Spooks - National Security and the History of the CIA

Description

The CIA is known for secret assassinations, thrilling spy encounters and international blunders.   This course looks at the history of the CIA, beginning with the OSS in WWII to recent involvement in the execution of foreign policy through covert operations.  The subject matter will be a world tour of foreign policy though the last 70 years. We will attempt to understand how this agency has shaped not only American diplomacy, but the perception of America throughout the world.  Current opinion polls show that a majority of Americans view the CIA favorably, but have significant concerns with respect to the CIA and privacy and the CIA and civil liberties.  How do we balance democracy with unseen government intervention?  There is a rich assortment of reading materials that invite serious discussions about spying, covert actions, and if a secret bureaucracy is needed to preserve American freedoms.  

Weekly Topics

1.    Spies and Secrecy;  WWII, Roosevelt and the OSS, and Wild Bill Donovan

2.    CIA Beginnings:  Truman, George Kennon and Allen Dulles

3.    The Iran Coup (1953)

4.    South America and the Guatemala Coup (1954) 

5.    The Bay of Pigs, anti-Castro operations and the Cuban Missile Crises  (1962)

6.    The CIA and the Vietnam War, and consequences for U. S. Intelligence

7.    Nixon, the Coup in Chili (1973) and Watergate (1974)

8.    Iran Hostage Crises (1979-81) and the Iran-Contra Affair (1985)

9.    The Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991)

10   The CIA and the Modern Middle East (1947 Syria, 1988 Iran-Iraq War, 2003 Iraq)

11.  The CIA and the 911 Attack (2001), Iraq, Bin Laden and Afghanistan

12.  Snowden (2013) Russian cyber hacks (2016) and foreign influence on US politics 

13.   Technology, Drones and Cybersecurity

14.   Cyber weapons, Space, and the future of espionage

Bibliography

Recommended Books:

Andrew, C. (1995),  For the President's Eyes Only:  Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency.

Immerman, R. (2014) The Hidden Hand, A brief history of the CIA.

Morley, J. (2008).  Our Man in Mexico:  Winston Scott and the Hidden History of the CIA.

Prados, J. (2006).  Safe for Democracy:  The Secret Wars of the CIA. *

Wallace, R. & Melton, K. (2008).  Spycraft:  The Secret History of the CIA's Spytechs from Communism to Al-Qaeda.

Wilford, H. (2019).  The Agency:  A History of the CIA (the Great Courses - video and audible (audible.com). *

Wilford, H. (2013),  America's Great Game:  The CIA's Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East.

*  Best for general information

Election 2020

Description

Every four years our nation goes through a political paroxysm of (pick one):  furious activity, anxiety, fear, or loathing.  The Presidential election -- this year may be the worst ever.  The nation has gone through a grueling time since the 2016 election.   Now, not only must we choose our president & vice-president, 1/3 of all Senators, all members of the House of Representatives, countless governors and state legislators – we are faced with two very different philosophies of governance. 

This SDG proposes to study Election 2020 in each of the three terms in 2020.  While we will focus on the Presidential race, we’ll also discuss important local and national trends & issues as they emerge.

During the course of the year, we'll cover:  election funding; PACs and SUPER PACs; how to win friends & votes:  advertising/PR/events; endorsements & what they mean; analyses of all debates; media coverage – fair and balanced, or…; geographical differences; polls & pollsters; real issues and phony issues; friends and foes; is honesty the best policy?; how do politicians approach/avoid talking about issues, and any and all relevant news.

Election 2020 #2 – Spring/Summer

By this point, the Presidential field is pretty narrow.  Competition for the Vice-Presidential slot is increasing.  Primaries are over, and platform discussions begin.  And then… conventions.

 Election 2020 #3 – Fall 

We will discuss how the campaigns are faring… and then, after the results are in, we’ll analyze them.

Note:  Since committing to a year-long course may be difficult or impractical, persons will initially sign up for Winter Term.  Those who wish to stay in the course will have priority for the nest term(s).  Open spaces will be filled at registration.

Weekly Topics

During the Winter term, when there will be a lot of Democratic candidates (and maybe even a Republican candidate or two), each member of the SDG will pick one Presidential candidate and spend the first hour of the SDG discussing that candidate. Then in the next hour, the same member will discuss one of these (or other relevant) topics:

• The current atmosphere -- what’s gone on since 2016

• The candidates

• The hottest issues - they might even change week to week

• Whistleblowers

• Impeachment

• Foreign commitments

• The Electoral College v popular vote

• Money, money, money

• The primary/caucus process/Iowa

• Diversity v identity politics

• Voter suppression v voter fraud

• The California primary -- and of course we'll follow the others

• Social media

• Polls

• 24-hour news cycles

• Debates

• Fake news

• Trolls/foreign intervention

• Blue, red & purple states

• Regulation v deregulation

• Congress

• Tariffs

• Immigration

• Emergency declarations

• Presidential power

• Emoluments

• And more, lots more 

Bibliography

Any & all news media

The Female Gaze: Woman Filmmakers

Description

This SDG examines eleven exceptional films made by women filmmakers around the world that offer a variety of themes: gender, class, race, globalization, the family, coming-of-age, religion, capitalism, and art.  Genres include comedy, drama, horror, thriller, western, and documentary..

The directors, from seven countries and cultures, bring personal styles and insights to their work, and feature both male and female protagonists.  One of the questions we'll ask is about the differences brought to their films by nationality and race.  And what might a woman bring to films that a male filmmaker might miss?   And does a woman necessarily brings a feminist or political vision to a film? Finally, is there "a female gaze?"

This is a Film Studies course with emphasis on film analysis.  We are interested in how how the art of film--narrative, mise en scene, cinematography, music, sound, editing, acting, expresses each director's unique vision.

Participants should be very comfortable using computers and DVDs. 

Weekly Topics

1. My Brilliant Career, Gillian Armstrong - Australia  1979

2. The Piano, Jane Campion - Australia  1993

3. The Holy Girl, Lucretia Martel - Argentina  2004

4. After the Wedding, Suzanne Bier - Denmark  2006

5. 35 Shots of Rum, Clair Denis - France  2008    

6. Winter's Bone, Debra Granek - United States  2010

7. A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, Ana Lily Amirpour - Iran/United States   2014

8. Toni Erdmann, Maren Ade - Germany  2016

9. Certain Women, Kelly Reichardt - United States  2016 

10. The Gleaners; Faces/Places, Agnes Varda - France  2000; 2017

11. The Rider, Chloe Zhao - United States  2017

Participants will choose their week and film in any order.  

Bibliography

Core Book:

Louis Gannett, Understanding Movies, Prentice Hall.  Buy a used edition, any edition.

All of the films are available on Netflix DVDs as well as other streaming channels.  Reviews and articles on all the filmmakers and films can be found on the Internet.  

An extended bibliography will be given to participants.

Can You Dig It? The Story of Archaeology

Description

Ever since my future mother in law gave me a special gift, I have been fascinated with Archaeology, including the gift,  the famous book by C.W. Ceram, Gods, Graves, and Scholars.  Yes, I am an Indiana Jones fan through and through,  It is such a thrill to read about Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter unearthing the ruins of King Tut's tomb.  Also, I am intrigued with the lost cities of the Olmec, Aztecs, Incas and Mayans.  It is a special privilege to view the cable show, Expedition Unknown, and experience the Smithsonian and National Geographic as well as the Nova offerings on Archaeology.  Over the years I am joined (in spirit) with the expeditions to find Nifertiti and Cleopatra tombs.  Two of my favorite archaeologists and finders remain Schliemann and Elgin as well as the Leakeys.  Their personalities left something to be desired, but they were men and women who preserved the past and presented to the world their findings.  As an armchair archaeologist I have collected museum and excavation boardgames that have brought to life Mesopotamia, the Middle East, Far China, Atlantis, Teotihuacan,  Machu Picchu and Cuzco.  Two of my favorite "digging" films are Journey to the Center of the Earth and The Mummy (various versions) that have archaeological implications.  What can we learn from Archaeology much more than digging up the past, scraping shards of dirt, or brushing an unearthed statue?  It is a rewarding study of how scientists, fortune hunters, and collectors go to the ends of the Earth to find what other civilizations were like.  Their unearthing, as tiresome and tedious as it may be, reveals worlds we thought could never be brought back to life. 

Weekly Topics

Session 1.  Theory & Methods of Archaeology:  Lessons from King Tut's Tomb

Definitions of Archaeology:  The Passive to Rubbish.  Archaeology and Storytellers.  "The Wondrous Things."  

Session 2.  Ashes to Ashes in Ancient Italy:  What Pompeii and Herculaneum Meant.

Session 3.  Digging Up Troy:  Did It Exist?

Session 4.  From Egypt to Eternity:  Are You an Egyptologist?

Session 5.  Mysteries in Mesopotamia:  Were the Babylon Gardens Found?  

Session 6.  Discovering our Earliest Ancestors, First Farmers in the Fertile Crescent:  Pre-Historic Africa

Session 7.  Exploring the Jungles of Central America and Mexico:  Tikal, Palenque, Uxmal, Copán, Teotihuacán

Session 8.  Revealing the First Greeks:  the Bronze Age

Session 9.  Classical Greece:  Discus Throwing to Democracy

Session 10.  Finding Atlantis?:  Did It Exist?  Was it Santorini or Akrotiri?

Session 11.  The Roman Eras:  What did the Romans teach us about preservation?

Session 12.  Cities of the Desert:  Excavating Armageddon, Petra

Session 13.  Unearthing the Bible:  What Really Happened at Masada?

Session 14.  Session 14.  Do you keep what you find?:  Museum Collections, Looting, New Advances with LiDAR and Other Technologies, Excavations (e.g.  Submarine Hunley) and UNESCO Sites

Bibliography

Core Book

Cline, Eric H.  Three Stones Create a Wall:  The Story of Archaeology.  Princeton, New Jersey:  Princeton University Press, 2017.

Selected Bibliography

Bahn, Paul, ed.  The History of Archaeology:  An Introduction.  London and New York:  Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2014.

Carlsen, William.  Jungle of Stone:  The True Story of Two Men, Their Extraordinary Journey and The Discovery of the Lost Civilization of          The Maya.  New York:  HarperCollins, 2016.

Ceram, C.W.  Gods, Graves, & Scholars--The Story of Archaeology.  Second, Revised, and Substantially Enlarged Edition.  

    Cambridge and New York:   Alfred A. Knopf, 1968.

Down, David.  The Archaeological Book.  Green Forest, Arkansas.:  MasterBooks, 2010.  

Fagan, Brian A.  Eyewitness to Discovery:  First-Person Accounts of More Than Fifty of the World's Greatest Archaeological Discoveries.           New York:  Oxford University Press, 1996.  

_________.  Writing Archaeology:  Telling Stories about the Past.  Walnut Creek, California:  Left Coast Press, Inc. 2006.  

Magness, Jodi.  The Archaeology of the Holy Land:  from the Destruction of Solomon's Temple to the Moslem Conquest.  Cambridge and          New York:  Cambridge University Press, 2012.  

Parcak, Sarah.  Archaeology from Space:  How the Future Shapes Our Past.  New York:  Henry Holt and Company, 2019.

White, Nancy Marie.  Archaeology for Dummies.  Hoboken, New Jersey:  Wiley Publishing, Inc., 2008.  

A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes

Description

Most of our generation learned of the history of civilization from the perspective of “Western civilization”.

Muslim success or failure was defined by their clashes with the outposts of Christian civilization, but only as these conflicts influenced European history.  We also learned how Islamic civilization preserved science and art in the Dark Ages, but not much else. To many of us the history of Muslim civilization was peripheral to world history.

The authors of our two core books: Destiny Disrupted, and No god but God, capture in  colorful, understandable, and very readable language the rich story of world history from the perspective of the Muslim community. The authors introduce the key people, events, ideas, legends, religious disputes, and turning points of world history from an Islamic perspective.  

They clarify how these two great civilizations grew up oblivious to each other, what happened when they intersected, and how the Islamic world was ultimately affected by its slow recognition that Europe -a place it long properly perceived as primitive- had somehow hijacked its destiny.

The story they tell moves from before and during the lifetime of Mohammed, through a succession of far-flung empires, to the interaction with European colonialism and the revolt against European domination, to the modern conflicts that culminated in the events of 9/11 and the current struggles within Islam.

This is a fascinating and enlightening story. Our two very readable core books,  are available in inexpensive used editions. There will be about  70 pages of reading each week.

Please join us in looking at world history from the perspective of the one billion people who are Muslims.

Here's a transcript of our two minute pitch:

In the year 610, according to the Christian calendar-- in an obscure place in the Arabian Peninsula that probably no Europeans even knew existed-- a prosperous caravan trader meditating in an isolated cave- perceived he was hearing messages from an entity he knew as the archangel Gabriel. 

 The caravan trader was Mohammad --and he perceived Gabriel told him he was to spread the God’s message as God’s final prophet.

  The message Mohammad took from that cave ultimately was spread by his followers and   converts to encompass to ¼ of the World’s population today.

So, what is Islam?  Is it A religion?  A community? A way of life?.  A prescription for a society?  A state?

What made it so appealing?

 How and why did it spread, and spread so quickly? What happened in its interactions with the West, from crusades, to colonialism, through two world wars, and afterwards?

  Are its tenets compatible with the modern world?

 Is what’s happening in the Islamic world today-- a clash between two civilizations, a conflict within Islam between competing philosophies, or a civil war within Islam.

 What is its future?

  We’ll examine all this and more—and try to understand   world history from the perspective of the ¼ of the world’s population with a different perspective than our western eyes.

 Along the way, we will also be reading selections from some of the finest Islamic writers –– and looking at examples of Islamic art and architecture.”

There is lots of reading --about 70 pages a week -- but our two core books are very well written and easy to follow.

 Come Join Us …As We Try to See the World and its history Through Islamic Eyes 

Weekly Topics

1.    The Middle World, Muhammad's Revelations and the Hijra

2.    Birth of the Khalifate and the Schism between Sunni and Shia

3.    The Khalifates of the Umayyads and the Abassids

4.    Scholars, Philosophers, and Sufis

5.    Enter the Turks:  The Seljuk Empire

6.    Havoc--Crusaders and Mongolian Hordes

7.    Rebirth of Order:  Ottomans, Safavids, and Moghuls

8.    Meanwhile in Europe:  The Reformation and the Enlightenment

9.    The West Comes East:  European Powers Colonize the World

10.  The Reform Movements in Islamic Governance

11.  Industry, Constitutions, and Nationalism

12.  The Rise of the Secular Modernists and the Crisis of Modernity

13.  The Tide Turns (Wahabism)

14.   The Islamic World Since 9/11

Bibliography

Destiny Disrupted, Tamim Ansary, PublicAffairs, a member of the Perseus Book Group , N.Y., 2009

No god but God, The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam, Reza Aslan, Random House N.Y. 2005

The Qu'ran, Oxford or Penguin or other editions

THE LIBERATION GAME - Role of Europe's Exiles in Saving Britain in WWII

Description

When the Nazi blitzkrieg rolled over Europe in the early days of WW II, London became a refuge for the European leaders of several occupied nations, who escaped there to continue the fight.  As the only European democracy still holding out against Hitler, Britain became known as "Last Hope Island."  In her books Last Hope Island and Citizens of London, Lynne Olson argues that England did not stand completely alone: the people of occupied Europe and the expatriate leaders did far more for their own liberation than historians have recognized, and the Americans in London who worked tirelessly for US involvement, played a significant role in raising American awareness and sustaining British morale. 

Churchill has portrayed World War II as an unalloyed American-British-Soviet triumph, with the Americans and British playing the starring role. Throughout the conflict, he promoted the idea that plucky little England and its united empire maintained the struggle "single-handed" until joined by the Soviet Union and the United States. This has remained the standard narrative. 

In this SDG, we will encounter a different, fuller narrative that highlights the vital role played by the Norwegian, Dutch, Belgium, and French people, not to mention the Polish Air Force, in ensuring British survival through their “darkest hour.” We will see the struggle between Churchill, Roosevelt, and the US Congress to provide American aid to Britain.  Once the Americans joined the Allies, we will see how Allied victory depended on participation of the people in the occupied  countries including the partisans fighting in the east. However, intentionally not involving any of them in strategy and war planning, American and British personnel refused to include de Gaulle in planning for D-Day, while also excluding Belgium, Dutch, and Norwegian governments, even though their citizens in occupied countries were essential for Allied success. The exclusion of Poles, Czechs, and Yugoslavs culminated in what many see as Roosevelt’s and Churchill’s final betrayal at Yalta.  

Both core books are well written, and a delight to read. We expect this to be a s SDG full of lively discussion.  

Weekly Topics

(1)    The debacle across Europe.

(2)    The European exodus to Britain and wartime London.

(3)    Sparks of resistance, British intelligence and the BBC.

(4)    The Battle of Britain: on the brink of disaster.

(5)    Americans in London: the arrival of Winant, Harriman. Harry Hopkins and Lend-Lease.

(6)    July - December 1941: Britain no longer “alone.” Stalin’s war and the threat to British Eastern Europeans allies; Roosevelt and Churchill take over the show.

(7)    1942-1943: preparation and planning for D-Day.  SOE's missteps, European resistance movements and rescuing Allied airmen.

(8)     American GI’s and the British.

(9)     D-Day.

(10)   Liberation Begins across Europe; Warsaw and Paris uprisings.

(11)   The war in Europe draws to and end; the hunger winter; the West turns it back on Poland and Czechoslovakia.

(12)    The aftermath of the European war: destruction, displaced persons, dealing with collaborators. Conclusions.

Bibliography

Core Books:

Last Hope Island - Britain, Occupied Europe & the Brotherhood that Helped Turn the Tide by Lynne Olsen, 2017.

Citizens of London: The Americans who Stood with Britain in its Darkest, Finest Hour by Lynne Olsen, 2010.

Recommended:

Participants may find it useful to have a general history of WWII for reference. Examples of such books are Inferno by Max Hastings (2011), The Storm of War by Andrew Roberts (2012), and The Second World War by Anthony Beevor (2013).

American Imperialism: History and Present

Description

America has harbored imperial ambitions since its founding. Its focus shifted in the twentieth century, from acquiring territory to penetrating foreign countries and influencing their governments to support US strategic and economic interests. That shift is the result of a decisive embrace of interventionism, aimed at extending US power throughout the world. Withdrawal from overextended military commitments could strengthen America.  Tied to American Imperialism is the concept of American Exceptionalism, a belief in the unique character of America that not only made it distinct but better than any heretofore identity.  Not only was it "exceptional" but prime for exportation.

Weekly Topics

I The territorial Empire

 1. Introduction and Northwest Territories

2.Continental expansion

3. Mexico and Central America

4. Africa and Pacific

5. The Caribbean

II The semiglobal empire

6. Institutions

7. Nonstate actors

8. The empire in action

9. The unipolar moment

III The Empire in retreat

10. Anti-imperialism in the US

11. The US economy

12. The decline of leadership

13. Hegemony under threat

14. Epilogue and Conclusions

Bibliography

Text: Victor Bulmer-Thomas, Empire in Retreat, Yale University Press, 459 pp.

Additional Reading: David Hendrickson, Republic in Peril, Oxford U. Press, 287 pp.

Deborah Madsen, American Exceptionalism,Univ. of Mississippi Press, 186 pgs.

Immerwahr, Daniel. How to Hide an Empire. Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2019.

A Fresh Look at American History From 1492 to 2018

Description

Our country started with promise and promises.  Not all of those promises of equality, sovereignty and consent, were achieved or were even achievable. 

In our core book, the Harvard historian Jill Lepore, in one volume, encapsulates the history of this country from the 1600s through 2016 and its aftermath.  It articulates the confusion of facts and fiction that have always been with us, as well as the deep and contradictory currents of our society continually swirling.  It is not just another history book, although it is a pleasure to read, and seems painfully honest and without excessive political bias.   

The question which it raises is if America has, and ever could have lived up to its stated ideals or whether a nation conceived in revolution must always be chaotic; whether the simplistic view of democracy ever worked.   It leads us through our history up to and through the 2016 election.  Its answer is in many ways disturbing, as it shines a light on the American experiment.  She says:

“The American experiment has not ended A nation born in revolution will forever struggle against chaos.  A nation founded on universal rights will wrestle against the forces of particularism. A nation that toppled hierarchy of birth only to erect a hierarchy of wealth will never know tranquility. A nation of immigrants cannot close its borders. And a nation born in contradiction, liberty in a land of slavery, sovereignty in a land of conquest, will fight, forever, over the meaning of its history.”

The story told contains much information that is new and fresh, and insights which need to be considered, even if rejected. Almost every page, while introducing us to new historical figures and clarifying others, is readily applicable to our present political, social and foreign policy situation.  Its focus is pointing out the counterbalancing ideas and movements during this period, highlighting people and events including some that we either do not learn about or fail to understand in context.

It’s a big sweeping book. It covers the history of political thought, the fabric of American social life over the centuries, classic “great man” accounts of contingencies, surprises, decisions, ironies and character, and the vivid experiences of those previously marginalized: women, African-Americans, Native Americans, homosexuals. It encompasses interesting takes on democracy and technology, shifts in demographics, revolutions in economics and the very nature of modernity. 

It includes the relationship of the races from the early days,  the impact on secular polity of religious revivals, ongoing and pernicious response of the South to the Civil War, and its continuing struggle, the role of media, including the sometimes interchangeable  connection of polling and advertising to political discourse, the important role of women and how moral issues were the key to their admission into politics and the franchise, our history of authoritarianism and attention to important and interesting  people that appear in other histories only  in footnotes.

This is a great and fresh way of viewing the entire panorama of our history through 2016 and its aftermath in one well written and thoughtful volume.  

Jefferson said that the American experiment rests on three “self-evident” truths:  political equality, natural rights and the sovereignty of the people. In history many had the idea that in American, there existed the Lockean “state of nature,” a place for new beginnings. 

Weekly Topics

SESSION	CHAPTER	PAGES
1	Intro, 1,2,	xi-55		1. The Nature of the Past (1-30). The people who made up our country. Divisions.
				2. The Rulers and the Ruled (41-71) How Locke’s philosophy tracked the American experience fueled by a slave underclass.
2	3	55-108		3. Rebellion in America (55-71) Of Wars and Revolutions (72-108). Origins of revolution, Declaration, “resolution” of problem of slavery.
3	4	109-152		4. The Constitution of a Nation (109-152). As to slavery and sovereignty, America and Great Britain come out of Revolutionary War in opposite positions.
4	5	153-188		5. A Democracy of Numbers. (153-188) nature of rulers and role of citizens; math trumps philosophy.
5	6	189-231		6. The Soul and the Machine. (189-231). Economic bases of northern and southern societies; industrial revolution and human rights issues clash.
6	7	232-307		7. Of Ships and Shipwrecks. (232-271). Racial/ economic issues come to a head, exacerbated by American imperialism. Industrialism meets religion meets democracy.
7	8	272-307		8. The Face of Battle. (272-307) Can technology bind up the disintegrating union? Was slavery the cause of the rebellion? Can Efficiency solve our underlying problems?
8	9	312-360		9. Of Citizens, Persons and People [312-360]. Who won the war? Who won the peace?
9	10	361-420		10. Efficiency and the Masses. (361-420). Impact of growth of population and size of country on premises of founders. Progressivism and rebirth of modern conservatism
10	11	421-471		11. A Constitution of the Air. (421-471). Post WWI enthusiasm evaporates with Hoover; mass media amplify and distort; fake news is not a new phenomenon.
11	12	472-517		12. The Brutality of Modernity. (472-517) WWII and it’s not necessarily positive impact on the pre-War problems;
12	13	521-588		13. A World of Knowledge (521-588) Dawn of an age of affluence and prosperity. New form of economic conservatism vs; racism, poverty and prejudice; new ideolgies.
13	14	589-645		14. Rights and Wrongs (589- 645.) Cold war and its end decrease of liberalism, economic inequality and political polarization all begin to rise.
12	15	646-718		15. Battle Lines (646-718. Social issues become politically partisan; Cold War ends, domestic cold war, Reaganomics; NRA; " discovery" of 2d Amendment, Twin Towers.
13	16	719-785		16 America, Disrupted. Myth that 911 united the country, widening of divide and disdtrust ; populism; fake news; Deregulation of communications.

Bibliography

These Truths, a History of the United States, Lepore, Jill, W.W. Norton, 2018

A Generation Removed, How Should We Understand Apartheid in South Africa

Description

More than 20 years have passed since Apartheid “abruptly” ended, the euphoria has died, the initial hopes dashed, none of the constitutional promises have been kept, and the lingering effects of what has been called the world’s worst example of a system of racially based human society remain, both visible and hidden. Earlier histories of the Apartheid Era in South African history have been written, and have their place, but now, with the distance of 20+ years, it’s time to take another look at the history, evaluate its interpretations, and perhaps reach a better understanding.

The core book, Apartheid, 1948-1994, by Saul Dubow, analyses the Apartheid regime and its overturn. According to the author, a question not sufficiently addressed is “not why Apartheid was defeated, but how it survived so long.” He considers apartheid an idea as well as an ideology, and he argues that because the idea of apartheid was kept alive by the resistance movement, long after the ideology of apartheid had been silenced (or gone underground), reinvention and transformation have proven difficult. He also argues that in order to understand apartheid, we need to both “refamiliarize” ourselves with it - events, institutions, individuals - and “defamiliarize” it - that is, stand back and look at it from a distance so as to better see how unusual and curious it was. In the course of this SDG, we, too, will grapple with our understanding of apartheid and our understanding of recent South African history, and, perhaps, its significance for the world.

Weekly Topics

1. Background:  Africans, Afrikaners, British before 1948 and the election of 1948 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Africa); Dubow, chapter 1)

2. The Consolidation of Apartheid (Dubow, chapter 2)

3. Sharpeville and its Aftermath (Dubow, chapter 3)

4. Apartheid Regnant (Dubow, chapter 4)

5.  The Opposition Destroyed (Dubow, chapter 5)

6.  Cracks within the System (Dubow, chapter 6)

7.  The Limits and Dangers of Reform (Dubow, chapter 7)

8.  A Balancing of Forces (Dubow, chapter 8)

9.  Conclusion (Dubow, conclusion)

10. The Truth and Reconciliation Report, conclusions (http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/report/finalreport/Volume5.pdf, 196-248)

Bibliography

Core Reading

Saul Dubow, Apartheid 1948-1994 (2014)

The Truth and Reconciliation Report, Conclusion, pp. 196-248 (http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/Report/finalreport/Volume5.pdf)

Additional Resources

Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom (1994); autobiography 

Nadine Gordimer, Telling Times, Writing and Living, 1954-2008 (2010); collection of essays

Athol Fugard, Tsotsi (1980); novel about gangs in a township; made into a movie, Tsotsi (2005)

The Forgiven, movie, 2018; about the T&R process