I hope you’re enjoying a lovely time away this week, hopefully getting some rest and having some fun, maybe making up any assignments you missed in the first half of the course. I just thought I’d share a word on what is to come after the break.

First, you should be thinking about your research paper topics. I’ve talked to many of you about your ideas. Now that you have a basic framework for the history of Europe from 1890 to 1945 it is time to go deeper into a particular topic. Would you like to know more about the experience of the home front in WW1 Italy? Or the “colonial imagination” in interwar France? Or the Holocaust in Bulgaria? Is there a time or a place you’d like to learn more about? Vienna in 1900? Sweden in the 1930s? Or a topic you want to dive into? The history of ballet? Or rugby? Or international diplomacy? This is your chance to be the historian.

Ultimately what you will need for this assignment is an interesting topic, a guiding research question, one historical monograph, and one primary source (or the equivalent). Full details are on the Research Paper Assignment with Details on the Handouts page. There are also some helpful bibliographies and links to research resources. Do some thinking – and dabble in the research databases – and come to class with your ideas.

While you all are working on your research papers, we will do some reading together to deepen are thinking about this history. First up, starting with discussion on Monday, is the introduction to Sarah Ann Frank’s recent book, Hostages of Empire: Colonial Prisoners of War in Vichy France (University of Nebraska Press, 2021). It brings together some themes we’ve touched on: the crisis of democracy in Vichy France, the history of empire, the experiences of colonial subjects. As you see, I’ll ask you to read the introduction for Monday after break and then one chapter for the following week that you will present to the class with a group of your classmates.

Details are on the schedule (but if anything looks askew please let me know)! See you back in the classroom soon!