Sixth International Congress of Entomology, Madrid (1935): politics and science

2021 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-297
Author(s):  
C. Martín Albaladejo ◽  
F. Carmona Vivar

Using the Sixth International Congress of Entomology (Madrid, 1935) as an example, we present a representative case of science as a social construct and its importance to the history of the winning side of a war to construct a memory that supports its own version of events. The Congress was held prior to the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939); however, the proceedings were not published until 1940. An examination of the proceedings and of archival documents show the exclusion of contributions initially intended for publication, particularly those by Spanish entomologists who were politically aligned with the Second Spanish Republic, the losing side, and who, as a result, suffered reprisals after the military conflict. These documents suggest that their contributions were rejected for reasons unrelated to their scientific investigations but due to the political inclinations of the editor.

2018 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
WILLIAM FITZSIMONS

AbstractMost scholarship on the military history of precolonial Africa focuses on state-level conflict, drawing on examples such as the Asante, Buganda, Zulu, and Kongo kingdoms. The current article instead examines connections between warfare and political history in the politically fragmented setting of nineteenth-century Busoga, Uganda, where a small geographical region hosted more than fifty micro-kingdoms competing as peer polities. Using sources that include a rich corpus of oral traditions and early archival documents, this article offers a reconstruction of military practices and ideologies alongside political histories of important Busoga kingdoms during the long nineteenth century. The article argues that routine political destabilization caused by competition between royal leaders, combined with shifting interests of commoner soldiers, continuously reconstituted a multi-polar power structure throughout the region. This approach moves beyond assessing the role of warfare in state formation to ask how military conflict could be a creative force in small-scale politics as well.


2021 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 324-368
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Grantseva ◽  

For many years, representatives of Soviet and then Russian historical science paid special attention to the period of the Second Spanish Republic and, especially, to the events of 1936-1939. The Spanish Civil War was and remains a topic that attracts the attention of specialists and influences the development of a multifaceted Russian-Spanish cultural dialogue. There are significantly fewer works on the peaceful years of the Republic, which is typical not only for domestic science, but also for the historiography of this period as a whole. Four key periods can be distinguished in the formation of the national historiography of the Spanish Republic. The first is associated with the existence of the Republic itself and is distinguished by significant political engagement. The second opens after 1956 and combines the continuity with respect to the period of the 1930s. and, at the same time, striving for objectivity, developing methodology and expanding the source base. The third stage is associated with the period of the 1970s-1980s, the time of the restoration of diplomatic relations between the USSR and Spain, as well as the active interaction of historians of the two countries. The fourth stage, which lasted thirty years, was the time of the formation of the Russian historiography of the Second Republic, which sought to get rid of the ideological attitudes that left a significant imprint on the research of the Soviet period. This time is associated with the active archival work of researchers and the publication of sources, the expansion of topics, interdisciplinary approaches. Among the studies of the history of the Second Republic outside Spain, Russian historiography has a special place due to the specifics of Soviet-Spanish relations during the Civil War, and the archival funds in our country, and the traditions of Russian historical Spanish studies, and the preservation of republican memory.


Author(s):  
Angela V. Dolgova

During the Civil War, Soviet workers had to fight against desertion and banditry. Since the majority of the country’s population was the peasantry, a confrontation arose with the Soviet government of that part of it that could not accept it. More often than not, peasants fell under such Bolshevik propaganda labels as “white gangs” or “gangs of deserters”, which had spread through the efforts of the party-Soviet propaganda machine. According to archival documents, local Soviet workers used terror not only to suppress resistance, but also as a forced measure caused by the real military-political situation in the Perm Governorate. The fight for the establishment of the power of the Soviets was fought against banditry, not desertion, and was fierce. Consequently, the widespread thesis in the history of the Civil War in the Perm Governorate about mass desertion is nothing more than an assumption. The line of the Eastern Front passed next to the Osinsky District, so the most fierce fight unfolded here, which in turn had an impact on the military-political situation in the governorate as a whole.


Author(s):  
Michael Alpert

Sin pretender ser una historia de las brigadas Internacionales en la Guerra Civil Española de 1936-1939, este trabajo se propone examinar ciertos aspectos míticos asociados con las BB.II, en especial la cuestión de su eficacia la experiencia militar de sus jefes. Llega a la conclusión que, aunque el valor y el autosacrificio de los internacionales son innegables, y pese a que se les empleaba a menudo a las BB.II como fuerzas de choque, su presencia en las fuerzas gubernamentales no pasaba de tener una ejemplaridad moral.This article is not a history of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War of 1936 - 1939. It tries to investigate certain persistent myths about the Brigades, in particular the question of their efficiency and the military expertise of their leaders. It concludes that, although the heroism and the self - sacrifice of the Brigades are undeniable, and despite their function as the vanguard in many of the batties, their presence in the Army of the Spanish Republic had a moral influence which far outweighed any military significance.


2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 319-354
Author(s):  
Marta Hanson ◽  
Andy Pham

This article reproduces an exchange between academics and practitioners at the Sixth International Congress on Traditional Asian Medicine (ICTAM VI) meeting in Austin about how the history of Chinese medicine could be more meaningful, interesting, and valuable to clinicians. It provides a brief history of exchanges, the panel proposal, the abstracts of the panelists, an edited transcript of the conversation, and some concluding remarks from the participants. As more and more practitioners of Chinese medicine outside of China spend time in China, learn Chinese, become culturally and linguistically bilingual or multilingual, they seek more knowledge about what they practise than they can get in current publications in English or other European languages. The panel and this article are intended to encourage further exchange, conversations, and cooperation that will lead to new histories of Chinese medicine relevant for practitioners as much as for other academics.


2020 ◽  
pp. 97-101
Author(s):  
T.V. Tishkina

The process of forming the fund and the features of the military-historical exposition of the Museum of History of Education in Barnaul is considered. The institution has been operating since 2008 under the direction of O.V. Kakotkina. Museum Fund it is more than 12, 5 thousand of items. Considerable attention has been paid to manning collections reflecting wartime events. The article analyzes the exposition of the hall “Education in Barnaul during the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945)”. The museum staff and artist-designer N.A. Burdina carried out the exposition. When creating the exposition, the principles of scientificness, subjectivity and communication are observed. Over 230 exhibits are presented in the sections of the exposition: letters, photos, awards, archival documents, household items 1930-1940, artifacts obtained as a result of excavations at battlefields in the Novgorod region, etc. A variety of modern museum equipment was used to accommodate them. About 7000 people visit the museum annually. They get acquainted with the exposition of the hall during museum or in their own. It is noted that the activities of the museum are important for the preservation, study and promotion of the heritage of Barnaul educators.


2020 ◽  
pp. 169-179
Author(s):  
Yuri N. Timkin ◽  

Drawing on archival materials from the State Archive of the Kirov Region and the State Archive of Social and Political History of the Kirov Region, the article analyzes attitudes to the New Economic Policy (NEP) in the party organizations of the RCP (B) of the Vyatka guberina in 1921. The novelty of this work lies in the fact that the author draws on archival documents to investigate the attitude of communists to the decision of the X Congress of the RCP (B) to replace surplus tax by tax in kind (prodnalog) and other measures for the development of the NEP in 1921. It turns out that party workers in position of responsibility and ordinary members of the party, as a rule, understood and perceived the NEP in their own way, reading into it the interests and needs of different social and professional groups. Moreover, there emerged some ideological differences due to different understanding of the political goals of the New Economic Policy. For the first time in local historiography, the author has introduced into scientific use some previously unknown archival facts. The analysis of the archival material allows the author to conclude that the attitude to the NEP of party workers in position of responsibility and of rank-and-file members differed. If the “top” of the party discussed the ideological aspects of the NEP, the “bottom” members, as a rule, were interested in its practical orientation. There was no unanimous support for the NEP not just among the responsible party workers, but also among the rank-and-file members. The author comes to the conclusion that the lack of clear understanding of the nature of the New Economic Policy caused disagreements in the party ranks, which, in absence of the tradition of broad discussion of controversial issues, was fraught with danger of a split. The Military Communism ideology and low literacy (including political one) that prevailed in the party ranks did not promote good understanding of the new party course and its creative application under specific regional conditions. Critics and open opponents of the NEP faced “organizational conclusions.”


Author(s):  
Александр Каменский

The history of suicide in Russia, especially prior to the nineteenth century, remains understudied. While in most European countries the process of decriminalization and secularization of suicide was underway, in Russia, with the introduction of the Military Article of 1715, it was formally criminalized. On the basis of the study of more than 350 newly examined archival cases, this article examines how the transfer of suicide investigations to secular authorities also entailed secularization, while the peculiarities of the Russian judicial and investigative system, as well as lacunae in the legislation, actually led to the gradual decriminalization of suicide. At the same time, although among Russians, as well as among other peoples, a number of superstitions were associated with suicide, there is no evidence in the archival documents studied in this article of a particularly emotional perception of suicide. The phenomenon of suicide in eighteenth-century Russia, when compared to early modern Europe, did not have any significant, fundamental differences. However, the features of the Russian judicial-investigative system made this phenomenon less public, less visible and less significant for public consciousness.  


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Jamie Hawkins Elder

<p>Anxiety and fear were central to the condition of settler colonialism in 1860s New Zealand. The Land Wars of the 1860s in New Zealand provoked potent anxiety about the enemy, about loved ones’ lives and about survival. The anxiety could transform into full-blown fear and panic with the onset of violence, or even the prospect or threat of violence. This thesis examines and compares evacuations of ‘refugee’ settler women and children from the sites of Land Wars conflicts in Taranaki (1860-61), and at Waerenga-a-hika (1865) and Matawhero (1868) in Poverty Bay. It explores the character and response to danger of what might be described as ‘settler anxiety’. Settlers of the 1860s used the specific term ‘refugee’ to describe the displaced settler women and children. Māori also faced displacement during the wars, though their situation is not within the scope of this thesis. The story of the Land Wars thus far has focused mainly on the narrative of the military conflict and examines events primarily as a male-centric, racial conflict. However, the time has come to examine experiences off the battlefield – of non-combatants. Women and children in particular are far more central to the history of the wars than is currently acknowledged. The first part of the thesis explores how the Land Wars ‘refugees’ coped with separation from homes and family. The second part examines how settler society, both on a formal governmental basis and on a more informal community level, reacted to the presence of ‘refugees’ emotively and with practical assistance. The research examines the language settlers used and the points they emphasised in their writing or speeches to reveal the frameworks of settler colonialism. Personal diaries, letters and memoirs are used to understand the settlers’ situations. To understand the broader reaction of settler society the thesis draws on newspapers, provincial council correspondence and records, and general government debate and legislation. This thesis argues that the existence of women and children settler ‘refugees’ during the Land Wars represented the settler colonial system in turmoil, providing evidence that the wars involved a conflict off the battlefield as well as on it. Colonists dreamed of creating a safe and secure colony where settlers could acquire land and make a livelihood to support a family. Consequently, attacks on family went to the heart of settler colonialism. The ‘refugees’ symbolised the ‘unsettling’ of settler colonialism, both literally by their locational displacement and figuratively by igniting fear about the stability of the settler colony. In response to the ‘refugee’ crisis settlers vehemently asserted their attachment to ‘home’, to prove their right to live in the colony, and promoted their solidarity with the ‘refugees’ and against enemy Māori, who they saw as threatening the settler dream. The evacuation of Land Wars ‘refugees’ is also considered for its similarities and differences to other ‘refugee’ situations internationally during the colonial era.</p>


2020 ◽  
pp. 177-192

This chapter recounts the Mormons' uneven relationship with the US government throughout the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the middle of the nineteenth century. It traces back how Mormons faced the greatest persecution at the hands of Americans and came closest to political independence, developing separate and semiautonomous economic, political, and military institutions, and relocating to the Great Basin. It also describes the Mormon settlement, political authority, economic development, and relations with the Great Basin's Native populations that threatened to disrupt US claims to the region. The chapter highlights anti-Mormon prejudice and the Mormons' continued suspicion of government officials and non-Mormons. It also talks about the military conflict that erupted between the US federal government and the Mormons in 1857.


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