My Photo

who we are

sharing......

Categories

February 2012

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
      1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 10 11
12 13 14 15 16 17 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29      

awards in the café cabinet

  •  

     

  • intute UK joint university database recommended

     

     

  • Channel 4 recommended

     

     

  • BBC radio recommended
    Radio 4

     

     

  • SBC Education Blue Ribbon Hot Site!

     

     

  • March '06 páginas recomendado

     

  • May '05 Site of the Month by SovLit, Harvard University.

     

  • April '05 Birmingham GRID for Learning Site of the Week

     

     

worthies who have departed the café

being read on the terrace.....

  • Matthew Parker: The Sugar Barons. Matthew Parker

    Matthew Parker: The Sugar Barons. Matthew Parker
    Parkers history of the West Indies sugar industry is one of the most valuable reads of the year for students of industrial and imperial history. He outlines the origins of the industry which originated on the Caribbean island of Barbados and reached its peak with the cultivation of Jamaica. The final chapters look at eventual decline and collapse. The 17th century saw the cultivation of sugar following ideas first used in Brazil by the Dutch and Portuguese. Other islands soon followed as the price for sugar rocketed in Europe and fortunes were made by the estate owners. Sugar became an essential luxury and demand forced more and more land into cultivation. More was being made in profit than could be spent on the islands- the growing surplus was being spent and invested in England - providing funds for other commercial and early industrial ventures. So far so good, but it is in exploring other aspects of this growth that the book excels: the growth of privateering - the use of ships to attack and loot Spanish treasure ships was encouraged; relations with the New England colonies; the growth of sugar as the key element of the English 18th century economy and the emergence of a sugar lobby that would determine English foreign and economic. However the key thread of the book is that of slavery. Parker makes it very clear that this "modern" slavery was driven by the needs of the Indies. Sugar cultivation is very labour intensive. The islands were amongst the least healthy places on earth with mortality, especially amongst Europeans being very high. Slaves brought in from Africa were the answer for the owners and were employed in ever growing numbers from the mid 17th century, despite their own high death rates. They were considered of little value other than as an economic commodity and Parker shows clearly how dehumanised the owners and their white management had become to slavery. Supported throughout by individual histories with a focus on the Landowners, this is well written and accompanied by good maps and illustrations. Dec '11 (****)

  • Alice Hogge : God's Secret Agents

    Alice Hogge : God's Secret Agents
    Tells the story of Roman Catholic missions and Jesuit priests in England during the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. A detailed and thorough account, with care taken to inform the general reader of the specialist contexts and terminology used by historians as the narrative progresses. She tells of the early missionaries from the continent, often educated in colleges founded in Europe by English Catholic exiles and how they travelled the country and lived within the "underground" recusant community. The main thrust of the book outlines the different and changing reaction of government. Initially tending to tolerance, this hardens, culminating in the post 1605 Oath of Allegiance and anti Roman Catholic legislation. The Apellant episode is also explored. Yet the Jesuits seem to have been opposed to regime change, the eventual Gunpowder Plot being the product of the frustration of home-grown subversives (assisted or not by government agents to increase the eventual anti-Catholic spin) at the lack of official change. Hogge paints a credible picture of the Jesuits as scapegoats for both James and Elizabeth’s Government to blame their troubles on. An interesting aspect of the book is the story of the Jesuit Nicholas Owen, arrested and racked to death in 1606, who was the builder of many of the priest-holes found in the country's great houses and used to hide Catholic clergy when a house was searched. Two final sections of note indicate where Owen's building work may be seen today, and draw parallels (already emerging to the reader as the story unfolds) with present day British changes to torture and terrorist legislation and practice in response to current concerns over militant Islam.However, this may be more a book to be dipped into (using the index - for some unexplained reason chapters are numbered like a novel but given no other description to assist partial reading for research) rather than read cover to cover. Perhaps tighter editing might have helped but I found the initial chapters and the final post 1600 section of most use and value (especially those outlining James I's early religious inclinations). During the 1580's and 1590's I tended to get lost amongst the places, names, conversations, letters and travels of those being described. Oct '11 (***)

  • John Simpson: Unreliable Sources: How the Twentieth Century Was Reported: How the 20th Century Was Reported

    John Simpson: Unreliable Sources: How the Twentieth Century Was Reported: How the 20th Century Was Reported
    John Simpson, BBC World Affairs editor, writes an account of how he sees the press reported on key stories from the Boer War to the Iraq invasion. As the focus is on the British press, so the themes are those that affected Britain and its press most strongly over the last 110 years. This probably means it will be of most direct interest to students of modern British history, but the story it tells of relationships between the press and its readers, of press owners and government as well as how far the press supports, questions and/or is restricted by government policy is more global in its significance. Simpson devotes a chapter to a key period that affected how the press operated: clearly Britain’s main wars and conflicts, but also issues such as the Abdication crisis, interwar attitudes to Hitler, Suez, Ireland, and the rise of the Murdoch press. I found the most useful chapters to be ones that examined the press response to government policy during the Boer and First World Wars (in the final chapters Simpson draws several parallels of approach between the Boer War and Iraq invasion). He shows clearly for example how loathe the press was to present the realism of the western front and how much his was resented by those at the front. Students (and teachers preparing courses on the impact of the media) will also find much of value on the interwar chapters which shows clearly which papers were most behind Hitler and the differing views on Appeasement and the actions of Chamberlain. Individual reporters are given mini pen portraits - many seem to be “gentle” and/or “generous…… Meanwhile he explains how the new kid on the block, news reporting on BBC radio, tried to catch up until coming into its own during World War II. Well written and reads easily, it is a large tome with a basic but useful bibliography for each section (although it publishes all chapter notes and the origin of specific sources online). It is sufficiently self-contained so that chapters could be taken on their own. This is worthwhile as Simpson provides many extracts from press reports (good for using as source questions?) and numerous worthwhile, not to say often enjoyable, anecdotes about the individuals he is describing. As for the Beeb, it might have been more valuable to have more on the impact of the BBC World Service reporting after 1945 and less on the BBC’s more recent conflict with the Blair government, which if we are being pedantic was not in the 20th century. Another point of issue is that the book seems to focus on issues that are exclusively political or to do with international conflicts that involved the UK. No mention is made at all of how BBC reporting made the world aware of the famine in Ethiopia and produced such global impact and consequences. Such “social” reporting has grown considerably since the 1980’s even if its thrust has been blunted/hijacked by more recent governments – however is this not the theme of the book? Aug '11 (****)

  • Philipp von Boeselager: Valkyrie - The Plot To Kill Hitler

    Philipp von Boeselager: Valkyrie - The Plot To Kill Hitler
    This is a memoir of Philipp von Boeselager, traditional German aristocrat, cavalry officer and last surviving member of the 1944 Bomb Plot to assassinate Hitler. In many ways this would seem to be of limited value to a historian: it is as said, a personal memoir, and would seem to be ghost written at that. Much of it is devoted to uncritical praise of an elder brother, also involved in the Plot and the amount of the (slim) work on the actual Plot is minimal. Nonetheless, this is a significant piece of history, but not so much on what it says about 1944, rather, it gives an interesting insight into the mentality of the Junker officer class during the Third Reich. Implicitly, the content and presentation of the narrative in the memoir makes clear that the aristocracy saw the Fuhrer as an upstart, but did not intervene to obstruct his accession to power seeing this more as "the will of the people" with which they should not deign to interfere. They also appeared to have exercised considerable informal local authority, but without too much accountability, or desire to use this considerable local and historic influence to resist or reduce the impact of national socialist policies (although a incident of the family assisting fleeing Jews early on is described). Von Boeselager and his brother join the cavalry and there is little questioning of German war aims/strategy until the war turns against the Germans, especially in the east, although the memoir states it was a growing awareness of SS atrocities in the east rather than growing Soviet pressure that brought about plans to assassinate Hitler and stage a coup. We read of how the July 1944 plotters gradually came together and instigated several attempts to kill Hitler in preparation of seeking an anti-Soviet alliance with the western allies, but ultimately failing and most facing arrest, torture and execution. Several take their own lives. The von Boeselager brothers are not betrayed by fellow plotters and survive (although Phillips brother is killed later fighting the Red Army), with Philipp himself living until 2008. These officers of the Junker class were undoubtedly brave and fought determinedly and with a strong sense of historic duty to defend Germany and ensure the well being of their men (Von Boeselager distinguished himself in combat on the Eastern Front, was wounded several times in combat and was awarded the Knights Cross with Oak Leaves for bravery in combat). It is clear that they were principled and honourable with a genuine sense of chivalry. The plotters themselves became the conscience of postwar (western initially) Germany. Unfortunately, these memoirs do little to remove the notion that the principles and sense of duty were misdirected. They had the political awareness, skills and inherited authority to prevent or restrain national socialism at its birth but chose to wait too long to act and when they did von Boeselager's account still makes it is difficult to remove the impression that they did so at a time when their historic interests and privileged lifestyle were most under threat - by the advance of Soviet communism. July '11 (****)

  • Christopher Meyer: Getting Our Way: 500 Years of Adventure and Intrigue: The Inside Story of British Diplomacy

    Christopher Meyer: Getting Our Way: 500 Years of Adventure and Intrigue: The Inside Story of British Diplomacy
    Meyer's book (he was the UK Washington Ambassador 1997-2003) is subtitled "500 years of adventure & Intrigue - the Inside Story of British Diplomacy" but is pretty selective in the episodes it examines. A series of chapters look at specific a stages in the story, some more successful than others. The initial chapter on the Elizabethan ambassador Killigrew in Edinburgh is an interesting example of the rudiments of modern diplomacy at work, as are the three on British relations with China (or should it be the British abuse of those relations?). There is a valuable section for students of the interwar period on Sir Robert Vansittart, Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office from 1930 to 1938 which clarifies Britain's ignominious role in the collapse of the League of Nations. Least successful chapter is the final somewhat diffuse one on Bosnia in the 1990's. However this is not a history book - footnotes are sparse, bibliographies are limited and contain largely the standard works that might appear on a decent piece of IB/A level coursework. The value of this readable book though is the insight it provides into the mindset of a modern successful British diplomat. From its introduction onwards it provides an argument in favour of reinforcing British diplomacy, and British support for how this branch of government should be enabled to strongly pursue and protect British interests and values in the world. In doing this Meyer writes little of the advantages of internationalism, and seems to ignore what even he writes about regarding the impact of the blind pursuit of British values and interests on 19th century China or on the Ethiopians in the 1930's. He argues diplomacy has to adapt and modernise to protect national interest. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, but not at the cost of a "beggaring my neighbour" approach that was so prevalent in the past. He correctly argues that following an ethical foreign policy (as recently with early New Labour) is itself problematical but that should be no reason to revert to past methods (he believes Margaret Thatcher's time was "a notably successful period for British diplomacy").It is telling that there is no chapter on the one great challenge - and questionably greatest failure of modern British diplomacy - Europe. Nothing on how diplomats failed to engage with the early moves for closer co-operation. Even in his own terms of reference, no mention of how greater involvement from the start might have delivered the British influence and values he seeks and how a successful British diplomatic offensive might have embedded them in the heart of the European project. Perhaps because this is the one big area Britain did not "get its way". This is a quick read and it reads well with much to fascinate - not the least of which is as an aid to understand the attitudes and objectives that formed so much of British foreign policy for so long. June '11 (***)

  • Barry Strauss: The Spartacus War

    Barry Strauss: The Spartacus War
    This slim volume is the story of Spartacus, leader of the slave revolt against the Romans in 73BC. Spartacus gathered a force of up to 40,000 slaves and in the course of two years was able to lead them up and down the length of Italy resisting all attempts by the Roman legions to suppress them - until the final campaign against Crassus when he was defeated and killed in battle (in contrast to the Kubrick film which shows him captured - the famous "I am Spartacus" scene happening in Hollywood only!). Spartacus is seen as a charismatic and very able commander and leader, his eventual vanquisher Crassus was not one of Rome's most sympathetic generals - he took 6,000 prisoners and proceeded to crucify each one along the road to Rome.To someone accustomed to reading about modern history, the style is unsettling at first - too many mentions of "might", "perhaps", "likely", "uncertain but" suggest a vagueness that makes for a lack of certainty, but gradually you realise Strauss is using the only evidence available - which is patchy and unreliable. The historians role in the ancient world here is to map a probable route through the possibles for the layman and build up a picture of what might have been. The available evidence allows for no more. Strauss does this well, giving his views on how much value to place on evidence at each stage of the campaign. Good maps and a thoroughly explained bibliography at the end make this a useful read for the non-specialist who wants to find out a little more about the considered reality beyond the film set. May '11 (****)

  • John le Carre: Our Kind of Traitor: A Novel

    John le Carre: Our Kind of Traitor: A Novel
    I am pleased to say this is a return to le Carré’s old hunting ground – the spy novel. As in the past, it also sees the British Secret Service ranged against the Russians and focuses around a high level defection from Russia. But here similarities with the Cold War novels end. The defection is not from the KGB or its modern successor but from the Russian mafia. Nor is the British secret service portrayed as it once was by le Carré. There is still internal rivalry but the conflict is now with a service deeply inbred with the London’s city establishment and it’s role as a financial capital. This is a darker, more political le Carré who is taking aim at what he perceives as another threat to liberal, compassionate, democratic society. The “Constant Gardener” took aim at the hypocrisy of the international aid and pharmaceutical communities, “A Most wanted Man” tackled international terrorism. Now it is the turn of the global banker and the way the establishment of a nation desperate for foreign capital fawns towards them. Perhaps because it is more of a “spy” novel than has recently been the case, this is le Carrés most successful work for some time (although his young central characters do appear to be drawn from the sixties rather then the facebook/twitter generation of today). A good read that encourages you to move through it quickly! April '11 (****)

  • John Keegan: The American Civil War

    John Keegan: The American Civil War
    Keegan, a war historian best known for his surveys of 20th century warfare writes well and clearly. I should imagine that the book provides more than sufficient detail on the campaigns and key meetings between both sides to satisfy most students researching the conflict (however some reviews have expressed concern with accuracy). What is irritating is the habit of repeating points made earlier on in the narrative.The battle maps are particularly useful (although I must admit to moving quickly through some of the land campaign details, lack of personal familiarity with the basic geography of the area trying my patience a little. This though is a personal failing, not one of the authors.). What is made very clear is how inexperienced and unprepared both sides were in the craft of warfare and it is interesting to read the process of natural selection required to find able military commanders. Keegan also provides a number of chapters prior to and after the conflict that are extremely useful articles in their own right on key aspects of the conflict (such as the Life of the Soldier, Generalship, Nature of the Civil War Battle, Home fronts, Black soldiers). In many ways these are just as valuable as (if not more so than) the account of the war itself. One omission is a discrete chapter focusing on the war role of Lincoln himself, which is a pity. Given Keegan's interest in 20th century warfare there are many instances where he shows how the Civil War displayed and introduced features of later wars (as well as how it did not and drew rather on earlier conflict experience in Europe). All in all this is an easily recommendable narrative cum basic analysis of the war if what is required is a primer. March '11 (****)

  • Matthew Brzezinski: Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Age

    Matthew Brzezinski: Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Age
    It tells the story of "Sputnik and the rivalries that ignited the Space Age". Indeed it starts well with a very atmospheric description of a V2 launch against London, and then goes on to tell the story of the early pre Sputnik US and Soviet space programmes and the internal politics that lay behind them. Centre-stage is rightly given to von Braun, ex member of Hitler's SS and Korolev, survivor of Stalin's Gulag camps (interesting that Korolev had as many failures - probably more than the US before his successful Sputnik launch) with an examination of their respective relationships with Eisenhower and Khrushchev but beyond telling the story, rather like early US attempts to get into space, it fails to really ignite. Brzezinski is a former journalist (for the Wall Street Journal) and this reads like an extended piece of journalism - rather like a long series of articles that you might find in a weekend supplement. The US political context is more satisfactory than the Soviet. The end notes suggest that research is essentially secondary - and much of that from the internet.An appropriate read perhaps if you are new to the period (having just seen the forthcoming movie on "Ham" the space chimp maybe) but don't look to find any novel insights or new archival research. Jan'11 PS If you are wondering why the next two reviews have no images it is because they are available on Kindle only in the US!! (***)

  • David Olusoga, Casper Erichsen: The Kaiser's Holocaust: Germany's Forgotten Genocide and the Colonial Roots of Nazism
    Tells the story of German colonialism in South West Africa, showing how German policy towards the native Herero and Nama peoples developed into one of genocide. Shows how a philosophy of white racial supremacy emerged out of the ideas of Charles Darwin and was put into practice. Survival of the fittest becomes justification for white dominance over "inferior" indigenous peoples and genocide an acceptable option. This process is shown though as not just a German process and the German experience is placed in a global context: with British colonists in Tasmania, the US frontier wars, the Argentine wars of the desert all showing the same features.In the German genocide against Herero and Nama we read of extermination orders, forced labour and concentration camps designed to kill off indigenous peoples who were articulate, politically able and well resourced, but ultimately doomed as the Kaiser's troops introduce a policy of "absolute terror and cruelty" in which missionary churches were actively complicit.The second part of the work shows the significance of this colonial experience for future nazism. The colonies first Governor was the father of Hermann Göring, the uniform of the SA was that of the Wilhelm II's brown shirted colonial army. The colonial period saw the emergence of the pseudo science of eugenics and the legal framework to protect the purity of German settlers from racial contamination for a Volk that needed Lebensraum to expand into and escape population pressure at home. These ideas survive the collapse of 1918 and become a core element of the politics of the right.After 1933 races considered impure, German Jews and Gypsies, are subjected to the treatment first employed in South West Africa: Nuremberg Laws to end racial mixing; control and internment in concentration camps, forced labour, extermination. Hitler's war, it is also argued, was ultimately one for colonial Lebensraum in the east. The German treatment of the eastern populations and Red Army was different to the western conflict as Hitler considered the eastern peoples to be similar to uncivilised indigenous colonial peoples. Fighting was more brutal, civilians were treated with even less regard. Necessary he believed to ensure Lebensaum and civilisation. The nazis compared this push East to how Wilhelm's troops had fought the Herero, or the British the Sudanese & Tasmanians, the US the Native Indians, or the Argentines with the tribes of the south. Thought provoking, this is an important, thorough and well written work. It ranks with Hochschild's "King Leopold's Ghost" as an indictment of European colonialism but develops its arguments beyond normally considered confines to place the events of a short-lived German colony in a far wider context. Jan '11 (*****)
  • Jane Conway: Mary Borden: A Woman of Two Wars
    The story of Ma(r)y Borden, one of those dynamic women who managed to flourish in the male dominated world of the early 20th century. Borden had been given a huge headstart as the daughter of a millionaire from Chicago and this she used to the full. A writer of books achieving both popular and critical acclaim and (second) marriage to a British politician ensured equal social acclaim across the Atlantic. The book is illustrated with many useful photos including several society magazine shots showing her in the 1920's as quite the society woman and hostess. However there was more to Borden than this. She was a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honour and bearer of the Croix de Guerre presented for her war work in setting up and managing hospitals very close to the Front and also those with the lowest mortality rates. She repeated this war work in the Second World War and continued to write successfully until late in life. Conway provides a literary commentary on her books as they were published, attempting to link them into Borden's experiences, but for historians what is most interesting are her sections on Borden's war work. In 1914-18 she used innovatory portable hospitals with reinforced windows to withstand blast damage that could be dismantled and rebuilt in a matter of hours. The section on her work in World War II is even more historically interesting. Leading the Hadfield-Spears mobile ambulance unit she managed front line Franco-British nursing care in France, Italy, north Africa and the Middle East and found herself more involved in the political machinations of the Franco-allied relationship. Conway is perceptive on the chaos and amateurism shown during the Fall of France as well as the in-fighting involving De Gaulle (which ultimately sees the disbanding of the unit in 1945). It is hard though to escape the paradoxes of her existence. Living a privileged lifestyle she was critical of the British Labour Party for not doing enough to relieve poverty. Given the hectic nature of her life it is clear that she spent little of what would be called "quality time" with her young family despite fighting a long and (clearly for them) disturbing battle with her first husband for custody of them. A more direct approach at times to some of the paradoxes outlined above would also help ensure that Borden could be seen more clearly in the context and standards of her time if not those of today. It is these contrasts that make understanding the assertive and successful women of the early 20th century (as well as today?) so interesting. In the last few years many unsung stories of the role played by key women in both world wars have become more public. Conway presents us here with the life of one such woman whose work and enthusiasm deserves to be remembered by a clear biography such as this. I would recommend this a book to be read in particular by students of social as well as women's history. Dec '10 (****)
  • Michael Howard: Otherwise Occupied: Letters Home from the Ruins of Nazi Germany

    Michael Howard: Otherwise Occupied: Letters Home from the Ruins of Nazi Germany
    Howard was a 19 year old officer sent to the Ruhr in 1946 as an intelligence officer for Britains T-Force to help administer British seizures and this is his story of his time as part of that process. He has used the 67 letters he sent home to his mother during the period as a structure to hang the development of the general account on, a narrative that reads well and is clear to follow. Maps and photographs by the author help general understanding and the personal story element of the book. Interesting aspects emerge on the nature of the early British occupation (for example it seemed many of the initial military administrators had a pre-war background in Britain's colonial administrations - his own father was in the Fiji Colonial Service) as well as the reality of life in the immediate postwar period for occupied and occupier and the issue of "fraternisation". Little is said about the wider picture of T-Force work (and indeed this is not the purpose of the book), rather the focus is on the experiences and impressions of a young officer who happened to be part of a wider process (so despite the described efficiency of the authors section, day to day military administration in general during the period comes over as somewhat ad hoc with officers clearly enjoying their occupying role, and much reliance on a public school ethos that was perhaps typical of the period). This is perhaps the key significance of Howards writing. Letters from the war period are relatively common, far less common are letters with a commentary written 60 years later by the same writer. Here this provides not just elaboration but a modern self-evaluation of attitudes and actions contemporary to the period that help the context to be better understood. Of particular value is the (empathetic) development of the author's response to German nationals. As a junior officer the author had no real part in key zonal decisions, so do not look here for new evidence on British postwar occupation policy or relations with the Soviets. However the book has real value to the historian in another way. Recent years have seen an explosion in German witness accounts of the immediate postwar period. Here we have what amounts to an annotated contemporary account of early occupation life by a member of a western occupying force to set alongside them. Nov '10 (****)

  • Sean McMeekin: The Berlin-Baghdad Express: The Ottoman Empire and Germany's Bid for World Power, 1898-1918

    Sean McMeekin: The Berlin-Baghdad Express: The Ottoman Empire and Germany's Bid for World Power, 1898-1918
    A thorough and almost magisterial acount of an area of World War 1 not normally given a prime focus; the Ottoman front. It is a very contemporary work using terms very familiar today: the creation of a jihad against the Entente and Britsh in particular; rivalry between Shia and Sunni; Caucasian minority struggles; strategies to control modern Iraq & Iran and at the end a push for middle east oil. McMeekin shows how Wilhelmine Germany had a rich seam of middle east specialist archaeologists. He records the excellent use made of this by Berlin in working on the Ottomans, Arabs, Persians, Afghans and others to promote an anti British & French jihad policy from Constantinople to Kabul via Baghdad. The ultimate aim was to bring about a collapse of British India. New light is cast on the context of many elements of Great war strategy & campaigns: the German push to india increased a British focus on Iraq and Iran that has persisted; the Armenian massacres as an element of Ottoman great war strategy; the success of the Tsarist Russian army and the later growth from it of Yudenich's White forces.The Turks were diplomatically, and often militarily, sharper and shrewder than usually given credit for. McMeekin argues that the Balfour declaration was made by a largely pro arab British government, partly out of pique with German advances to Zionists and a desire to win US zionist support for a speedier US mobilsation. It also traces German - muslim relations to the end of World War 2 showing how these were cultivated as part of the Nazi anti-semitic program. Given the unfamiliarity of the characters to most readers a list of Dramatis Personae would have been helpful. Equally the title perhaps suggests more of a focus on the actual Berlin-Baghdad railroad. Although a vital thread in the narrative, it is no more than that. Railway enthusiasts will be disappointed early on by what is perhaps the title of an over-zealous editor. Nov '10 (****)

  • David Finkel: The Good Soldiers

    David Finkel: The Good Soldiers
    Finkel spent 8 months in Iraq during the "Surge"with the US 2-16 Ranger division and reports on their deployment there, as he himself writes "without agenda". This is not a strategic analysis of their role within the Iraq theatre. Rather the focus is on an infantry battalion of young soldiers who see themselves as being there to do as good (hence the title) and decent a job as possible. They are not politicians or ideologues. Finkel draws a series of pen portraits of key figures – battalion leader, soldiers going out in their humvees to face yet another patrol route seeded with remote controlled bombs, the Iraqis who work with them. Then there are the casualties. The book presents them in their truly awful detail – especially in one chapter which describes a visit by the commander to severely his severely wounded men in hospital in the States. Good Soldiers puts the troops in their human context. Finkel writes empathetically of men trying to survive and do a job they were sent out to do but who grow increasingly disillusioned as their deployment comes to an end. The 2-16 Rangers live in fortified areas as separate from the Iraqi population as it is possible to be and still be in Iraq. This is necessary – they appear to be under constant deadly attack. This is not the more secure confines of Baghdad's Green Zone, but in Rustamiya, on the eastern edge of the city, a violent place where 350,000 Iraqis were hanging on as the war ground ahead. The enemy are faceless, nameless, not explored by Finkel and neither are their motives. This makes them perhaps perceived all the more as the Good Soldiers saw them. This is no gung-ho account. The reader though is left with a great deal of sympathy for those involved, regardless of what might be thought of the reasons for them being there in the first place. For this reason The Good Soldiers is likely to remain a valuable source for understanding the bravery and ferocity but also the futility of the Iraq occupation. Sept '10 (****)

  • Greg Grandin: Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City

    Greg Grandin: Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City
    Tells the story of Henry Ford's attempt to build a settlement in the Amazon jungle during the 1920's and 1930's. Ostensibly to provide rubber for Ford's factories and so break the monopoly of the Dutch and British plantations of the Far East, in reality Fordlandia was an attempt by the US industrialist to build what he considered a model industrial settlement in the heart of the Brazilian rainforest. Grandin tells the story well, of how Henry Ford was hoodwinked into buying a 5,000 square mile tract of land which he might have gained for nothing from the government; how a New England type town was built in the middle of nowhere for brazilian and expat workers complete with company shops, golf course, barn for square dancing and clapboard hoiuses each with a garden ready for planting flowers; and how ultimately the project collapsed. But the story is more than this. We are taken on an intriguing journey into the mind of the founder of Fordism and his theories of small planned industrial communities which he had already tried out in Michigan. Here was paternalism at its height. Quality housing, above average wages, planned communities with clinics and schools. In this Ford also displayed some ideas recently quite fashionable: dislike of big banking, direct government control and monopoly producers. His communities were planned where possible without any of this. But the downside was company control. No organised labour, intolerance of those who failed to think as Ford men should, entertainment outside the (Ford) approved parameters (ie alcohol, gaming, close-up dancing) frowned upon. There was also a disdain for specialists in favour of individuals who were self trained, who learned from experience. All of this was to come to a head in Brazil. Fordlandia becomes the island of homely "mid-western" modernity in the Amazon. Well laid out housing, clinics and schools combined with above average wages to spend in company shops selling at reasonable rates to encourage the purchase of clean clothing. But the cracks appear. The dislike of experts mean the Ford team in the Amazon have to learn on the job (the pretty houses were solid, but their thick walls and tin roofs made them like ovens to live in). More importantly scant attenton was paid to cultural differences. Clocking in helped produce a riot that destroyed much of the early settlement. The rubber was also a disaster. Blight and bugs spread easily in the damp heat of the Amazon. Plantations at Fordlandia and a new site further north were devastated by disease. Agronomists could have told this to the Ford team of car engineers before they went to Brazil. Eventually after World War II Ford's grandson sold Fordlandia to the Brazilian government. It is now overgrown and much is used for soy production. The inexperienced Ford technicians did devise a new way of cross cutting plants to improve them genetically that was soon to be copied across the globe. A visit to the Ford plantations inspired Brazil's dictator Vargas to make his 1940 "March to the West" speech that formally announced the drive to open up Brazil's interior. In a final irony Grandin explains how this has since led not only to the erosion of the rainforest but also to the explosion of an industrial region in the mid Amazon with squalid living conditions that are the antithesis of Ford's hopes fo rhis Fordlandia. And the irony? This industrialisation is based on the unskilled assembly of parts made elsewhere - the essentials of those Fordist principles which made Henry his fortune. An intriguing and provoking book. Reads well and is accompanied by many instructive photographs. Sept '10 (****)

  • Dee Brown: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West (Arena Books)

    Dee Brown: Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West (Arena Books)
    Brown shows clearly, and with a regularity that begins to distract, how the Plains Indians were dealt with one by one from the 1850's to the 1890's as they fell foul to a combination of the white man's greed, lack of humanity and an almost universal desire to rid the growing USA of an unwelcome people. When written forty years ago the use of the word "genocide" was not one in general use. However this is what Brown is describing. Villages wiped out, tribes herded onto reservations where the land was worthless, meaning they had nothing to hunt or could not grow anything. Then when something of value was found - gold for example - they were moved on to another reservation. All this despite signing supposedly binding agreements with Washington. The Indians were innocent, naive, unable to grasp at first the self interest of what Brown describes as the military-washington-reservation complex which saw them and their original lands (and later on the provisions provided by Washington) exploited for personal and commercial gain. Even those who adopted the "white" lifestyle advocated by Washington: who settled in one place, grew crops and went to church were eventually dispossessed through trickery and military force. Very few whites understood or attempted to understood the Indian position -that they were trying to live with the whites and a culture alien to them but were forced to resist when their lands were illegally settled on or buffalo being hunted out of existence. The old chiefs tried hard to restrain their younger members realising that the white man's power was much greater and resistance would only bring even greater retribution. When finally realising the true determination of the growing white population it was too late. The tribes were too few in number, too divided in intention and left facing an arrogant US military busily building forts across their original lands, equipped with the latest technology (magazine loading rifles, mobile artillery, and the beginning of long distance communications) and using them to ride out and deal with Indian problems and ultimately to round up the survivors of their raids and campaigns and imprison them on reservations. In 1970 this had definite echoes of US military policy in Vietnam but depressingly still equally for modern Iraq. So the tactics developed against the north American Indian continue to drive US military policy. Brown uses a strange mechanism to increase the readers sympathy for the Indians - the narrative is written as if by the Indians themselves. Today this can seem patronising and an encumbrance to a reasoned understanding of the aboriginal position, and although the work is widely sourced, it makes sourcing what is written difficult. Nonetheless the work remains a powerful piece of writing, if not strict history. Aug '10 (****)

  • Rowland White: Vulcan 607: The Epic Story of the Most Remarkable British Air Attack since WWII

    Rowland White: Vulcan 607: The Epic Story of the Most Remarkable British Air Attack since WWII
    This is the story of the first Black Buck V-bomber raid on Stanley airport during the Falklands/Malvinas war. It recalls much that is to be admired from a purely logistical and management aspect: the ingenuity of the engineers as well as the planners, coaching the old superannuated nuclear bombers (due to be scrapped in June 1982) into service and planning a massive in-flight refueling programme to ensure one Vulcan made the islands and was able to disable the runway and prevent its use by Argentine jets, so ensuring the eventual success of the British campaign. A role that has perhaps been underplayed in the past. It also paints a magnificent picture of two of the legendary V-bombers, Vulcan & Victor, at work. However the cover has a quote recommending the book written by BBC petrolhead Jeremy Clarkson which sets its tone quite accurately. This is very much a "Boys Own" account which makes only a limited attempt to view the raid in a broader context than the RAF and the crews involved. This is served especially poorly by brief anecdotal inserts that appear to tell the story of some of the islanders after the Argentine landings. The sources listed at the end are extremely thin on Argentine materials/interviews. This may be a good beach read but it is no Frederick Taylor (Dresden) or Leo McKinstry (Dambusters). July '10 (**)

  • Mark Urban: The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Codes: The Story of George Scovell

    Mark Urban: The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Codes: The Story of George Scovell
    Although this does what it says on the tin and tells the story of how Scovell broke the Napoleonic codes during the Peninsular Wars, the key thread is that of the campaigns rather than the code-breaking (presumably because this is not an Enigma type process, rather it relied on the interpreting of a few, albeit vital coded letters and how these contributed to Wellington's eventual victory. Knowing too little of the Iberian theatre this suited me as it would a general reader (it also has excellent maps), but anyone seeking an in depth look at Napoleonic cipher breaking will be disappointed. July '10 (***)

& for café anoraks...

  • also today:

    Today's Birthday

     

    Clicky

  • café watching......

Blog powered by TypePad
Member since 04/2006

Entries categorized ".. americas"

the lies of a history teacher…

I have finally got hold of the 1995 "Lies my Teacher Told me" by James Loewen (winner of the 1996 American Book Award, the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship, and the Critics Choice Award of the American Educational Studies Association) in which he shows the dangers of teaching in line with narrow national guidelines and stereotypes. Although the author describes history teaching in the US, its arguments apply to most other countries where history teaching is dominated by state recommended (or prescribed) textbooks.

I have only just started reading, but already the first chapter on the use (or abuse?) of "heroes" is telling. Loewen uses two characters commonly found in US teaching, President Wilson and Helen Keller. In both cases, using well supported and documented arguments, he shows how text book authors, and through them teachers, have created historical figures somewhat different to reality, but interpretations that better suit the perceived political aspirations of the authorities. In the case of Wilson, he is portrayed as the world statesman striving for peace after World War I, yet this is the President who instigated intervention and invasions in five central American countries (not to mention his Russian war) – a "bad neighbor policy" but never called this. A US Marine general is quoted as reporting that during the invasion and occupation of Haiti "Practically indiscriminate killing of natives has gone on for some time". Nor are his racist views at home (and at Versailles) given much treatment. He was also a vehement anti socialist, although the "Red Scare" he started is normally presented (here I must confess guilt myself) as a policy of the 1920's Republicans.

A different perversion of the hero figure is illustrated with the case of Helen Keller. The blind and deaf girl who overcame her physical handicaps has been presented by teachers worldwide as an inspiration to generations of school children. Yet Loewen shows how here the image has been edited (perhaps redacted to use current terminology) to conform to liberal ideas of success and progress for those who work hard to overcome adversity. In fact little is written, or taught of Keller as the adult (and born in 1880, she lived until 1968). As an adult Keeler became an ardent left winger. Her commitment to socialism stemmed from her experience as a disabled person and from her sympathy for others with handicaps. She soon realised that disability was disproportionately an affliction of the poor – industrial accident, slum and factory life all contributed as well as a lack of means to cope with the disability as she had done. All a consequence of the capitalist system as she saw it. So she moved to the larger political arena to push for change: key figure in womens suffrage, supporting the new Soviet Union, founder member of the American Civil Liberties Union, funding the NAACP and Debs the Socialist presidential candidate. Little of this or her view that the power to rise in the world was not within the reach of everyone suits teaching the American Dream or the land of opportunity for all. Hence it was not in the teaching materials and Keller remained the child hero rising above adversity.

Of course Loewen has his own hobby horses (which to be fair he makes clear early on) and this was first written over 15 years ago (A Second 2008 edition looks at post 2000 textbooks). Teaching has moved on from then (perhaps too much in the opposite direction in some cases to the bewilderment of many students), but so far this has been an intriguing read – certainly one that should be sampled, if not read totally by all teachers.

Keller is quoted as saying "People do not like to think. If one thinks one must reach conclusions. Conclusions are not always pleasant." Very true, and often against ones learning, national inclination or peer pressure.

 

Image origin………………… .

linked casahistoria site: Teachers Pages

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

 

 . .

 

 

Posted on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 05:23 PM | | Comments (0)

the oldest popcorn comes from peru

It seems that there is such a thing as National Popcorn Day (Jan 19th) and to coincide with this National Geographic reports on a new study which says that people in what is now Peru were eating the snack 2,000 years earlier than thought. Coastal peoples were preparing corn-based foods up to 6,700 years ago, according to analysis of ancient corncobs, husks, tassels, and stalks recently unearthed at the Paredones and Huaca Prieta archaeological sites on Peru's northern coast.

Previously, evidence of corn as a food before about 5,000 years ago had mostly come from what are called microfossils—microscopic remains that do not offer information on the cobs' sizes and shapes. But the newfound corn remains revealed a lot, via radiocarbon dating and other tests. Indeed, the oldest cobs can be identified as popcorn (see image alongside), says the curator of New World archaeology at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., and emerita staff scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama.

The people who lived at Paredones and Huaca Prieta would have cooked their corn several ways: Wrapping a cob (in an as yet undetermined material) and resting it on coals, roasting a cob directly over a flame, or cooking a cob in an earthen oven. In this culture, corn was likely a delicacy or a minor supplement to the diet — archaeological evidence shows they did not eat it in large numbers.

As for the earliest history of corn itself, it was first domesticated in Mexico about 9,000 years ago from a wild grass called teosinte. A few thousand years later, corn was brought to South America, where farmers bred the plant crop into hundreds of varieties.....

All that is needed now is for archaeologists to discover the remains of a movie multiplex at Machu Picchu....

 

Image origin………………… .post source: National Geographic

linked casahistoria site: Peru

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

 

 . .

 

 

Posted on Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 11:27 AM | | Comments (0)

reading the sugar barons by matthew parker

Parkers history of the West Indies sugar industry is one of the most valuable reads of the year for students of industrial and imperial history. He outlines the origins of the industry which originated on the Caribbean island of Barbados and reached its peak with the cultivation of Jamaica. The final chapters look at eventual decline and collapse.

However, this is much more than a narrative. It's value is in how it draws in key strands of Britains early imperial history showing how they all worked together - but reading between the lines it also makes clear modes of behaviour that still exist amongst the descendants of the sugar barons today - the bankers of the city.

The 17th century saw the cultivation of sugar following ideas first used in Brazil by the Dutch and Portuguese. Other islands soon followed as the price for sugar rocketed in Europe and fortunes were made by the estate owners. Sugar became an essential luxury and demand forced more and more land into cultivation. More was being made in profit than could be spent on the islands- the growing surplus was being spent and invested in England - providing funds for other commercial and early industrial ventures. so far so good, but it is in exploring other aspects of this growth that the book excels:

  • the early years coincided with Spain's domination of the area. London encouraged the settlers to help defend and expand their investments. Privateering - the use of ships to attack and loot Spanish treasure ships was encouraged. This would become little more than blatant piracy, especially as it happened consistently, not just during war due to the odd concept that the West Indies were "beyond the line" of normal diplomatic niceties. By the late 17th century this was real "Pirates of the Caribbean territory.
  • Sugar is not an easy crop to produce. It requires complex processing from cane and as such represents one of the first areas of agriculture heavily dependent on capital and expertise - key elements of the later industrial revolution in Britain.
  • From the start the significance of the wealth generated from sugar for the English economy was recognised in London. Cromwell and the restored Stuarts introduced the Navigation Acts to ensure that the industry and its transportation and sale remained in English hands. so developed close ties with that less important part of England's American empire - the New England colonies. Newport, Rhode Island grew in direct response to the profits to be made by trade with the Indies. Many new England families bought land and ran sugar estates in the West indies making vast profits for themselves and giving them political influence in new England. Several are eventual signatories of the Declaration of Independence.
  • Attitudes of the most powerful and influential families towards law and authority from London were selective at best. As time went on and they amassed wealth greater than most others they formed a powerful lobby on the English parliament ensuring financial and foreign policy was directed their way. Government seemed to fear upsetting their perceived interests in way familiar to their modern relations with the Banks.
  • The mid 18th century Sugar and Stamp Acts which ultimately led to the US War of Independence were introduced to provide funding to protect the Indies at the expense of what was considered at the time the less significant colonial territory.

However the key thread of the book is that of slavery. Generally little focus is placed on the use of slaves in British colonies. Writers (and syllabuses) tend to focus on the slave trade - the inference being the slaves were carried to be used elsewhere - presumably the US southern plantations. Parker makes it very clear that this "modern" slavery was driven by the needs of the Indies. Sugar cultivation is very labour intensive. The islands were amongst the least healthy places on earth with mortality, especially amongst Europeans being very high. Slaves brought in from Africa were the answer for the owners and were employed in ever growing numbers from the mid 17th century, despite their own high death rates. On some islands they eventually outnumbered whites 16 to 1. They were considered of little value other than as an economic commodity and Parker shows clearly how dehumanised the owners and their white management had become to slavery. In places I was reminded of the treatment in Schindlers List of the Jews by the Feinnes character in the Labour camp. Harsh, brutal treatment was considered by many as correct. Even those arriving from England with initial scruples, usually lost them pretty soon. In one of the books most valuable chapters though Parker uses the diaries of an English overseer Thomas Thistlewood, to draw attention to the complexities of the white-black relationship as well as its sexual consequences for women slaves.

Supported throughout by individual histories with a focus on the Landowners, this is well written and accompanied by good maps and illustrations.

Other Reviews of the Sugar Barons: The Literary Review, History Extra, The Guardian

linked young casahistoria site: The Slave Trade

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .

Posted on Tuesday, December 20, 2011 at 10:54 AM | | Comments (0)

archaeological escapism

A few weeks ago I watched a TV programme about an archaeologist who was digging up the remains of the Stalag Luft III prisoner of war camp (in modern Poland) which was the setting for the Steve McQueen "Great Escape" movie. The programme to be honest was pretty tedious. A concrete shaft was dug - presumably at great expense - in the wrong place and all that was unearthed included the remains of one of the bellows used to pump air into the tunnels and an unknown extra tunnel. But survivors have already written at length during the last 70 years about the events and the technology used. Little else seemed to be gained historically from the expense shown by this TV "show" in revisiting the camp. Indeed the most interesting point to emerge was the use made of "klim" tins - powdered milk sent to the prisoners by the Red Cross. Perhaps it is a coincidence but this was shown at a time when the crisis over the euro and Britains relations with Europe were at another low. If in doubt mention the war......

Now though the same TV archaeologist, Dr Tony Pollard, has revealed controversial plans to excavate the battlefields of the Falklands/Malvinas War. Pollard plans to invite a team of Argentine archaeologists to take part in the venture, which, if approved, will be televised. Battle sites to be targeted include Mount Tumbledown, Mount Harriet and Goose Green and both British and Argentine positions will be explored.

British veteran groups have warned that such an exploration would be inappropriate after such a short time, with many combatants and friends and relatives of the dead still alive although some others have welcomed it as an opportunity to raise awareness of the conflict and its legacy.

Pollard believes that because of its isolated location, the remains on the Falkland/Malvinas Islands are well preserved. That, in conjunction with the fact that many of the combatants are still alive would give an ideal opportunity to complete a project looking at the archaeology, the history and the anthropology. He intends to travel to Buenos Aires in the spring/autumn with the intention of securing the cooperation of Argentine counterparts. What is puzzling is what would be excavated that is not already known about and which would add significantly to the history. Rusted military artefacts that would later appear on ebay? The places to research the war are in the records of London, Paris, Washington and Buenos Aires. Little more can surely be gained by digging up the islands where the land conflict was relatively short-lived and mobile.

I have no idea what the response amongst Argentine veterans will be. The British South Atlantic Medal Association 1982, is opposed to the project believing that it would be appropriate to excavate conflict battlefields so comparatively soon after the event and particularly not in 2012, the 30th anniversary year, when many veterans and some next of kin of those who died will be going back to the islands to remember and to pay respects to fallen colleagues and family members".

Most telling perhaps, a well known British veteran, Simon Weston, badly burned during the conflict, said perceptively: "I don't have a problem with it, but it's not the sort of programme I would stop a runaway horse to watch (has he seen the Stalag programme perhaps?). What I would say to Dr Pollard is, 'Go, but be very careful'. The Argentinians might get a different welcome. The islanders are still very sensitive."

Probably poor archaeology, poor TV, poorly thought out, but pure escapism for the home market.

 

Image origin………………… .post source: The Scotsman

linked casahistoria site: Malvinas/Falklands

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .

Posted on Friday, December 16, 2011 at 11:19 AM | | Comments (0)

the genetics of the slave trade

A new project called EUROTAST (for Europe and Trans Atlantic Slave Trade) and funded by a grant from the European Union's Marie Curie network, and will support 15 researchers at 10 institutions in Denmark, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Portugal and Iceland is to investigate the transatlantic slave trade from a new angle - the genetics of the slave populations. Geneticists, archaeologists and historians will be collaborating in the €4.3-million (US$5.8-million) project.

Between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, millions of people from west and central Africa were captured and shipped across the Atlantic by European slave traders to a life of forced labour in the Americas. The subject has been well studied by historians, but one of the coordinators of the project, geneticist Hannes Schroeder of the Centre for GeoGenetics at the Natural History Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen, says that there are still "large gaps in our knowledge" regarding the origins of the people captured as slaves, for instance, and how the slave trade operated.

Schroeder got the idea for the scientific collaboration with historians after studying isotopes of strontium, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen in the bones and teeth of slaves buried at the Newton plantation in southern Barbados. Archaeologists were keen to find a method to distinguish between first-generation captives and individuals who were born later on the island, and to connect that to ancient African cultural practices such as filing teeth or burying grave goods with bodies.

Of the remains from 25 individuals studied, Schroeder showed that 7 were first-generation captives born in Africa, including one who had made the Atlantic crossing as a child . Schroeder was subsequently keen to use DNA to pin down the ethnic origins of slaves to particular regions within Africa, and to bring together researchers of different disciplines. Bioarchaeologists at institutions including the universities of Bristol and York, UK, will now study the skeletal remains of enslaved Africans to investigate their demographics, health and quality of life, and use protein and isotope analysis to gain information about geographical origins and identify diseases such as scurvy and tuberculosis. Meanwhile, historians at the University of Hull, UK, will compile and study written sources on the origins of African captives, and archaeologists based at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands will map and excavate plantations and slave villages in the Dutch Antilles.

But a large focus is on genetics. Several groups will study the DNA of modern populations, such as the Noir Marron people in French Guiana, to reconstruct the origins of Africans captured as slaves. The Noir Marron are direct descendants of slaves who escaped their Dutch masters during the era of plantation slavery, and have since interbred very little with other populations. Researchers at the Centre for GeoGenetics will study ancient DNA from enslaved Africans buried in the Caribbean, using more than 300,000 genetic markers on the nuclear genome. This will help to distinguish between people from different populations in West Africa. The researchers believe the EUROTAST work may reveal controversial findings. These could include, for example, the extent of interbreeding with native Americans and Europeans among US populations who see themselves as purely African, and the role of African people in the slave trade. So the researchers plan to discuss their work with involved communities ahead of announcing the results.

Image origin………………… .post source: Nature    

linked young casahistoria site: Slave Trade

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .

Posted on Friday, December 02, 2011 at 10:25 AM | | Comments (0)

stalin’s daughter svetlana dies

The only daughter of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin -- who defected to the United States in 1967 and became a critic of the Soviet Union -- died at age 85 on Nov. 22 in Wisconsin, USA.

Born Svetlana Stalina on Feb. 28, 1926, she led a complex life that ended in obscurity and poverty after decades of wandering. Known as "the little princess" of the Kremlin, she was a child celeb in the Soviet Union, with thousands of babies named Svetlana in her honour. Stalin showered his daughter with presents and called her his "little sparrow,". However he became distant in her teenage years during World War II when he was struggling to ensure victory for the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany.

At 17, she fell in love with an older man -- a Jewish writer and filmmaker -- and a disapproving Stalin had him sent to a labour camp in Siberia. Then she succeeded in defying her father's objection to her next love -- a fellow student at Moscow University whom she married in 1945 and divorced in 1947 after they had one child, Iosif.

Her next marriage, in 1949, was to Yuri Zhdanov, the son of Stalin's right-hand man Andrei Zhdanov. They had one daughter, Yekaterina, but also soon divorced.

She lost most of her privileges after Stalin's death, and Soviet officials refused to let her marry Brijesh Singh, an Indian Communist who was visiting Moscow. They did, however, reluctantly give her permission to take his ashes home to India after he became ill and died in early 1967. Once in India, Peters evaded Soviet agents and sought asylum at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi.

She denounced the Soviet regime at a news conference upon her arrival in New York and probably earned more than $2.5 million from her autobiography, "Twenty Letters to a Friend,". In 1970 she remarried briefly to American architect William Wesley Peters, whose name she continued to use after the divorce.

After a visit to Moscow in November 1984 -- where she denounced the West and said she had been a pet of the CIA -- she nonetheless returned to the United States in April 1986 and disavowed her anti-Western statements. Finally she spent much of her life wandering from the United States to England, France and even a convent in Switzerland.

What did she have to say of her father? In a 2010 interview with the Wisconsin State Journal, she said of her father: "He broke my life." "Wherever I go," she said, "here, or Switzerland, or India, or wherever -- Australia, some island -- I always will be a political prisoner of my father's name."

Asked if she thought Stalin loved her, Peters said yes, adding, "I looked like his mother." "He was a very simple man," she told the paper. "Very rude. Very cruel. There was nothing in him that was complicated. He was very simple with us. He loved me and he wanted me to be with him and become an educated Marxist."

 

For a more detailed obituary from the Guardian read here. 

 

image origin………… ……..post source: Discovery News

linked casahistoria site: Stalin 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .

Posted on Tuesday, November 29, 2011 at 06:41 PM | | Comments (0)

four argentine novels to look out for

112811_1804_fourargenti1An interesting article in this weeks Economist, Fiction from Argentina: The price of love, reviews four recent translated Argentine novels set during the period of the military junta or economic collapse of 2002. These are:

  • Purgatory. By Tomás Eloy Martínez. Translated by Frank Wynne. 
  • An Open Secret. By Carlos Gamerro. Translated by Ian Barnett. 
  • Open Door. By Iosi Havilio. Translated by Beth Fowler. 
  • 7 Ways to Kill a Cat. By Matías Néspolo. Translated by Frank Wynne.

It would seem from the review that these are worth looking out for given the atmospheric context they place their narrative in. The café will try and get hold of them and hopefully post reviews in the future.

 

 

image origin………… ……..post source: The Economist

linked casahistoria site: Argentina – the military dictatorship

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .

Posted on Saturday, November 26, 2011 at 10:04 PM | | Comments (0)

argentina delivers justice to france's disappeared nuns

On Wednesday a Buenos Aires court dealt out justice to Alfredo Astiz and 11 other former officers of the military junta which came to an end nearly 30 years ago. As reported here in earlier posts, Astiz and the other defendants were sentenced for the kidnapping and murder of two French nuns, Alice Domon and Leonie Duquet during the military dictatorship. The French missionaries had aided the mothers of Argentina's disappeared by accompanying them to police stations and military barracks looking for news of their children. Astiz was also condemned for the murder of three of the founding members of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, the mothers of the disappeared who started a defiant march every Thursday in front of the presidential palace in downtown Buenos Aires.

In front of a full courthouse (and large TV screens outside the court where many of the public held up photos of some of the disappeared - see video), Astiz showed little remorse when sentenced, laughing in the face of the judge, then taking out a ribbon with the blue and white colours of the Argentine flag and pinning it to his coat lapel. He had earlier accused the judge of being a tool of foreign interests.

The two-year trial was the latest in a succession of cases into the "disappearance" of around 30,000 mostly young political opponents of the military regime.

Many are critical of the slow pace of the trials, taking place only now when so many of the accused are old and enfeebled (although Astiz, who is also remembered as the commander who landed on the South Georgia islands in 1982 in the first move that led to the Falklands/Malvinas war, is not yet 60), but few countries have persevered to pursue previous political persecutors to the extent that is occurring in today's Argentina.

 

 

Image origin………………… .post source: Guardian    Pagina 12

linked casahistoria site: Argentina: the military dictatorship

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………


 . .


Posted on Friday, October 28, 2011 at 10:20 AM | | Comments (0)

argentina marks its 'night of the pencils'

Thirty-five years ago, one of most notorious episodes of abuse committed during military rule in Argentina took place - the abduction of 10 students by security forces in the city of La Plata near Buenos Aires. In September 1976, masked men raided their homes under cover of darkness, taking them away to hidden detention centres in what became known as the "Night of the Pencils".

It is not clear what actually provoked their abduction. What is clear, however, is that in the repressive atmosphere of the time, the military regarded them as subversives. Most belonged to the students' union, which in turn had links to an urban guerrilla group known as the Montoneros.

Survivors describe their brutal treatment in detention centres like Arana, in La Plata: beatings, electric shocks, days without food. The murdered victims, aged 16 to 18, included Maria Claudia Falcone, whose face became one of the best-known images to keep the students' memory alive.

At a trial that began this week in Buenos Aires, 25 former police or military officers and one civilian were accused of committing crimes against humanity for the "Night of the Pencils" and hundreds of other cases. Prosecutors say one of the policemen, Miguel Etchecolatz, now aged 82, tortured 90 prisoners. It will be his second trial, as he is already serving a life sentence for other crimes committed under military rule.

Their story was told in a 1986 film directed by Hector Olivera, called "La Noche de los Lapices" (The Night of the Pencils), regarded as a powerful depiction of events. During military rule, an estimated 30,000 political dissidents were murdered by the security forces. It is believed some 250 people under 18 years of age were among them. The Commission Against the Disappearance of Persons (Conadep), which in 1984 carried out an inquiry into crimes against humanity committed by the military government, found that some of the victims were as young as 13.

Memories from those times are obviously still painful and as one of the survivors now says: "I hardly have any of the friends I had when I was young. Most of them were disappeared, or those who survived suffered torture or imprisonment."


Image origin………………… .post source: BBC    

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

. .

 

Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2011 at 05:41 PM | | Comments (0)

new evidence of us medical experiments on guatamalans

It seems that in the 1940's US medical teams conducted live medical experiments on Guatamalans, many of whom consequently died. Last year, after a Wellesley College medical historian discovered records among the papers of Dr. John Cutler, who led the experiments, an investigation into their discovery has shown that the researchers were unusually unethical, even when placed into the historical context of a different era.

It seems that from 1946-48, the U.S. Public Health Service and the Pan American Sanitary Bureau worked with several Guatemalan government agencies to do medical research — paid for by the U.S. government — that involved deliberately exposing people to sexually transmitted diseases. The researchers apparently were trying to see if penicillin, then relatively new, could prevent infections in the 1,300 people exposed to syphilis, gonorrhea or chancroid. Those infected included soldiers, prostitutes, prisoners and mental patients with syphilis. The commission revealed Monday that only about 700 of those infected received some sort of treatment after being deliberately exposed and that 83 people died, although it's not clear if the deaths were directly due to the experiments.

The research came up with no useful medical information, according to some experts.

Perhaps though methods used were not unusual at the time? Other researchers elsewhere were also using people as human guinea pigs (shown in the image alongside of a scientist working in another Cutler project, the Tuskegee experiment, where, from 1932 to 1972, scientists tracked 600 black men in Alabama who had syphilis but didn't know it, without ever offering them treatment) in some cases infecting them with illnesses. Studies weren't as regulated then, and the planning-on-the-fly feel of Cutler's work was not unique, some experts have noted. But the investigation members concluded that the Guatemala research was bad even by the standards of the time. They compared the work to a 1943 experiment by Cutler and others in which prison inmates were infected with gonorrhea in Terre Haute, Ind. The inmates were volunteers who were told what was involved in the study and gave their consent. The Guatemalan participants — or many of them — received no such explanations and did not give informed consent, the commission said.

President Barack Obama has called Guatemala's president, Alvaro Colom, to apologize. He also ordered his bioethics commission to review the Guatemala experiments. Meanwhile, the Guatemalan government has vowed to do its own investigation into the Cutler study. A spokesman for Vice President Rafael Espada said the report should be done by November.

Shades of the experiments by nazi war criminal Mengele in the same decade.....

 


Image origin………………… .post source: Associated Press

linked casahistoria site: The US & Latin America

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

. .

 

Posted on Tuesday, August 30, 2011 at 11:31 PM | | Comments (0)

eva peron helps to preserve spanish regional costumes for today

In 1947, while the rest of Europe was benefiting from the Marshall Plan, post civil war Spain was poor, hungry, and isolated due to a United Nations boycott against the dictatorship of Francisco Franco. But the country still had one friend, Argentine President Juan Perón, who as well as shipping thousands of tons of wheat and establishing diplomatic relations with Madrid, sent his wife, Eva Duarte (Evita), to Spain that summer as his unofficial ambassador. Eva Perón was honoured with grand public receptions, and made herself even more popular by distributing 100-peseta notes to the crowds that thronged the streets to see her. She was decorated with the Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic, she attended bullfights and toured historic sites. Coming from a southern hemisphere winter and seemingly impervious to the June heat in Madrid, the fashion-conscious Eva wore a heavy fur coat during public appearances.....

The highlight of the trip was a huge gathering in Madrid's Plaza de España, where the first lady was presented with a collection of more than 800 Spanish elaborately tailored traditional costumes from each of the country's 50 provinces. Shawls, jewellery, shoes, intricately sewn petticoats, and hand-embroidered handkerchiefs bearing Perón's initials and sentimental messages such as "We love you Evita" complemented each costume.

After Eva Perón died in 1952, Juan Perón gave most of his wife's enormous dress collection away, but kept the Spanish gift. When overthrown in a military coup in 1955, the presidential residence was briefly opened to the public, along with the dress display. But fearful of the mystique surrounding Perón and Evita, it was decided to sell the collection off, and it was kept in a warehouse in Buenos Aires for more than a decade. Then, in 1967, the military decided to donate the collection to the Museo Español Enrique Larreta in the Buenos Aires suburb of Belgrano. When in 1973, Perón was back in power, the Larreta offered to exhibit the collection, only to be told that the time was not yet right. Three years later, with the country teetering on the brink of chaos, the military took over, staying in power until 1985. Since then, due to lack of space, the Larreta has only been able to put on small and sporadic displays.

Until now. The Larreta is currently showing a selection from the collection and it appears to have had an additional value apart from being a display of items connected with Eva Perón - the collection is now a priceless, and very complete, representation of a key aspect of Spanish popular culture. Patricia Nobilia, the exhibition's curator, points out, "We get the descendents of Spaniards coming here, remembering the land of their ancestors. Others come to remember Evita. Many see the collection as a way of remembering our country's history." - Belgrano's time capsule of mid 20th century Spain.

Image origin………………… .post source: el Pais

linked casahistoria site: Perón

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

. .

 

Posted on Sunday, August 28, 2011 at 11:44 AM | | Comments (0)

the gauchos who came from beyond the pale of imperial russia

An item by the US National Public Radio (Download and listen here) on the 1890s the wave of European emigration to Argentina shows that they included Russian Jews fleeing anti-Semitic violence and discrimination. So far nothing new here, but NPR reports how many moved out of Buenos Aires (most emigrants remained in the city) and onto the Pampas where they founded hamlets similar to the shtetls they left behind. They spoke Yiddish, built synagogues and traditional Jewish schools — and became farmers and gauchos: Argentine cowboys.

Only a few of their descendants remain, and in Entre Rios province, which became the centre of Argentina's rural Jewish communities, there are still gauchos, Hebrew lessons and sacred scrolls to be found. The few remaining gauchos from the European east live on farms that go back more than a century. Most though have given up and live in the cities.

In the late 19th century, entire Jewish towns packed up and fled czarist pogroms (attacks on Jewish communities). A German-Jewish philanthropist, the Baron Maurice de Hirsch, planned a Jewish homeland not in the Middle East but in the Americas. He recruited would-be pioneers from the so-called Pale of Settlement (the part of the Russian empire where the czar permitted Jews to live) that today forms parts of Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine and other countries. Hirsch bought up vast areas of farmland in the United States, Canada, Brazil and Argentina, renting them out to Jewish arrivals. Some 50,000 Jews made it to Entre Rios and other rural provinces. They built up dozens of towns with names like Sajaroff, Sonnenfeld and Moises Ville. Some had two or three synagogues, community farms like the ones they left behind in Russia and schools that taught in Yiddish and Hebrew

Remnants of that past remain. In the town of Villa Clara, lessons are still taught in Hebrew. A couple of blocks away is the town synagogue, carefully restored through donations. Other towns have storerooms still containing the items brought by the emigrants on their journey to Argentina: old framed photographs of men in black hats and long beards; wooden clocks; heavy metal typewriters; old deeds and titles as well as religious scrolls. The image shows an 1895 synagogue built in Colonia Lucienville.

Not enough for a museum perhaps, but on a Friday night, there are still enough of the old Jewish residents in several towns and villages for Sabbath services, just like old times in eastern Europe, and on Argentina's Pampas.

Image origin…………………… ……….post source: NPR

Linked casahistoria sites: Emigration to Argentina, Pampas Tales

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

 . .

   

Posted on Sunday, August 14, 2011 at 04:01 PM | | Comments (0)

a single us museum of the people?

Calls have been made in the US to set up a privately funded Museum to tell the history of immigration and migration into the country. Given the interest in casahistoria's emigration pages there would certainly be considerable interest in such an institution. Consequently several members of the US Congress are calling for a presidential commission to study the formation of a National Museum of the American People in Washington and Virginia Rep. Jim Moran, a Democrat, and Tennessee Rep. John Duncan, a Republican, introduced legislation Thursday that calls for studying the feasibility of creating such a museum without any federal taxpayer funds.

However there may be more to this than just creating a museum to represent a period in North American history. Moran has been a chief critic of the building of individual ethnic museums on the National Mall for fear they appeal to segregated audiences (a presidential commission has also recently called for a Latino museum to be added to the Smithsonian Institution). A single museum documenting the history and development of all ethnic groups living in the USA would set all the population movements, voluntary or otherwise, as well as the impact on the native peoples in a single national narrative.

Already a group that wants to build a Museum of the American People says more than 130 minority groups support the idea. But is there any money.......

Image origin………………… .post source: Washington Post

linked casahistoria site: Emigration 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

. .

 

Posted on Sunday, July 17, 2011 at 10:02 AM | | Comments (0)

convincing jfk to aim for the moon

Fifty years ago US President Kennedy made  his famous speech to Congress in which he set out a moon landing as a goal to be achieved within the decade. In a new tape of a conversation between JFK and James Webb, the head of NASA, on Sept. 18, 1963, ( just over two months before the president was assassinated in Dallas) released by the Kennedy Presidential library (click here) it is clear he needed convincing that the moon was the way to go. He was worried that exploring space and going to the Moon might be seen as a PR stunt. He seems also to have been upset that a successful landing would probably not happen until after even a second term as President.

Some historians believe Kennedy was trying to find a way out, especially as he prepared for a 1964 re-election campaign where cost, and the lack of significant progress, could become an issue. The conversation underscores his qualms but also his ultimate attempt to stay with the program while casting it in a different light, perhaps as function of defence or national security needs, not solely the prestige of feats in space. Webb, whose comments prove prescient of the future US success in the race, makes the case for persisting and for the ultimate scientific and intellectual benefits. But he makes clear that, even if Kennedy wins re-election, we would not be landing on the moon before a second term ended, seemingly disappointing Kennedy, whose voice drops at Webb's cautionary note. Ultimately, Neil Armstrong became the first to set foot there on July 20, 1969.

Kennedy seems to feel it would be seen more favourably by electors if the Moon project, taking place as it did at the height of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, could be shown to have real military value: "But it seems to me what we've got to try and do is for the reasons you suggested: we've got to wrap around in this country a military use for what we're doing and spending in space. If we don't, it does look like a stunt and too much money," Kennedy declares.

At the end Webb concludes: "And I predict you are not going to be sorry, no sir, that you did this."

The recorded meeting is open in full without any redactions (parts cut out). Unlike many of the presidential recordings from the Kennedy Library Archives, the quality and clarity of the tape recording are exceptional.

Image origin………………… .post source: the Atlantic

linked casahistoria site: US and the Space Race

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

............

....

Posted on Thursday, May 26, 2011 at 12:58 PM | | Comments (0)

fdr: “traitor to his class” - review

I have now finished reading the main part of the large HW Brands bio of FDR – up to 1937. This takes in his early political career under Wilson, his contraction of polio and political comeback as New York Governor then election as US President in 1932 and the introduction of the New Deal.

FDR came from a privileged background – this included wealth, yachts, political networking (his cousin, was "Teddy" Theodore Roosevelt who stole the show at FDR's wedding) as well as good looks. Brands also makes clear the impact on the later FDR of early role models. Theodore Roosevelt provided a pattern for early political involvement via the Navy Office. His boss there, President Wilson, taught valuable lessons on how to steer public opinion towards unpopular war involvement.

I was initially surprised at the lack of emphasis on philosophy. Brands suggests FDR was ambitious for the White House from an early age but not due to a need to introduce any deep political philosophy other than to pursue the "progressivism" most usually attributed to Wilson but also promoted later by Theodore.

However, it is the impact of polio that provides the key to his strength in pushing for the New Deal. Polio makes FDR empathise for the first time with those hit by disadvantage and his fight back enables others to see him a s a fighter. Interestingly for the New Deal, it is his development of Warm Springs as a rehab region that gives him the chance to see the regeneration possibilities of basic economics at work (funding basic work projects to put cash into a local economy) – and the shortcomings of the Republican Laissez Faire economics of the 1920's.

FDR is able to put this to use after his 1932 election. The New Deal is brought in measure by measure, FDR playing a supportive Congress and Senate well (at least until he overstretches on the Supreme Court) in addition to keeping public opinion abreast of the changes. This was not dogmative change driven by politics of the left, but as Brands indicates, reforms to restrain the worst excesses of a free market economy and protect those most affected by its failure in the 1920's and to remedy what he saw as an affront to the personal dignity of those (whites – little is said about measures to include Black Americans in his schemes save for some references to CCC inclusion) in poverty. But not to dismantle US capitalism. Despite the bio's title, FDR's early keynote measure, the NRA, is seen in very much in terms of protecting Big Business, in creating industry cartels - and that is how they perceived it at the time. FDR was an economic nationalist - he scuppers attempts at international solutions to the Depression as they threatened US internal recovery. Equally his willingness to accommodate Stalinist Russia served US industry – and helps explain his reluctance to assist the US citizens "Forsaken" in the USSR at the time (see earlier post).

FDR was surrounded by able advisers and secretaries who he gave much freedom to. But he kept a sufficient distance at times so that he could disassociate himself from their actions and policies (or even overrule as happened over the London economics conference) if this served his longer term reformist need. He would also set one unknowingly against the other then select what he considered the best policy to follow. Realpolitik indeed, but the strength of this personal overview perhaps contributed to the broad based resistance to the Supreme Court reform that also heralded the end of further deep change. Many supporters would have given him the benefit of the doubt concerning what would have been greatly enhanced statutory authority, but what if a later President (perhaps a Nixon or a younger Bush) should abuse this…..

One character though does appear to be able to make good use of FDR's power, and pursue an increasingly independent and more left wing agenda – his wife Eleanor. By 1932 theirs is a marriage of convenience – in a later period FDR's infidelity would have perhaps brought divorce, but Eleanor carves a real and increasingly political niche for herself. As First Lady she writes a daily newspaper column, holds regular press conferences – for women reporters only, to redress the male dominance in the regular FDR conferences, makes her own visits to CCC camps and Projects and puts pressure for her pet social projects to be included in wider schemes.

This is a very readable bio of one of the café's pin-ups, but if you don't have the time to read it page by page it will serve as a very useful reference resource on the background and infighting behind the New Deal.

I still have the post 1937 section to read, but as the book is too heavy to include in my Ryanair hand baggage allowance for the flight back to the UK, it will need to wait until I return south in early summer …….

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

. .

 

Posted on Sunday, May 01, 2011 at 09:31 AM | | Comments (0)

Older »