AMST 301 Rogues and Rebels

AMST 301Rogues and Rebels Monday

Syllabus etc • American Rogues and Rebels: AMST 301 • Professor: Dr. Ian Chambers • Fall 2008 • Contact Details: • Office: History Department, 315 Administration building • Phone: (208) 885-6551 -E-mail: chambers@uidaho.edu • Office hours: Monday 2:00pm – 3:00pm • Wednesday 2:00pm – 3:00pm • Additional office hours available by appointment

Texts • Eric Larson, Devil in the White CityMurder, Magic and Madness at the Fair that Changed America • A pack of six books from the book store (all books from Bedford/St. Martins): • Kenneth S Greenberg, The Confessions of Nat Turner and Related documents • Jonathan Earle, John Brown’s Raid on Harpers Ferry: A Brief History with Documents • Shelia l, Skemp, Judith Sargent Murray: A Brief Biography with Documents • Victoria Bissell Brown, Twenty Years at Hull-House Jane Adams • David Howard-Pitney, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Civil Rights Struggle of the 1950s and 1960s: A Brief History with Documents • Richard W. Etulain, César Chávez: A Brief Biography with Documents • Additional reading as issued during the semester • I will also be showing various documentaries and movies outside of class hours. Details to be issued during the first week of class

Course Requirements • Exams: A final on Thursday, December 18. 30% • Research proposal 10% • Group Class Presentation 20% • Research paper: Students will select a topic, in consultation with the professor, and prepare a research paper of 7-8 pages, type-written and double spaced. • The paper will be due on November 19th and count as 30% of the final course grade. • Class Participation • Class participation counts as 10% of the course grade and is determined by the following criteria: attendance and classroom discussion. • Class Rules and Regulations • Three-One System • You must wait ONE day before contesting any grade • You must write ONE paragraph explaining why your grade should be adjusted • You must challenge the grade within ONE week of receiving it. • Plagiarism • Plagiarism WILL NOT be tolerated • Late Papers • You will lose one point per minute for any late work.

Schedule (subject to change) • The class will follow a weekly format • Monday – General historical overview • Wednesday – Specific topic lecture • Friday – Group presentations and discussion

Groups: • Class will divide in 13 groups • (min 3 people max 4 per group) • Each group will present on the Rogue/Rebel under discussion that week

Additional Readings • For discussion this week • James ClavellA Children’s Story • How is power worked out in this book • Eric Hobsbawm chapter from Bandits • Can, as I suggest, Hobsbawm form a theoretical base for this class

Hobsbawm and Banditry • What interests the social and economic historian is primarily the structure of banditry . . . rather than the effects on the wider history of events in their time

In this class we are going to attempt to do more • We need to know the make up of the people we study • But also their position and impact in America

Why? • I want to examine America through the idea of rogues and rebels for two reasons • 1) to find out why America loves them • 2) to find out if America has ‘progressed’ because of their actions

For this class I will use the following definition • Rogue – someone who goes against society for no reason or for personal gain • Rebel – someone who goes against society to correct a wrong within society

Who are what are Rebels? • John Smith • Pilgrims • Thomas Paine • Nat Turner • John Brown • Jessie James • Judith Murray • Jane Adams • HH Holmes • Eleanor Roosevelt • Martin and Malcolm • James Dean and the teenager • Ceaser Chavez

Rogues and Rebels Wednesday

Group work clarification • Each group will present on one of the listed Rebels/Rogues • That group will also turn in a written report on the day of their presentation • If the Rebel/Rogue does not have a corresponding book I will supply some suggestion to the group • I expect other people in the class to have read about and have knowledge of the Rebel/Rogue to enable a discussion

Groups

Paper Clarification • Research paper of 7-8 pages, type-written and double spaced. • Based on a Rogue/Rebel of your choice • Paper must deal with the historical time period and the impact that the individual or group had on society • Check your paper topic with the Professor before starting your paper.

To understand banditary and its history we must see it in the context of power • That is control by governments of what goes on in the territories and among the populations over which they claim control • The history of banditry • including social banditry • Cannot be understood or properly studied except as part of the history of political power

Power to control increasingly concentrated in territorial or ‘national’ states • Claiming and exercising power over everything that goes on within its boarders • Power reaches down to interact with every person in its territory.

In modern world • volume of information travelling and number of people • make it difficult for American government to control all power • If it could there would be no people in jail • Inability to stop certain acts of behavior displays a similar gap between claimed and real power

But power limited by • ability to maintain large and effective body of armed and civil servants • an efficient system of information, communication and transportation • These potential weakness of power contain the potential for banditry

Social Banditry • For the law, anyone belonging to a group of men who attack and rob with violence is a bandit, • Historians and sociologists cannot use so crude a definition. • Social bandit • :-People not regarded as simple criminals by the people

Power of bandits to operate is always, ironically, defined by the same gap that allows their creation. • Eventually state power will react and either negotiate or crush • Bandits have to come to terms with whatever centers of power are prepared to tolerate them or go under

Social Banditry • Universally found wherever societies are based on agriculture and consist one groups ruled, oppressed and exploited by someone else • lords, towns, governments, or even banks • 3 main forms • Noble robber • Primitive resistance fighter • Terror bringing avenger

social bandits • state regards as criminals • considered by their people as • heroes • champions • Avengers • fighters for justice • leaders of liberation

It would be unthinkable for a social bandit to snatch the peasants harvest in his own territory. • Those who do lose the peculiar relationship which makes banditry ‘social’ • In practice such distinctions are less clear than in theory

Modern agrarian systems • no longer those of traditional peasant society and cease to produce social bandits • except in countries of what has been called ‘settler capitalism’ = The USA, Australia, Argentina • Settler capitalism exploitation by one country over another

Britain, the country which gave the world Robin Hood • the international paradigm of social banditry • has no records of social bandits after the early 17th C

And Now • something completely different

Banditary becomes epidemic in times of pauperization and economic crisis • more than able bodied men who take what they need by arms rather than starve. • the resistance of entire communities or people against the destruction of its way of life

Unless • It becomes the symbol, even the spearhead, of resistance by the whole of the traditional order against the forces which disrupt and destroy it. • Or • If the dream of every peasant for a society free from evil and oppression is awakened

What part if any do Bandits play in the transformation of societies • According to Hobsbawm banditry itself is not a program for peasant society but • a form of self help to escape it in particular circumstances • However, reformist or revolutionary, banditry does not constitute a social movement

Friday

When banditry merges into a large movement, it becomes part of a force which can and does change society. • But the results are not always what were expected • This does not devalue their historical position or power however

To understand social composition of banditary • look primarily at the mobile margin of peasant society • Importance of age • Male youth between puberty and marriage • Before the responsibility of family life • Men not integrated in society • Ex service men • shepherds

But possibly the most important type of person to contribute to the bandit category • People who were unwilling to accept the ‘meek and passive social role’ • “men who make themselves respected”

Friday Discussion

I want to make Friday a regular discussion day • I want to spend a little time today organizing the structure of the discussion • First I want you to individually think about and then write down: • A) The best group discussions you have been in and why were they good? • B) The worst group discussions you have been in and why were they good? • Think about what factors made them the way they were they • structured, free flowing, did they build on previous weeks, did everyone have to speak etc

Now I want you to get into your groups • Compare and discuss you individual answers • Then I want each group to come up with three ideas/rules for the class discussion

Not everyone has to speak • Although you all can • Use examples – from text or from your life that relate to discussion • Read the text • Be respectful to other participants • Be to the point • Teacher to encourage not run discussion

Some start up questions • What struck me most about the text we read to prepare was….. • The question I’d most like to ask the author is … • The part of this weeks class that made the most sense was ….. • The part of this weeks class that made least sense was ….

Not everyone has to speak • Although you all can • Use examples – from text or from your life that relate to discussion • Read the text • Be respectful to other participants • Be to the point • Teacher to encourage not run discussion

AMST 301 Rogues and Rebels