and commemoration, which allowed for them …


Radio And Rebellion: An Investigation Of Radio And Its Use By Czechoslovakian Youth During The 1968 August Invasion, Jillian E. Updegraff Jul 2022

Radio And Rebellion: An Investigation Of Radio And Its Use By Czechoslovakian Youth During The 1968 August Invasion, Jillian E. Updegraff

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

In 1968, an already tumultuous year throughout the world, Czechoslovakians showed immense bravery in the face of a Soviet-led invasion between August 21and August 27. While separate bodies of existing scholarship examine the role of radio in the resistance efforts and the part that youth played in these efforts, little scholarship examines the two in conjunction. This paper explores the ways in which radio impacted the actions of youth movements and encouraged cross-generational resistance among the Czech population during the invasion and subsequent occupation by the Soviet Union. Through an examination of radio broadcasts, photographs, and student accounts, this paper …


Bastardy And The New Poor Law: Redefining The Undeserving, Bianca M. Serbin Feb 2022

Bastardy And The New Poor Law: Redefining The Undeserving, Bianca M. Serbin

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The English New Poor Law, enacted in 1834, signaled a new era of welfare in England, shedding the paternalistic provision of aid that was characteristic of the Old Poor Law. Existing scholarship positions the New Poor Law as an important landmark in the capitalist development of the English economy. This paper analyzes the text of the Bastardy Clause of the New Poor Law––which overturned the existing bastardy laws and said that mothers of illegitimate children could no longer receive aid from the parish––and contextualizes it as a major rethinking of charity in 19th century England. The debate on the …


Portrait Of Same-Sex Desire: Lesbian (Mis)Representations In Nineteenth-Century French Art, Jessica N. Mummert Feb 2022

Portrait Of Same-Sex Desire: Lesbian (Mis)Representations In Nineteenth-Century French Art, Jessica N. Mummert

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

In late nineteenth-century France, lesbianism became a heightened topic of interest due to scientific, social, and political discourse surrounding female sexuality. From this discourse stemmed a small but significant outpouring of lesbian artworks by male artists. Rendering the lesbian as a hypervisible, hypersexual figure for men to project their desires and fears onto, these artworks communicated concerns over sexuality, morality, feminism, class, and gender roles. Traditionally, historiography on this topic tends to focus on one mode of lesbian representation at a time or discusses lesbian art en masse. This scholarship has highlighted some different representations and the social circumstances that …


Cinquante Cinq Millions De Français?: French Propaganda During The Algerian Revolution, Amaya Escandon Feb 2022

Cinquante Cinq Millions De Français?: French Propaganda During The Algerian Revolution, Amaya Escandon

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

In the late 1950’s to early 1960’s, the visual landscape of Algerian communities would have included walls plastered with various posters and pamphlets in both French and Arabic urging them to “talk,” or to enlist in the French Army, or to “say yes to France and Algeria,” or to say “Yes to Peace.” During the Algerian Revolution, a conflict of urban warfare, terrorism, torture, and no detectable enemy for the French to target, both sides recognized that the war would be won through political control of the population. One of the ways they fought for this control was through visual …


Playing With Fire: The Medieval Judicial Ordeals And Their Downfall, Aaron Larson Jul 2021

Playing With Fire: The Medieval Judicial Ordeals And Their Downfall, Aaron Larson

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Trials by ordeal in the Middle Ages prove to be some of the most complex secular trials in all of history. Both trial by fire, and trial by water looked to call God's judgment into play, hoping that He would make the decisions of guilt or innocence. God is all-knowing. He is all-powerful. Therefore He has all of the relevant information to determine the fates of those who go through the ordeals. Despite this, the theologians in the medieval Church looked to lessen clerical involvement in the ordeals. In 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council met, and the ordeals ceased to …


Attitude Towards Cross-Culture Exchange In The 1685 French Embassy To The Kingdom Of Siam, Benjamin M. Beese Jul 2021

Attitude Towards Cross-Culture Exchange In The 1685 French Embassy To The Kingdom Of Siam, Benjamin M. Beese

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

Traditional histories of Early Modern exchange tend to emphasize the dispersion and adoption (or rejection) of European science and culture. More recently, there has been an historiographical trend to see early modern international interactions as multi-direction exchanges in which all parties are altered in each interaction. The 1685 French-Jesuit Embassy to Siam provides an interesting opportunity to explore the implications of this multi-directional approach. Although this exchange had no significant, lasting impact on either Siam or France, the dynamics at play demonstrate how each party’s attitude towards the exchange impacted their ability to achieve their aims. This paper uses Guy …


Full Issue: Volume 2, Issue 1, Editorial Board Feb 2021

Full Issue: Volume 2, Issue 1, Editorial Board

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The first issue in the second volume of the Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal.


The Importance Of Morocco In The Spanish Civil War, Jarod E. Ramirez Feb 2021

The Importance Of Morocco In The Spanish Civil War, Jarod E. Ramirez

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

This paper addresses the pivotal yet forgotten role that Morocco played in the Spanish Civil War. Other histories and analyses of the Civil War limit discussion to the Spanish side of the conflict without recognizing the colonialist holdings that Spain had and the ways that those lands and people impacted the war. This leads to an incomplete history that denies the Civil War its full historical context and the foundational context for the Nationalist side of the conflict. This paper analyzes the war as well as the ideological creations behind Spanish Fascism and the ways in which Morocco was tied …


Full Issue: Volume 1, Issue 1, Editorial Board Jun 2020

Full Issue: Volume 1, Issue 1, Editorial Board

Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal

The first issue of the Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal.