AP EH CHAPTER 24: AN AGE OF MODERNITY AND ANXIETY, 1894-1914
I. TOWARD THE MODERN CONSCIOUSNESS: INTELLECTUAL AND CULTURAL DEVELOPMENTS
A. before 1914, most Europeans continued to believe in the values and ideals that had been generated by the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment
B. beginning in the late 19th Century, a new view of the physical universe, an appeal to the irrational, alternative views of human nature, and radically innovative forms of literary and artistic expression shattered old beliefs and opened the way to a modern consciousness (a sense of confusion and anxiety prevalent)
C. Developments in the Sciences: the Emergence of a New Physics
1. science was one of the chief pillars underlying the optimistic and rationalistic view of the world that many Westerners shared in the 19th Century
2. throughout the 19th Century, Westerners adhered to the mechanical conception of the universe postulated by the classical physics of Isaac Newton
3. these views were seriously challenged at the end of the 19th Century
4. Inquiry into the disintegrative processes within atoms became a central theme in the new physics in part due to the experimental work of Marie and Pierre Curie on radium and radiation
5. the quantum theory of energy developed by Max Planck raised fundamental questions about the subatomic realm of the atom as the basic building blocks of the material world
6. Einstein was responsible for the Special Theory of Relativity
D. Toward a New Understanding of the Irrational
1. intellectually, the decades before 1914 witnessed a combination of contradictory developments
a. human reason and progress still remained a dominant thread
b. a small group of intellectuals attacked the optimistic progress, dethroned reason, and glorified the irrational
2. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)
a. intellectual who glorified the irrational
b. believed that Christianity was a scourge and had deeply undermined the creative power of western civilization
3. Henri Bergson (1859-1941)
a. accepted rational, scientific thought as a practical instrument
b. reality was the “life force” that suffused all things
4. Georges Sorel (1847-1922)
a. a French political theorist
b. believed that a small elite ruling body had to govern the masses (advocated violence if necessary to achieve socialism)
E. Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)and the Emergence of Psychoanalysis
1. Austrian (Vienna)doctor who put forth a series of theories that undermined optimism about the rational nature of the human mind
2. argued that human behavior was determined by one’s unconsciousness and by inner drives which people were generally unaware
3. Maintained that human being’s inner life was a battleground between the id (contained lustful drives and desires), ego (seat of reason), and superego (represented inhibitions and moral values)
4. often linked with Marx and Darwin as the intellectual giants of the 19th Century
F. The Impact of Darwin: Social Darwinism and Racism
1. in the 2nd half of the 19th Century, scientific theories were sometimes wrongly applied to achieve other ends
2. the application of Darwin’s principle of organic evolution to society came to be known as Social Darwinism
3. the most popular exponent of Social Darwinism was the British philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) who argued that all human societies were organisms evolving through time from a struggle with their environment
4. according to Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855-1927), an Englishman who became a German citizen, Aryans were the real creators of western culture
5. he urged that the Aryan race, under German leadership, must be prepared to fight for Western civilization and save it from the destructive assaults of lower races such as Jews, Negroes, and Orientals (Jews in particular)
G. The Attack on Christianity and the Response of the Churches
1. the growth of scientific thinking as well the forces of modernization presented new challenges to the Christian churches (EX: church had weak hold on factory workers)
2. political movements of the late 19th Century were hostile to the established Christian churches (EX: Paris Commune murdering the archbishop of Paris)
3. science became one of the chief threats to all Christian churches and even to religion itself in the 19th Century (EX: Darwin’s theory of evolution)
4. the urbanization of Europe brought religion under attack through:
a. new migrants to cities without connections to civic churches
b. advocates of more scientific inquiry (EX: higher criticism of the Bible championed by the French Catholic scholar Ernst Renan [1823-1892]seriously questioned the historical accuracy of the Bible and denied the divinity of Jesus)
c. Marxist political environment of the 19th Century
5. the Catholic Church took a rigid stand against modern ideas including religious toleration, freedom of speech, and freedom of the press under the direction of conservative popes such as Pius IX (1846-1878)
6. the church began to compromise more with modern society under Pope Leo XIII (1878-1903) who stated in his De Rerum Novarum (1891) that much in socialism was Christian in principle
7. other religious groups also made efforts to win support for Christianity among the working-class poor and restore religious practice among the urban working classes
H. The Culture of Modernity
1. Naturalism and Symbolism in Literature
a. throughout much of the late 19th Century, literature was dominated by Naturalism
b. Naturalists accepted the material world as real and felt literature should be realistic
c. although Naturalism is a continuation of realism, it lacked the underlying note of liberal optimism about people and society that had still been prevalent in the 1850s
d. the Naturalists were pessimistic about Europe’s future and often portrayed characters caught in the grip of forces beyond their control (greatest difference from realism)
e. the best example of naturalistic literature can be found in the novels of Emile Zola (Rougon-Macquart)
f. explaining his use of naturalism in his novels and his depiction of characters, Emile Zola said: “I have simply done on living bodies the work of analysis which surgeons perform on corpses.”
g. Russia entered its golden age of literature powered by the realistic novels of two men:
1. Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910)
a. known for his character portrayal and vivid descriptions of military life
b. War and Peace is his masterpiece
2. Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881)
a. known for his narrative skills and profound insights into human nature
b. most famous works Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov
3. Symbolism
a. primarily used poetry
b. believed that objective knowledge of the world was impossible
c. WB Yeats and Rainer Maria Rilke are the best examples
d. Late 1800s early 1900s
2. Modernism in the Arts
a. in art, modernism found its beginnings in the work of Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) movement called impressionism
b. sought to put into painting their impressions of the changing effects of light on objects in nature
c. Claude Monet (1840-1926) was especially enchanted with water and painted many pictures in which he sought to capture the interplay of light, water, and atmosphere (evident in Impression, Sunrise)
d. Berthe Morisot (1841-1895) was a female impressionist who had to fight every step of the way to be regarded as a serious artist; known for her lighter colors and flowing brush strokes (Young Girl by the Window [1878])
e. by the 1880s, a new movement known as Post-Impressionism arose in France but soon spread to other European Countries
f. Post-Impressionism retained the Impressionist emphasis upon light and color but revolutionized it even further by paying more attention to structure and form
g. Paul Cezzane (1839-1906) [Woman with Coffee Pot] and Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) [Starry Night]
4. Modernism in Music
a. modernism in music included the elements of:
1. attraction to the exotic and the primitive
2. nationalist themes
3. folk music
b. Edvard Grieg (1843-1907) was a Scandinavian composer who dedicated his music to Norwegian nationalism; used Norwegian folk music extensively (Peer Gynt Suite—best-known work composed in 1876)
c. Claude Debussy (1862-1918) was closely linked to the Impressionist movement as his music was often inspired by art and poetry (Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun [1894])
d. Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) was a chief exponent of musical primitivism (The Firebird --1910;Petrushka –1911); composed many of his works for Sergei Diaghilev who headed the world famous Ballet Russe
e. at its premier, Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring (1913), now considered as a classic example of modernism in music and ballet caused a great riot at the theatre by audience members fighting over the music’s heavy beat, sharp dissonance, and blatant sensuality
II. POLITICS: NEW DIRECTIONS AND NEW UNCERTAINTIES
A. The Movement for Women’s Rights
1. in the 1st half of the 19th Century a number of women in the United States and Europe began to work together for women’s rights
2. family and marriage laws were especially singled out since it was difficult for women to secure divorces and property laws gave men almost complete control over the property of their wives
3. progress was slow as women in Britain did not gain rights over their own property until 1870 (Germany in 1900; France in 1907)
4. divorce was not legalized in Britain until 1857 (France in 1884 and just partially; Spain and Italy not at all)
5. some upper and middle-class women gained access to higher education during the 19th Century
6. teaching was the first professional occupation opened to women
7. thanks to the pioneering efforts in the field of nursing by women such as German Amalie Sieveking (1794-1859), Englishwoman Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), and American Clara Barton (1821-1912), nursing became another professional career open to women
8. by the 1840s and 1850s, the movement for women’s rights entered the political arena with the call for equal political rights
9. the women’s suffrage movement was strongest in Great Britain and the United States where Enlightenment ideas such as “natural rights” were often nurtured
10. the British women’s suffrage movement was divided into camps led by two women
a. Millicent Fawcett (1847-1929)
1. led the moderate faction
2. her group believed it was important for women to demonstrate that they would use political power responsibly if they wanted Parliament to grant them the right to vote
b. Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928)
1. led the radical faction
2. along with her daughters, Christabel and Sylvia, founded the mostly middle and upper-class Women’s Social and Political Union in 1903
3. to advance the cause of women’s suffrage, this group took a radical, public, well publicized approach to the movement, employing different media and provocative public actions to demand the vote for women like pelting male politicians with eggs, chaining themselves to lampposts, smashing windows of fashionable department stores, burning railroad cars, going on hunger strikes when imprisoned
11. nevertheless, only in Finland, Norway, and some American states did women actually receive the right to vote before 1914
12. women such as Bertha Suttner (1843-1914), who led the Austrian Peace Society, led the movement for disarmament and peace
13. Italian Maria Montessori (1870-1952), medical doctor turned educator, established a system of childhood education based on natural and spontaneous activities in which students learned at their own pace (her schools were popular both in Europe and the US by the 1930s)
B. Jews within the European Nation-State
1. during the 19th Century, Jews were emancipated in most countries, but still restricted
a. in France, they had full citizenship granted to them in 1791 but due to a 1808 decree restrictions were placed on their movement and ability to lend money commercially
b. in Prussia, Jews were emancipated in 1812 but not allowed to hold government offices or take advanced degrees in universities
c. in Vienna, Austria, Jews made up ten percent of the population but 39% of all medical students and 23% of all law students
d. in Great Britain, Jewish politician Benjamin Disraeli rose to the position of Prime Minister in the 1860s
2. despite advances as a group during the 1800s, anti-Semitism was still alive and well in Europe
a. France—Dreyfus Affair
b. Austria---the most powerful party in Vienna was the Christian Socialists who combined agitation on the behalf of workers with a virulent anti-Semitism
c. Germany---had right-wing anti-Semitic parties such as Adolf Stocker’s Christian Social Workers’ Party
d. The worst treatment of Jews in the last two decades of the 19th Century and the first decade of the 20th Century occurred in Eastern Europe where 72% of the entire world Jewish population lived (widespread persecution and pogroms led to a mass Jewish exodus from Eastern Europe to the United States, Canada, and, to a much lesser degree, Palestine)
3. Theodor Herzl (1860-1904)
a. Jewish leader who was a key figure in the growth of political Zionism
b. In 1896, he published The Jewish State in which he advocated the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine as a means of sparing European Jews the indignities of growing anti-Semitism
C. The Transformation of Liberalism: Great Britain and Italy
1. in Great Britain, neither Liberals or Conservatives were moved to accommodate the working-class with significant reforms until they were forced to do so by the pressure applied by the newly created Labour Party and fledgling trade unions (both non-Marxist)
2. the Labour Party had been created by Fabian Socialists who advocated the necessity of workers using their new voting rights to progressively elect a new House of Commons wherein legislation favorable to the working-classes could be passed in a democratic fashion
3. the Liberals, who gained control of the House of Commons in 1906 and held it until 1914, perceived that they would have to enact a program of social welfare or lose the support of workers
4. under the leadership of Prime Minister David Lloyd George (1863-1945), the Liberal Party abandoned the classical principles of laissez-faire and voted for a series of social reforms such as the National Insurance Act of 1911
5. the National Insurance Act of 1911 provided sickness and unemployment benefits to workers with state aid (paid for by increasing the tax burden on wealthy classes)------2
6. In Italy, Liberal leader and sometime Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti used a policy of ruler ship called transformismo which was the policy of transforming old political parties into new power blocks through the calculated use of political patronage and outright bribery