Readings and Discussion Schedule

NOTE:   The discussion questions for each class will usually be posted a few days  prior to the class for which they are required.  

**IMPORTANT NOTE ON VISUAL SOURCES**

January 6:        Introduction 

• Movie:  Explosion

• 1914-1918 Casualty Figures - for course reference

• Ayers, "A Statistical Summary..."(1919) -for course reference

January 13:      Total War and Global Conflict

• Jay Winter, On Total War

• "France, Africa, and the First World War" (1978) pdf.

• "Beasts of Burden..." (1978) pdf.

• Why Canada Entered The War (1918)

• Beckett, pp. 1-17; 22-43; 90-122

• Movie:    Total War

• Discussion questions

January 20:        Homefront and Total War (societal level)

• Letter, My Dear Poilus, August 2, 1914

• Ontario's Reaction to the War

• Jay Winter, "Britain's Lost Generation" (1977) pdf.

• Sermon, The Call of the War (1915)

• Introduction, The Canada War Book (1918)

• Why We Should Save Food and Fuel (1918)

• Editorial, "No More Canadians for Overseas Service..." (1916)

• Arthur Marwick, ...the German homefront....

• Images of the Homefront

• Beckett, pp. 437-454; 471-480

• Discussion questions
   

January 27:    Propaganda, National Image, and Imagining War

• The Bryce Report (1915)

• What Germany Stands For (1918)

• Italian Propaganda in the Great War (2002) pdf.

• Words as Weapons (1978) pdf.

• Public Opinion in Wartime (1919) pdf.

• Sedition Act (1918)

• Vera Brittain, ...on the atrocities of war...

• Propaganda:  Images of Nationalism

• Beckett, pp. 392-408

• Discussion questions

February 3:    Homefront and Total War (individual level)

• Jay Winter, The Lusitania and Total War

• Arthur Marwick, ...participation...

• Letter, My Dear Poilus, August 2, 1914

• Paul Fussell, The Heroic Connotations of War

• Soldiers:  The Drive to Recruit

• Children and the War

• A Message To The Boys and Girls of Canada (1918)

• Vera Brittain, ...the agony letter...

• Beckett, pp. 282-321

• Discussion questions

February 10:      Women and War

• Gail Braybon, Women's Contribution to the War Effort

• Vera Brittain, ...circumstances of Roland's death...

• "Becoming Austrian..." (2002) pdf.

• The Canadian 123rd Recruiting Leaflet

•  "What Did You do In The War, Mommy?"

• Movie:    Stalemate

• Beckett, pp. 454-471

• Discussion questions

February 17:    Women and War

• Win the War Suggestions and Recipes

• Editorial, "Social Reactions of the War"(1918)

• Women:  Myth, Symbol, and Reality

• War Letters From Women

• A Mother's Answer to "A Common Soldier" (1916)

• French Volunteer Nursing (1996) pdf.

• Discussion questions

March 3:        The Soldiers' Experience

• Paul Fussell, ...the trenches...

• Paul Fussell ...the trench scene...

• John Keegan, ...the English Officer...

• John Keegan, ...on too few doctors....

• Foot, "Rum a Combat Motivator"

• Seigfried Sassoon, ...a raiding party...

• Recruitment:  The Soldier Imagined

• Images: The Soldiers' Reality 

• Movie:  Slaughter in the Mud

• Beckett, pp. 214-261

• Discussion questions

March 10:        The Soldiers' Experience

• Letters from the Front

• Why Stay We Here? - complete book discussion

• Movie:  "I Remain Your Loving Son"

• Discussion questions    (I apologize for posting them so late but my computer crashed on the weekend)

March 17: The Literary War

• Rupert Brooke, The War Sonnets

• Wilfred Owen, Poems

• Seigfried Sassoon, Poems

• Poem, "Requiem For The Dead" (1915)

• Poem, "Vigil" (1915)

• H.G.Wells, ...loneliness and death....

• Buitenhuis on H.G. Wells

• Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth (excerpts)

• Movie:  Slaughter

• Discussion questions

March 24:  Sassoon, Owen, Shell Shock, and Regeneration

    **Note:  Due to the movie, we will meet tonight in Building 355 Room 203

• Rivers, The Repression of War Experience

• Seigfried Sassoon, Statement Against War (1917)

• Winter, "Shell Shock...." (2000)

• Bogacz, "War Neurosis and Cultural Change...." (1989)

• Movie:  Regeneration

• Movie reviews

• Discussion Questions

March 31:  The End: Impact, Remembrance, and Memory

• Jay Winter, World War One Today

• Paul Fussell, The Initial Shock

• McCrae, In Flanders Fields

• WWI Cemeteries (look at La Chaudiere, Sanctuary Wood, and Serre Road #2)

• Huppauf, ...effects of war...

• The Social Unrest of the Soldier  (1921) pdf.

• Beckett, pp. 598-637

• Movie:  Shadows of the Great War  

• Discussion questions

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