The Early Years

Arthur Szyk ◽  
2004 ◽  
pp. 5-27
Author(s):  
Joseph P. Ansell

This chapter traces the early years of Arthur Szyk's life, from his birth to the early nineteenth century, before World War II began. He was born in Łódź, an industrial city in the Russian-dominated portion of Poland, in 1894. At the time Poland was not an intact, independent nation; it had been partitioned among Russia, Prussia, and Austria more than a century earlier. It was within this backdrop that the young Szyk began cultivating an interest in art. He also began to develop a passionate interest in history, both world history and the history of his people. More importantly, even at this very early age, Szyk saw the power of art within the political arena. The chapter tracks his early career in the arts during the early 1900s, and how he began to apply politics to his creative work as tensions between Poland and Russia reached their breaking point.

2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 82-90
Author(s):  
Boris Valentinovich Petelin ◽  
Vladilena Vadimovna Vorobeva

In the political circles of European countries attempts to reformat the history of World War II has been continuing. Poland is particularly active; there at the official level, as well as in the articles and in the speeches of politicians, political scientists and historians crude attacks against Russia for its commitment to objective assessments of the military past are allowed. Though, as the authors of this article mention, Russian politicians have not always been consistent in evaluation of Soviet-Polish relationships, hoping to reach a certain compromise. If there were any objections, they were mostly unconvincing. Obviously, as the article points, some statements and speeches are not without emotional colouring that is characteristic, when expressing mutual claims. However, the deliberate falsification of historical facts and evidence, from whatever side it occurs, does not meet the interests of the Polish and Russian peoples, in whose memory the heroes of the Red Army and the Polish Resistance have lived and will live. The authors point in the conclusions that it is hard to achieve mutual respect to key problems of World War II because of the overlay of the 18th – 19th centuries, connected with the “partitions of Poland”, the existence of the “Kingdom of Poland” as part of the Russian Empire, Soviet-Polish War of 1920. There can be only one way out, as many Russian and Polish scientists believe – to understand the complex twists and turns of Russo-Polish history, relying on the documents. Otherwise, the number of pseudoscientific, dishonest interpretations will grow.


2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 494-499
Author(s):  
Destin Jenkins

This essay revisits Making the Second Ghetto to consider what Arnold Hirsch argued about the relationship between race, money, and the ghetto. It explores how Hirsch’s analysis of this relationship was at once consistent with those penned by other urban historians and distinct from those interested in the political economy of the ghetto. Although moneymaking was hardly the main focus, Hirsch’s engagement with “Vampire” rental agencies and panic peddlers laid the groundwork for an analysis that treats the post–World War II metropolis as a crucial node in the history of racial capitalism. Finally, this essay offers a way to connect local forms of violence to the kinds of constraints imposed by financiers far removed from the city itself.


Author(s):  
Barry Riley

This book discusses the 220-year history of the political and humanitarian uses of American food as a tool of both foreign and domestic policy. During these years, food aid has been used as a weapon against the expansion of bolshevism after World War I and communism after World War II, a cudgel to force policy changes by recalcitrant recipient governments, a method for balancing disputes between Israel and Egypt, a backdoor means of increasing military aid to Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, a signal of support to friendly governments, and a resource to help achieve economic development in food-insecure countries. At home, international food aid has, at times, been used to dump troublesome food surpluses abroad and has served politicians as a tool to secure the votes of farming constituents and the political support of agriculture-sector lobbyists, commodity traders, transporters, and shippers. Most important in the minds of many, it has been the most visible—and most popular—means of providing humanitarian aid to tens of millions of hungry men, women, and children confronted, on distant shores, by war, terrorism, and natural cataclysms and the resulting threat—if not the reality—of famine and death. The book investigates the little-known, not well-understood, and often highly contentious political processes that have converted fields of grains, crops of pulses, and herds of livestock into the tools of U.S. government policy.


2018 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 171-196
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Nowak

From 1999 Polish and Romanian humanists face each other on conferences in Suceava (Romanian Bucovina) which are part of “Polish Days” in Romania organized by the Association of Poles in Romania. Polish and Romanian historians, ethnographers, sociologists, politologists and linguists deliver lectures and discuss Polish-Romanian contacts and relations in the past and present. from the Polish part many historical lectures concern the interwar period and the problem of Polish refugees in Romania during the World War II. In the period between1918–1945 the relations between Poles and Romanians were rather friendly and now these topics are discussed most frequently. Among the Romanian historians there are more specialists on the relations between Moldova and the Polish Kingdom till the end of 18th century. Many historians focus on the Polish-Romanian relations in the years 1945–1989. Most of the lectures concerning the political present were delivered by the Poles. Cultural sections of the conference concentrate on mutual language influences, Polish–Romanian literature contacts, translations of Polish literature into Romania and Romanian literature into Poland, the analyses of literary works, Polish studies in Romania and Romanian studies in Poland, the perception of Romanian culture among the Poles and vice versa, the problems of religions, education, libraries, music and tourism. Polish etnographers concentrate on the problems of Polish Bucovinians but the most discussed subject is not the history of Polish Bucovinians but their local dialect. Most of the conference lectures were printed. “Polish Days” in Suceava are the most important event organized by the very active Association of Poles in Romania and they help breaking the stereotypes and enhance the integration between the Poles and Romanians.. In general the conferences in Suceava do not have their equivalent in the contacts between humanists of other countries.


Author(s):  
Souleymane Bachir Diagne

Souleymane Bachir Diagne’s text is on the history of what has been called ‘African philosophy,’ a phrase with origins in the early post-World War II period. Diagne begins by tracing the complex history and legacy of the book Bantu Philosophy (1949), which was written by the philosopher and theologian Placide Tempels, a Franciscan missionary and Belgian citizen. Diagne argues that that text represented an important break with the way in which Africa had been ignored and set aside in philosophical circles (a practice that Diagne traces to Hegel). From there, he outlines how currents in African philosophy first imitated, and then later broke with, Tempels’s model. He concludes with observations on current trends in African philosophy, which above all focus on democratic transitions, human rights, the future of the arts, citizenship, and languages in use on the continent today.


Author(s):  
Ihor Diakunchak ◽  
Hans Juergen Kiesow ◽  
Gerald McQuiggan

Siemens gas turbine history can be traced back to the early years of World War II. The Westinghouse aero jet engine (J 30) and the Junkers JUMO 004 jet engine were the basis for the industrial gas turbines designed and manufactured by Westinghouse and Siemens / Kraftwerk-Union since World War II. KWU was formed in 1969 as a joint venture of AEG and Siemens and became wholly owned by Siemens in 1977. AEG worked with Junkers on the development of the Jumo 004 jet engine during the War. Westinghouse Power Generation was purchased by Siemens in 1998. This paper examines the history of those early gas turbines and traces the evolution of the modern Siemens gas turbine from that time. Details are also given of the latest Siemens gas turbine to enter into operation, the 340MW SGT5-8000H.


2021 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-43
Author(s):  
Paula Petričević

Abstract The author explores the socialist emancipation of women in Montenegro during World War II and its aftermath, using the example of the 8 March celebrations. The social life of this ‘holiday of the struggle of all the women in the world’ speaks powerfully of the strength and fortitude involved in the mobilization of women during the war and during the postwar building of socialist Yugoslavia, as well as the sudden modernization and unprecedented political subjectivation of women. The emancipatory potential of these processes turned out to be limited in the later period of stabilization of Yugoslav state socialism and largely forgotten in the postsocialist period. The author argues that the political subjectivation of women needs to be thought anew, as a process that does not take place in a vacuum or outside of a certain ideological matrix, whether socialist or liberal.


2014 ◽  
Vol 50 ◽  
pp. 145-170
Author(s):  
Elvan Altan Ergut

AbstractThis paper focuses on two exhibitions of architecture and town planning held by Britain in Turkey in the mid-1940s. The use of these exhibitions for propaganda purposes, as well as their reception in the highly politicized context of World War II, requires the study to emphasize the political as well as the professional perspective of the contemporary architectural context. Analyzing why and how these exhibitions were held, and what they displayed as representative of British architecture and town planning, the paper discusses the characteristics of the contemporary discourses and practices of the profession with reference to the national dynamics of each country and their position in the international scene at the dawn of a new era in world history. The aim is to question the relations of power that are conventionally taken to define discursive and practical hierarchies of binary constructs, such as national/international or traditional/modern. Examining the case of the British exhibitions in Turkey, the paper emphasizes instead the necessity of a comparative analysis to evaluate the architectural products in-between or beyond dichotomies as produced in discrete yet interconnected contexts.


2022 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 159-187
Author(s):  
Erica Kanesaka

Abstract This article explores the ties between anti-Black racist kitsch and kawaii culture through the history of the Dakko-chan doll. In what came to be called the “Dakko-chan boom” of 1960, tens of thousands of Japanese people lined up to purchase an inflatable blackface doll with a circular red mouth, grass skirt, and winking hologram eyes. Dakko means “to hug,” and Dakko-chan's astronomical popularity resulted in part from the way the doll could be worn as an accessory, attached to the body by its hugging arms. This article asks what it meant for Japan, a nation still recovering from World War II and the American occupation, to quite literally embrace American blackface in the form of an embraceable doll. Rejecting the claim that blackface loses its significance in a Japanese context, this article argues that Dakko-chan cannot be considered devoid of racist meanings. Emerging amid the political turmoil surrounding the revision of the US-Japan Security Treaty, Dakko-chan came to express a wide range of contradictory feelings about race, sex, and nation, illustrating how affective attachments to racist forms have accrued rather than dissipated through their movement into new cultural contexts.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document