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Instructor: Dr. Sandra Ott Office: Center for Basque Studies (GL 281) Phone: 784.4854 basque@unr.edu http://basque.unr.edu Course Description and Goals The course is interdisciplinary in approach. Its chief aims are: · To explore certain approaches to relationships among history, memory, and testimony, within the context of the Occupation of France and the French Basque Country by the Nazis during the Second World War · To gain insights from a range of disciplines and genres that have contributed to the socio-cultural history of the Occupation and Resistance, drawing upon the works of historians, cultural anthropologists, novelists, film-makers, as well as upon forms of oral and written testimony · To consider the sometimes confused, often changeable, and complex meanings attached to “resistance” and “collaboration” in the French Basque Country and elsewhere in France during the “Dark Years 1940-1944” of Occupation The course will address the much debated relationship between history and memory by looking at a selection of approaches taken by historians, sociologists and anthropologists. These will then be considered within the context of French and French Basque society both during and after the Occupation. The primary focus of the course will be the German Occupation of France and, in particular, of the French Basque Country. It will explore the experiences of “resisters”, “evaders”, “collaborators”, exiled refugees (Jews and Spanish/Spanish Basque Republicans), the Catholic clergy, as well as “ordinary citizens” during the Occupation. The focus will then widen to explore a cross-section of communities in different parts of France, in order to gain a wider understanding of what Occupation meant to people at that time and how, with the passage of time, they perceived their experiences retrospectively. Course Schedule & Topics for the Semester: Sessions 1-2: Introduction to the History/Memory debate and to the Occupation of the French Basque Country 1940-1944 What is the relationship between History and Memory? Are they opposites? Does Memory ever constitute History? Is there subtle interplay between them? What is the relationship between History and Testimony? What is Social or Collective Memory? These are questions to which we will return regularly during the course. An overview of French Basque culture & society in the early decades of the 20th century will be given in the initial sessions. Sessions 3-4: French Basques in the 1930s Opposition to the Popular Front and anti-Semitism. The Aintzina movement: Basque language, faith, and family. The Basque clergy, regionalism, and nationalism. Session 4: French Basques and the Spanish Civil War Spanish, Basque, and Jewish refugees. Gurs: from “welcome center” to internment camp. Does the collective memory of a traumatic event such as civil war ever change with time? Does it ever vary from one group to another? Sessions 5-6: The Vichy Regime The defeat of France in 1940 and the first phase of German Occupation. Vichy, anti-Semitism, and the Catholic Church in the Basque Country. Basques hopes for regionalism & support for ethnic minorities under Petain. Ibarnagaray: A Basque elite and Vichy minister. Sessions 7-8: Forced Labor, Occupation and the Resistance Forced labor in Germany (STO), draft evasion and deportation: some Basque experiences. German occupation of the “Free Zone” (and French Basque Country). The maquis & the diverse nature of resistance. The Black Market & rationing. Session 9: Occupation and Resistance in the French Basque Country The Secret Army & other resisters in Soule/Xiberoa: factions & in-fighting. The pastorale, “The Maquis of Xiberoa”, as a popular, twenty-first century representation (combining theatre and song) of the Occupation and Resistance in one French Basque province. What role do commemorative performances play in shaping and sustaining collective memory in a society? What, if anything, does the pastorale about the German Occupation of Xiberoa tell us about French Basques’ collective memory of those “dark years”? Session 10: Resistance in the French Basque Country (cont.) The “Comet line”: the clandestine passage of Allied pilots and refugees from Brussels to the Basque Country (and on to freedom). The role of Basque shepherds & smugglers in the flight to freedom. The role of women in the Resistance. Session 11: Time, Family Memory, and Local History in a Burgundian French Village and a Basque Mountain Community Comparisons and contrasts: the ethnography of Minot in Burgundy and of Santa Grazi in the French Basque Country. How does collective memory function? How are the two World Wars used as “markers” for life histories as well as community histories? Why are some memories of the war “forgotten” in certain contexts, but remembered in others? Do informants ever tell the anthropologist the “whole story” about the war? Sessions 12-13: Collaboration and Cohabitation The Vichy myth & collaboration. Ethnic collaboration with the Nazis: Basque nationalism as a priority. The police, prefects, and mayors: living under German “rules”. The film, Lacombe Lucien, directed by Louis Malle. Sessions 14: Religion under Occupation The Church and Basque clergy in the Resistance: Benedictine monks & rural priests. Local religion under Occupation: comparing Basque, Parisian, and Loire parishes. What impact did the war and Occupation have on local forms of religion? How and why did the Catholic clergy change their views on the Vichy regime? What roles did Basque clergy play in the Resistance? Sessions 15-16: Liberation The Liberation: freedom, judgment, prosecution. Some ethnographic accounts of Liberation in the Basque Country: Tardets, Mauleon, Cambo. Faction-fighting among resisters. Reprisals & punishments for “horizontal collaborators” (women who developed intimate relations with German soldiers), “collaborators,” and “bad ferry-men” (men who promised refugees safe passage across the Pyrenees to Spain but led them to their death). Why the dual need both to remember and to forget figure so prominently in both personal and collective memories of the “Dark Years”? Have the Basques had as much difficulty as the French in coming to terms with the experiences, decisions, and actions of people during the war? Sessions 17-18: The Experience of Occupation in Chinon and in the Cevennes: Two social historians as ethnographers of the Occupation and Resistance Overview of Robert Gildea’s study of Chinon, a town in the Loire valley. Overview of H.R. Kedward’s study of the maquis in the Cevennes. How can social historians and anthropologists “collaborate” in their study of this period in French and Basque history (as well as in others)? Sessions 19-20: Memory, History and Fiction: Other perspectives on Occupation What can fiction teach us about the experience of Occupation? Have any narratives about France under Occupation got the story right? What are the drawbacks of using literature as an illustration of History? Does literature ever inform the cultural anthropologist when he/she studies the past of a particular society? Why did the 1941 underground novel, The Silence of the Sea, cause such a stir? What can Roger Grenier’s short novel, Another November, teach us about relationships between personal memory and history, as well as about the Occupation of Pau? Sessions 21-22: Testimony and Witnessing What is testimony? What special challenges does it pose for the historian and anthropologist in their attempts to understand the past, especially traumatic events such as war, occupation, and the Holocaust? What are the relationships between testimony and individual memory, testimony and collective memory? Sessions 23-24: Memory, History, and “The Sorrow and The Pity”: A controversial documentary film about France and the French during the Occupation What is the relationship between History and various kinds of witnessing (observation of the present, reconstitution of the past, memories handed down from generation to generation, testimony on film, written records)? What was the “official” memory of the Occupation of France during the Second World War?Were there specific “group memories” of it, and how did these relate to individual, personal memories? Sessions 25-26: History, Memory, Testimony Does testimony ever equate with History? How can testimony be utilized judiciously by anthropologists & historians? Testimony as a social imperative: what ethical issues arise? Excerpts from the film by Lanzmann, Shoah, will be shown and discussed in class. Session 27: Preparatory session for final examination (to be advised of date/time). |
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