Copyright (c) 2009 University of Pennsylvania All rights reserved. http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors Recent documents in Honors Program in History (Senior Honors Theses) en-us Mon, 29 Jun 2009 21:46:34 PDT 3600 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/18 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/18 Mon, 23 Jun 2008 06:08:11 PDT This thesis explores the paradox between the events of the Kanpur Riots and the Kanpur Riot Commission Report, written in its aftermath. While the former is regarded as another example of Hindu-Muslim strife in the twentieth century, the latter has become an important text in nationalist historiography. This thesis will argue that the significance of the Report is bound up in the Kanpur Riots. The riot participants were the subject and audience of the Report and the authors of the Kanpur Riot Commission Report used them to create a framework for understanding Indian history that continues to be invoked today. Priya Agarwal http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/17 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/17 Mon, 23 Jun 2008 06:03:55 PDT Corporate responsibility is a popular buzzword in the news today, but the concept itself is hardly novel. In response to a barrage of public criticism, the Ford Motor Company commissioned and published a study of its own activities immediately before and during WWII. The study explores the multifaceted and complicated relationship between the American parent company in Dearborn and the German subsidiary in Cologne. The report's findings, however, are largely inconclusive and in some cases, dangerously misleading. This thesis will seek to establish how, with the consent of Dearborn, the German Ford company became an arsenal for Hitler's march on Europe. This thesis will clarify these murky relationships, and picking up where the Ford internal investigation left off, place them within a framework of corporate accountability and complicity. Ford's development as a transnational entity provides a perfect subject of study to embark on such a project. Many of the major themes of post-World War I Europe - economic stagnation, nationalism, coping with the aftermath of a devastating conflict, and eventually, the rise of authoritarian states - are all present in Ford's German story, and their consequences not only resonate within the fields of American, European, and business history but also that of corporate responsibility. The lessons are still relevant today. Daniel Warsh http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/16 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/16 Mon, 12 May 2008 07:55:50 PDT The thesis, "Reading Under the Folds: John Dickinson, Gordon's Tacitus, and the American Revolution" examines the effects that one of the most important radical Whig texts had on one of the leading figures of the American Revolutionary movement. John Dickinson is often overlooked in histories of the American Revolution despite being a strong force from the time of the Stamp Act Congress through the Second Continental Congress, penning many of the resolves that came out of these meetings along with the highly influential Letters from a Pennsylvania Farmer. This thesis examines Dickinson's personal copy of Thomas Gordon's translation of the works of the Roman historian, Tacitus, published with Gordon's Discourses on the translation. This radical Whig text was revered by almost all of the American Founders, Dickinson included. Dickinson provided future readers of his copy of the text a unique insight into exactly what he took note of as he read the five volume work. He made no notes in the margins of his copy of the text, but rather folded literally hundreds of pages to mark particular passages throughout the work. Thus, he allowed future readers to literally read along with him. It turns out that almost every fold had a purpose. This thesis analyzes exactly what Dickinson highlighted through his folds and looks at the influence that these highlights had on some of the most crucial moments of his Revolutionary career, including how they very well might have been one of the factors that led to his fateful decision to not sign the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Alexander Bregman http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/15 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/15 Mon, 12 May 2008 05:54:02 PDT Nineteenth-century international exhibitions served as platforms for national competition and self-expression. Though over 4,000 miles apart, both Chicago, Illinois and Barcelona, Spain were animated by "second city" politics and featured a thriving industrial economy in the last decades of the nineteenth century. Yet while Chicagoans swelled with pride about the city they had helped resurrect from the ashes of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, they also displayed patriotism toward an American nation that had overcome the Civil War and was rapidly amassing power. A burgeoning Catalan nationalist movement, on the other hand, contributed to a widening disconnect between the capital of Catalonia and a sputtering Spanish nation. These pivotal differences - along with historical circumstance - have informed the historical interpretation of Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and Barcelona's 1888 Universal Exposition. The ways in which the collective memory of these two world's fairs have diverged shed light on why, today, remembering Chicago's World's Fair has largely become an intellectual exercise while conjuring up memories of Barcelona's Universal Exposition persists as a critical tool for Catalan nationalists wishing to advance their interests and broadcast their nationalism to the global community. Uri L. Friedman http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/14 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/14 Fri, 09 May 2008 08:45:15 PDT On 1 September 1939, after the German invasion of Poland and the formal outbreak of World War II in Europe, António de Oliveira Salazar addressed the National Assembly and declared Portugal's neutrality. Salazar, the stern and fastidious Prime Minister of the Estado Novo regime in Portugal from 1932 to 1969, adhered to strict neutrality in order to keep this underdeveloped nation on the periphery of the grueling conflict. But the Açores Islands in the Atlantic and the critical stocks of wolfram made Portugal an immense strategic concern for the Allied Powers. The Anglo-American negotiations with Salazar for the use of facilities on the Açores Islands and a complete embargo on the sale of wolfram to Germany were empowered by the fourteenth-century Luso-Anglo Alliance, which obliged Salazar to concede to Britain's requests. But while the concessions to the Allies were guaranteed in principle, Salazar needlessly protracted the negotiations in an attempt to further Portuguese interests in the post-war period. It was clear that the outcome of the conflict would decide the status of Portugal's oversea empire and the survival of Salazar's regime. This thesis explores the various motivations and consequences of Portugal's neutrality during World War II and how Salazar's post-war anxieties impacted the tone and outcome of his negotiations with the Anglo-American Powers. Yet, the question that remains unsettled is whether neutrality was a justifiable course for Portugal, or whether it should be interpreted as an act of tacit collaboration with Nazi Germany. Melissa Teixeira http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/13 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/13 Thu, 08 May 2008 10:48:52 PDT The histories of the Opium War, of which there are many, have posited that the roots of the conflict are diverse and interconnected, ranging from cultural differences to conflicting perspectives on trade. Many historians even imply that the Opium War was somehow inevitable. They point to the famous Macartney Mission of 1793, in which the first British diplomat to meet the Chinese emperor refused to kowtow and was subsequently denied formal diplomatic relations with the Chinese. However, in investigating documents of the British East India Company at Canton some years later, the war in no way seemed predestined. On the contrary, there existed a collaborative and mutually beneficial relationship between the Chinese and British merchants at Canton.Through examining the archives of the East India Company Factory at Canton from March 1833 until July 1834 it becomes quite clear that the internal problems of regulating trade at Canton, the relationship with the Hong Merchants, the attitudes toward the Chinese, and the legal and political issues that arose all paint a lucid, new narrative of the root of the Opium War. The documents demonstrate that the Company's successful management of the tenuous relationship with the Chinese merchants at Canton actually helped avoid conflict and legal infractions with higher authorities. Although the Company lacked true authority over the British subjects at Canton--other than providing them with licenses--it carried out the difficult task of representing the entire British community to the Chinese. Thus, when significant problems arose, the company's long-standing relationship with the Chinese merchants ultimately led to decades of a stable, lucrative trade for the British. However, when the Company lost its monopoly over the China trade in April of 1834, the management of the relationship drastically changed. The first British superintendent of trade, Lord Napier, would exhibit stubbornness, belligerence and a misunderstanding of the Chinese. Refusing to draw upon the knowledge of colleagues who were experienced in the China trade, his cavalier actions set Sino-British relations on a path to war. It was the loss of the British East India Company's monopoly and the subsequent restructuring of the trade relationship on the ground at Canton that would ultimately set the stage for the precipitation of armed conflict in the Opium War of 1840. Jason A. Karsh http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/12 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/12 Wed, 07 May 2008 14:06:30 PDT From the years 1942 to 1945, William A. Rich, a volunteer ambulance driver with the American Field Service, wrote a vast collection of letters home; he served in the Middle East, North Africa, Italy, France, Germany and India. Rich corresponded with his family and girlfriend biweekly about his experiences and opinions, resulting in a collection of more than 300 letters. From these letters, supplemented by additional archival sources, a fascinating narrative emerges. Rich's story explains the complexity of life on the frontlines as a non-combatant of a total war. From the fall of Tunis to the horrors of the relief of Belsen Concentration Camp, the letters provide an unmediated perspective on World War Two through the eyes of a twenty-year old. My thesis seeks to examine whether these letters, and whether war letters in general, are valuable historical documents. Alice S. Hickey http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/11 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/11 Tue, 06 May 2008 13:49:03 PDT William Edward Dodd served as United States ambassador to Germany between August 1933 and December 1937. Using archival sources, this thesis examines Dodd's reactions to and analyses of three events in Nazi German history, with reference to how these episodes altered the landscape of international security. These events are the withdrawal from the Disarmament Conference and League of Nations in October 1933, the announcement of conscription in March 1935, and the remilitarization of the Rhineland in March 1936. By focusing on these three critical moments, this thesis traces the evolution of Dodd's perception of the threat Nazi Germany posed to world peace. The four years of Dodd's service converted a man once conservatively optimistic about the Hitler regime's future to one deathly afraid of it, convinced that action by foreign powers was the only avenue to stop Germany's march towards war. Few in the State Department shared his doomsday beliefs. The Ambassador was left isolated and ignored. Kevin P. Glowalla http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/10 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/10 Thu, 01 May 2008 06:43:22 PDT The mid-sixteenth century witnessed religious and political upheaval across much of Western Europe, particularly in the British Isles. In 1565, a good portion of the Scottish nobility rebelled against their sovereign, Mary, Queen of Scots. The roles played and decisions made by the nobles during this revolt, known as the Chaseabout Raid, provide important insights concerning the converging issues of feuding, factionalism, and religion in Scotland. My reconstructed narrative of the Chaseabout Raid indicates that there were, in fact, no firm factions determined by ideology, but rather shifting allegiances in the midst of conflict, determined by complex and interrelated factors, personalities, and motivations. The primary motivation for the coalitions formed during the Chaseabout Raid was selfish personal ambition--base desire for individual gain still superseded any proto-nationalistic ideas or purely ideological commitments. Using this incident, I offer new conclusions regarding the origins of the Scottish kirk and national identity, the rise of the modern notions of loyalty and allegiance, and the construction of the modern Scottish state. With respect to the broader study of history, these conclusions discovered through an empiricist approach may demonstrate the validity of this method for reexamining other riots, rebellions, and revolts across history. Rachel Omansky http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/9 http://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/9 Thu, 01 May 2008 06:35:00 PDT This work presents an analysis of the presidency of Plutarco Elías Calles. It views Calles as a man of the Mexican Revolution and as an heir to the values promoted by the Constitution that came as a result of this movement. His respect for the constitution, pushed him to act on his anticlerical beliefs and to unify the Revolutionary movement under one party. Focusing mostly on the reasons and results of his anticlerical policy, we hope to gain insight into Calles' constitutionalism. By understanding Calles' policies, we can understand both the nature of the peculiar separation of Church and State in a very religious country, and the reasons for the formation of a party that would rule Mexico for seventy-two years. Pedro Gerson