This course introduces students to major themes in European Studies, considering the dynamic processes by which Europe and European identities have been defined since the Cold War. Students examine, among other questions, how Europe has changed in the wake of new economic and political realities, with the formation of international organizations, and in the face of shifting ethnic, racial, religious, and cultural landscapes. By investigating these topics from various perspectives, students gain the interdisciplinary tools to understand the intricacies of an ever-changing Europe.

This course examines European revolutions and their legacies—social, cultural, political, and ideological. The French Revolution of 1789 brought unprecedented promises of reform to old Europe, introducing new democratic and egalitarian possibilities. Yet it also brought counterrevolution and new authoritarian rulers, a cycle that seemed to repeat itself in 1848, "the first time as tragedy, the second as farce," as Karl Marx lamented. We consider these revolutions together with the Communist uprisings waged in Marx's name, the "velvet" revolutions of 1989, and the relationship between these last European revolutions and the populism that engulfs the continent today. We investigate these histories as lenses to understand the dynamics of modern revolution; the engagement of ordinary Europeans in these processes; and, not least, the making of modern Europe over the past 300 years.

In this course, students explore the historical and cultural relations between Germany, the most prominent political and economic power in Central Europe, and the countries of East-Central Europe. The coursework focuses on "New Europe," a group of post-communist countries after 1989, investigating how they are viewed in Germany and how they positioned themselves in relation to Germany. By analyzing a wide range of fictional and nonfiction texts, students integrate insights from historical, political, and artistic discourses in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries to develop an understanding of the region's past, the current dynamics, the narratives that shape mutual perceptions and attitudes, and the ongoing processes of European integration. Conducted in English.

This course explores how travel, migration, and mobility have influenced European identities, challenged notions of belonging, and reshaped cultural boundaries from the 19th century to the present. Using an interdisciplinary approach, it examines the impact of human movement on Europe's social, political, and cultural landscape. Students will analyze diverse materials, including literature, film, art, and digital media, to understand representations and experiences of travel and migration in various European contexts. Topics include the emergence of modern tourism, the impact of colonialism and postcolonial migrations, travel writing's role in shaping perceptions of "otherness," and the consequences of increased mobility within the European Union. Students will engage with theories of travel, migration, and cultural exchange, developing a grasp of Europe's evolving relationship with movement and identity in an interconnected world.

This course examines the role of youth and student culture in shaping East European societies in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Course materials including film, literature, journalism, and music provide an introduction to East European cultural and social history and encourage students to explore themes of identity, activism, expression, and community. As students move from considering the role of youth in the Russian Revolution to contemporary student protests in support of human rights, class discussions bring new perspectives to the ways young people both navigate and foster change in the times and spaces they occupy.

This course explores representations of gender, race, and class including the intersectionality and historical evolution of these categories of difference. Students acquire analytical tools to better appreciate and contextualize French and Francophone films and look critically at their various aesthetic frameworks. How do classic French cinema, surrealism, avant-garde cinema, the New Wave, and postcolonial cinema question social norms and values? How do French and Francophone films represent personal memory, national history, gender relations, and colonial and postcolonial gazes? How do filmmakers address social change and capture shifting identities within French and Francophone history and cultures? Course and reading materials are in English; films are in the original with English subtitles. Not open to students who have earned credit for FRE S15.

In 1927, Katherine Mayo wrote a scathing report on public health and religious custom in India; the study was meant to support British rule as a modernizing force. Indian women, among others, responded immediately, tacking carefully between outrage at Mayo’s argument for imperial oversight and desires for reform. The battles for and against European empires included battlefields and soldiers. As this course underscores, however, the logics of empire and anti-imperialism were deeply entwined in ideas about how those under imperial rule should live, as well. Such rationales underwrote social incursion; condensing visions drove resistance movements, too. As we will see, the makings of many of these campaigns began as early as the rise of modern European empires themselves. We focus on the British Empire, and India and Ireland especially, while taking close stock of what would become a truly global anti-colonial wave in the twentieth century.

An introduction to the study of Western classical music. This course is at once a survey of representative works, an investigation of the concepts that have shaped the institutions and practices of classical music, and an introduction to the kinds of study that support classical music culture. The course considers the nature of a musical tradition in which works are defined by their place in a historical sequence and in which performance consists of interpreting historic written texts. Students choose a composer and a musical genre as subjects of individual projects. Prerequisite(s): any one course in music or permission of the instructor.

An exploration of the cultural landscape of Eastern Europe in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with a focus on Jewish experience. What did it mean to be Jewish under the Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires and in the interwar republics that replaced them? How did Jews fashion their lives as political subjects, as members of diverse communities, and as individuals? How do historical research, personal and collective memories, a rich storytelling tradition, and mass media shape our access to this cultural landscape, and what efforts are underway to revive it?

This course explores the shifting and varying relationships between peoples of the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and the Russian Federation and the natural world. We will examine the often contradictory ways people understand and express those relationships, presenting nature alternately as prison, as escape, as an asset, as a threat, as salvation, as home, or as distant—often frozen—other world. Using sources from a broad range of genres and disciplines, we will look at how and why people express these attitudes and how these attitudes bear on historical and contemporary behaviors and politics. Conducted in English.

Race in Europe has seemed to be a 20th-century importation, the product of new migrations from the “outposts” of European empires in the wake of WWII. The “migrant crisis” of the present era doubles down on this sense of racial, ethnic, and religious difference as externally imposed. This account has served as a comforting narrative, just as it’s been intended to fuel reaction. In this course, we examine changing views on racial, ethnic, and religious differences in European thought and politics since the eighteenth century. In contrast to populist claims, there has been a long history of European difference-making -- of “othering” along racial, ethnic, and religious lines that has produced a seemingly white and Christian European identity. Together, we will situate our investigation of difference-making alongside primary sources and recent scholarship which highlight the experiences of the individuals who built their lives and communities in the midst.

The course focuses on how the experience of the First World War (1914-1918) changed established narratives of violence and armed conflict in central Europe. It investigates how these new narratives became sites of memory, mourning, and remembrance in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, drawing on examples from the literature and art of Central and Eastern European countries. Conducted in English.

Mendelssohn, Meyerbeer, Mahler, Finzi. Each a successful composer, but each of their stories marred by one commonality: antisemitism. Using the hermeneutics of Jewishness, nationalism, and cosmopolitanism, detailed study will be afforded to each of the aforementioned composers, to discuss the interplay between the nineteenth and twentieth-century European musical arena and antisemitism. Not open to students who are enrolled in or have earned credit for FYS 586.

Cold War Identities explores the ways the combative and competitive culture of the Cold War impacted discourses surrounding race, sexual and gender identities, and national and ethnic identities in the United States, the Soviet Union, and in their respective spheres of influence. Working with materials from across cultural, political, and commercial spheres, students will engage with a fundamental contradiction of the Cold War: the ways superpowers both self-represented as bastions or freedom and progress, while simultaneously using the context of international competition as a justification for persecution of minoritized people within their own countries. With a focus on primary documents, the course builds students’ skills in evaluating and understanding discussions and representations of identity and their impacts across a broad range of media and popular culture. Conducted in English.

The course analyzes many aspects of Russian folk and popular culture from pre-Christian to post-Soviet Russia and how folklore continues to influence contemporary Russian culture. The first part of the course concentrates on Russian folk belief as expressed through oral lore, visual arts, and music. The second part of the course focuses on the myth and folktale in the Soviet Union. The course concludes with the uses of folklore in Putin’s Russia and the interaction between the forms of traditional folklore and modern popular culture. Conducted in English. This course is not open to students who have completed RUSS S27.

Indigenous movements for land, rights, and cultural preservation have spread to and originated in all corners of the world. However, the global nature of these movements at times obscures ways of being Indigenous in differing contexts. This course analyzes Indigeneity in both the United States and Russia today. Through reading and analyzing ethnography, theory, and literature, it focuses on Indigenous peoples in a comparative context. Rather than prioritizing concern with Indigenous peoples emerging from the US, it attempts to demonstrate what Indigeneity has been in both the United States and Russia and what it is and means today. It asks the following questions: what is Indigeneity and who is Indigenous; how is Indigenous identity constructed and by whom? Topics include: Indigeneity and the State, Revitalization and Resurgence, Indigenous People and Nature Protection, and Hemispheric and Global Indigeneities.

Like any region of the world, Europe has experienced significant strife and political unrest throughout its history. However, the study of modern conflict often situates Europe as outside the realm of relevance. This course will explore the complex landscape of peace and conflict in post-World War Europe in the 20th and 21st century. Through in-depth examination of case studies such as Cyprus, Northern Ireland, the Balkans, and Ukraine, the course will investigate the underlying causes of these conflicts, ranging from inter-group dynamics to systemic factors, and the various paths toward peace that have been pursued to end the violence.

The course engages students with contemporary Russia through cinema and discusses a European culture that is, at the same time, non-Western in its political make-up. Topics discussed include the colonial center and its contemporary political and cultural ambitions, imperial periphery and Russia’s "quiet others," the Russian Idea in New Auteurism, Putin’s blockbusters, Russia’s alterities (minorities, sexualities, taboo Russia), Global Russia (the United States, Europe, Russia, and Ukraine). Conducted in English.

This course examines the dynamic relationship between German cinema and social transformation from the early 20th century to the present. Focusing on key movements and filmmakers who have explored the intersecting spheres of art, politics, and social life, the course investigates how German films have both reflected and driven societal transformation. Students will study the radical innovations of Expressionist filmmakers in the Weimar era (1919-1933), the works of independent filmmakers of the New German Cinema in the 1960s and 1970s, the often-overlooked films of East-German cinema produced under the DEFA studio system, and the diverse voices of post-reunification Germany. The course highlights how cinema has responded to and influenced political shifts and social reforms. Conducted in English.

If the home was the “Englishman’s castle,” its walls were porous. Liberal culture called for separating private from public life, yet households were key sites for negotiating classed, gendered, and racial relationships. Fear that family units might break down spurred social movements and governmental reform. Modern life tends to be understood as the rise of the presumptively white, male individual, someone independent of his surroundings. By flipping the script, this course demonstrates the centrality of women, family, and community in defining and redefining society. Topics explored include work, motherhood, property rights, and the everyday life of politics, capitalism, and empire.

This course offers an in-depth examination of core issues in political sociology. Attention turns to the formation of nation-states, nationalism, postcolonialism, neoliberalism and welfare states dynamics, international organizations, social movements and revolutions, democracy and regime change, violence, power, and related topics. Students encounter a variety of theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches, with empirical analyses focusing on case studies from across the globe. Recommended background: one or more courses in the social sciences.

Free speech has long been a centerpiece of modern, liberal institutions. Dictators have feared it, of course, but it chronically troubles democratic societies, too. Words have fanned racial and religious hatred and destroyed personal reputation, bringing neighbors to the courts over women’s sexual honor and drawing men into deadly duels. This course draws students into the intertwined histories of freedom of speech and the protection of reputation. The course is rooted in early modern and modern European histories, drawing connections and comparisons not only over time, but also with American, colonial, and postcolonial contexts. Note: As part of History’s 301 series, the course is designed to guide students through the research and writing process.

Economic and political change during the 1800s revolutionized the daily lives of Europeans more profoundly than any previous century. By the last third of the century, the modern city became the stage for exploring and enacting new moral fears. This course examines these developments by focusing on sex, gender, and new urban spaces in the decades around the turn of the twentieth century. We will explore the writings of Sigmund Freud and Gustav Le Bon, investigate middle-class fascination with urban voyeurism and new media, and read about sensational cases like those of Jack the Ripper and the “discovery” of an international sex trade. Note: As part of History’s 301 series, the course is designed to guide students through the research and writing process.

Populist movements and parties have gained power and prominence in recent years. Often defying traditional left-right distinctions, they have in many cases adopted anti-globalization, nationalist or nativist, and anti-elitist positions. They have enjoyed electoral and other successes in Europe, Latin America, North America, Asia, and Africa. This seminar examines the causes of their rise, nature of their rhetoric and policies, and profound impact on cultural, political, economic, and other social processes and dynamics. Prerequisite(s): EUS 101 or one course in politics or sociology.

Despite crises and challenges, the European Union (E.U.) represents one of the most remarkable achievements of the contemporary world. This seminar first reviews the history and structure of the E.U. It then examines a series of topics related to the policy, social, and power dimensions of European integration. These topics include the drivers of integration, the transformation of domestic societies and institutions, the demands of E.U. law, the rise of a European identity, immigration, the consequences of expansion in Eastern and Central Europe, the salience of regions, and the E.U. on the international scene. Comparisons with other trade blocs conclude the seminar. Prerequisite(s): one course in sociology or politics, or EUS 101.

What is a cyborg and how does this political and cultural concept evolve through various historical periods? How are transformative relations between humans, animals, and machines imagined across cultural texts? What is trans- and post-humanism? The course examines changing ideas of constructing, enhancing, and technologizing body and mind in the Soviet Union and modern Russia. Students engage with ideas of the biopolitical remaking of humans, rejuvenating bodies surgically, prosthetically, pharmacologically, and digitally. Topics discussed include technologies of gender and gender technologies, identity politics, immortalization narratives, geopolitics. Conducted in English. Recommended background: prior coursework in literature or film.

Once regarded as impenetrable barriers dividing Europe, the Alps and Carpathian Mountains were transformed into international meeting places with the arrival of mass tourism in the late nineteenth century. At the same time, these mountain ranges began to be claimed in the constructions of national and ethnic identities that reshaped Central and Eastern Europe in the first half of the twentieth century. The course examines the role ascribed to the Alps and Carpathians at a pivotal time in European history, when the demise of empires and rising nationalism, but also new ideas about class, gender, ethnicity, and race, fundamentally restructured dynamics of power on the continent. Recommended background: a 200-level course focused on the study of literature and/or film in any department.

Since Sweden declared a Feminist Foreign Policy (FPP) in 2014, the concept has gained significant traction, and fourteen countries have subsequently adopted the term to describe their own global engagements. However, there is little consensus regarding what an FPP means in practical terms. Can a feminist approach to foreign policy be truly realized in the modern international state system? Through the use of case studies and consideration of policy areas including migration, development, humanitarian intervention, human rights, and security, students will critically engage the concept of FPP and grapple with the tensions, contradictions, and possibilities it presents. Prerequisite(s): one of the following: PLTC 155, 171, 256, or GSS 100.

Students, in consultation with a faculty advisor, individually design and plan a course of study or research not offered in the curriculum. Course work includes a reflective component, evaluation, and completion of an agreed-upon product. Sponsorship by a faculty member in the program/department, a course prospectus, and permission of the chair are required. Students may register for no more than one independent study per semester.

This course involves research and writing the senior thesis under the direction of a faculty advisor. Students register for EUS 457 in the fall semester. Majors writing an honors thesis register for EUS 457 in the fall semester and EUS 458 in the winter semester.

This course involves research and writing the senior thesis under the direction of a faculty advisor. Students register for EUS 458 in the winter semester. Majors writing an honors thesis register for EUS 457 in the fall semester and EUS 458 in the winter semester.

This course explores representations of gender, race, and class including the intersectionality and historical evolution of these categories of difference. Students acquire analytical tools to better appreciate and contextualize French and Francophone films and look critically at their various aesthetic frameworks. How do classic French cinema, surrealism, avant-garde cinema, the New Wave, and postcolonial cinema question social norms and values? How do French and Francophone films represent personal memory, national history, gender relations, and colonial and postcolonial gazes? How do filmmakers address social change and capture shifting identities within French and Francophone history and cultures? Course and reading materials are in English; films are in the original with English subtitles. Not open to students who have earned credit for FRE 151.

Oscar Wilde, an icon today, was popular in his own time as well. His relationship with Alfred Douglas was an open secret despite the fact that homosexuality was at the time a criminal offense. Indeed, Wilde’s sexuality was tolerated until he sued Douglas' irascible father for libel. This course begins with the 1895 trials, seeking to understand cultures of sexuality in a period notorious for sexual repression, and contextualizing issues they raise of scandal and the law, celebrity, gender, and sexuality. Designed to encourage independent research, the course guides students through the research process, drawing to the fore histories often hidden from view. Cross-listed in European studies, gender and sexuality studies, and history. Open to first-year students. Enrollment limited to 30.

This interdisciplinary course examines the questions, concepts, and potential surrounding puppets through a combination of hands-on work and play with puppets, discussion, readings, and viewings of puppet performances. Readings and other materials offer perspectives on what puppets are, how they interact with audiences, and what makes puppet performance a distinct forum for exploring questions about bodies and identities. Students test these ideas together using actual puppets to see how theory and practice collide. The course concludes with a collective project using puppets to engage with the community at Bates and beyond. Conducted in English.

This course investigates selected films from West and East Germany produced after 1945. Students discuss a broad range of topics and issues that define the popular view of Germany and its cultures today. They explore the cinematic images of Germany's Nazi past, the postwar division of the country and its reunification in 1990, the legacies of the 1968 generation, and diversity in contemporary Germany. The course also provides students with basic tools of film analysis, which are used in the discussion of cinematic art and in the analysis of the specific aesthetic qualities of a film. Conducted in English.

The global cataclysm of World War II put fever-dreams of racial destiny, staggering liberal democracies, rickety colonial empires, and militant communism together in a crucible of unprecedented violence and mass cruelty. Having reshaped humanity’s political horizons during the 20th century, World War II needs urgent reexamination in our current era of resurgent authoritarianism. This course juxtaposes the analytical insights of history and related social sciences with the efforts of filmmakers trying to make commercially appealing and historically responsible narratives that do justice to the humanity (and inhumanity) of individuals’ experience of the War and its aftermath.

A study of Hungarian and Czech history, politics, and theater since about 1945. Our focus is on the impact on theater of the cataclysmic social and political changes in Central Europe since the Hungarian uprisings of 1956. Other seminal events bearing on this study are the Prague Spring of 1968, the collapse of the Soviet bloc in 1989, and the subsequent rebuilding of politics and culture in the region up until today. In conjunction with our study of history, politics, and drama, students read an array of secondary sources on the social and cultural history of post-war Central Europe. Classes will be conducted as discussions, led by the Bates instructors and Hungarian, Czech, and other Central European artists and scholars. Students maintain a journal describing and analyzing the plays, readings and other academic materials studied. Recommended background: one course in European studies, theater, or politics.

Students, in consultation with a faculty advisor, individually design and plan a course of study or research not offered in the curriculum. Course work includes a reflective component, evaluation, and completion of an agreed-upon product. Sponsorship by a faculty member in the program/department, a course prospectus, and permission of the chair are required. Students may register for no more than one independent study during a Short Term.