Description

The bomb exploded. The great table lifted up and crashed down again in pieces. Shrapnel tore off limbs and fatally wounded four men. But Hitler, the target, escaped serious injury.

Although the attempted coup succeeded in proving that there was “another Germany,” it was fatal for the military resistance. Hitler smashed its ranks. Conspirators were arrested, tortured, and slowly hanged with piano wire. Although executions continued right up until the last weeks of the war, the military, bureaucratic, and Christian resistance, as it had existed since the late 1930s, was dead by the summer of 1944.

Resistance to Hitler’s megalomaniacal quest to lead Germany, Europe, and the world to further disaster would have to come from other, far less likely quarters: from the streets of Paris, the Riviera, the shattered cities of Germany, and the machinations of Albert Speer and Erwin Rommel.

Both horrifying and life-affirming, Disobeying Hitler tells the untold stories of German revolt against the dying Nazi tyranny.

Description

Over the past few decades, intellectual history has undergone significant changes as it has adapted to advances in cultural history, the social sciences, the history of the book and the letter, material culture, learned practices, the fine arts, and the history and philosophy of science, among others. Due to its inherently interdisciplinary nature, the adoption of new methods from outside disciplines could be said to be one of its greatest strengths. Yet, at the same time, the speed with which intellectual history has been able to adjust to changes in the outside world has meant that its identity has become fluid; lacking firm definition. What methods today define the practice of the intellectual historian? Is intellectual history a discipline still circumscribed by the “great book” and by “great thinkers,” its focus on canonical authors and their texts a help or a hindrance? Is a canon indispensible for connecting to students and broader readerships? Or should we emancipate ourselves from it entirely? Intellectual Hinterlands proposes to investigate the increasingly expansive historical, contextual, and methodological spaces in which intellectual history is now practiced, and to question whether, as intellectual historians, our unique perspective enables us to address the problems now facing liberal education, the humanities, and society at large.

Description

A Global Discussion – Toronto Meeting

Since 16 June 2014 Alexander Sodiqov, a young scholar and PhD student at the University of Toronto, has been in the custody of the security services in Tajikistan. Under contract to conduct academic research for a British-funded project, Sodiqov had just started his research in Khorog, Tajikistan, when his ordeal began. A Tajik national, Sodiqov was in Tajikistan conducting research on the topic of “Rising Powers and Conflict Management in Central Asia” under a contract with the University of Exeter in the UK. The project is funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council. Sodiqov had just started his research in Khorog, Tajikistan, when his ordeal began. The detention incommunicado of a young scholar has generated an international outcry—from students, from scholars, from universities, from human rights groups, and from foreign governments.

In this global discussion, held in at least seven settings, scholars consider not only the latest information about Sodiqov’s detention but also the broader implications for research scholars around the globe.

The Toronto Meeting will be held at the Munk School of Global Affairs on Friday, June 27, 12-2 PM
Confirmed Speakers: Prof. Edward Schatz (Univeristy of Toronto), Ms. Chrystia Freeland (Canadian MP and author)

This panel is part of a Global Discussion (June 26 – July 1, 2014):

Thursday, June 26
Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan: American University of Central Asia and Institut français d’études sur l’Asie centrale

Friday, June 27
Exeter, United Kingdom: University of Exeter
London, UK: School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto, Canada
Washington, DC, USA: George Washington University

Monday, June 30
Paris, France: L’école des hautes etudes en sciences sociales

Tuesday, July 1
Freiburg, Germany: Freiburg University