Day 13 -- Culture Wars and Colonialism
Today we will be following a different pattern. We will be meeting later than usual (11:00). You will need to do the reading and write your reflections before class.
Be sure to do the following:
- Get straight the nature of the battle between religious and secular forces in the Third Republic and how they played out in the Dreyfus Affair
- Prepare to defend either side in a class debate. (You may have personal feelings that incline you naturally towards one side or the other, but for the purposes of this class be sure that you can articulate the position of each side as a defender in the late 19th century would.)
- Submit a reflection paper before class begins in which you explore the values and assumptions implicit in each of the major sides in this dispute
The Battle for the Soul of France
Frederick Brown, The Battle for the Soul of France; Culture Wars in the Age of Dreyfus (New York: Alfred Knopf, 2010), pp.3-5,
Charles Sowerwine, “The Social and Cultural Bases of Republicanism” in France since 1870: Culture, Politics, and Society (Palgrave: Houndmills, U.K., 2001), pp. 40-44.
Jean-Marie Mayeur and Madeleine Reberioux, The Third Republic from its Origins to the Great War, 1871-1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp.,101-115.
Pope Pius IX's Syllabus of Errors
Festival of Reason in Notre Dame, 1793
Postcard of the Shrine to the Virgin Mary at Lourdes
Édouard Debat-Ponsan, Truth Leaving the Well (1898)
(A comment on the revelation of the cover-up of the military's manipulations during Dreyfus' trial)
The Dreyfus Affair
Raymond Rudorff, , The belle epoque; Paris in the nineties (New York, Saturday Review Press, 1973), pp.276-288.
Jean-Marie Mayeur and Madeleine Reberioux, The Third Republic from its Origins to the Great War, 1871-1914 (Cambridge: Canbridge University Press, 1984), pp.191-196.