COLD WAR HISTORY

The teaching of Cold War History is a defining feature of the Master's degree in History from the Middle Ages to the Contemporary Age. The objective of the course is to provide knowledge of the history of the Cold War from 1945 to 1991, with particular emphasis on transnational exchanges between the Western bloc, the Soviet bloc, and the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement. The course will combine Cold War history with women's and gender history, the history of political movements, cultural history, social history, and microhistory.

The expected outcome of this course is that students acquire 1) knowledge and understanding of the main historical, political, economic and social aspects of the Cold War period and of the main historiographical debates on the Cold War; that they also begin to familiarize themselves with the history of women and gender during the Cold War from a transnational point of view. That they also acquire 2) the ability to comment on and contextualize archive sources and autobiographical sources produced in different geographical areas during the Cold War, and the ability to relate historical-political phenomena and individual and collective experiences; through seminar activities the course also aims to 3) encourage autonomous re-elaboration and autonomous communication of what has been learned, demonstrating their skills on the indicated manual and on a biography of their choice.

General knowledge of the historical events of the 20th century and a good command of the English language.

The course retraces some crucial phases and events of the Cold War period both in the European scenario (e.g. Trieste crisis, breakup between the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, Marshall Plan, construction of the Berlin Wall, Hungarian uprising, Prague Spring) and international (e.g. Korean War, Bandung Conference, Cuban Revolution, Global 1968, Vietnam War, coup in Chile, Solidarnosc movement in Poland). These events will be discussed through the experiences and testimonies of direct and indirect protagonists, in particular through archive documents and biographical and autobiographical sources. The course will also pay attention to the perspective of activists affiliated with the socialist, communist and revolutionary left at a transnational level, and to the women's internationalism of the International Democratic Federation of Women. Primary and secondary sources will be assigned for each lesson and will be discussed after the lecture. Some sessions will be dedicated in particular to a seminar on historical sources.

For the oral exam, a manual on the history of the Cold War and a biography of your choice will be assigned. For each lesson, some in-depth articles on the reference context will be assigned. The texts covered and discussed, with any support tools, are provided by the teacher during the course and made available to all students the Moodle platform. All the texts indicated are an integral part of the exam program. The purchase of the manual and the biography of your choice, or the retrieval of these texts in the library, is the responsibility of the course participants.

Manuals:
Odd Arne Westad, La guerra fredda globale. Gli Stati Uniti, L'Unione Sovietica e il mondo. Le relazioni internazionali del XX secolo (il Saggiatore 2022)

A biography or autobiography of your choice (other biographies to be agreed with the teacher):

Daniel Bensaid, An Impatient Life: A memoir (Verso 2015)
Antonio Bonelli, Fra Stalin e Tito. Cominformisti a Fiume, 1948-1956 (IRSREC FVG, 1994, only in Italian)
Luciana Castellina, Discovery of the World:A Political Awakening in the Shadow of Mussolini (Verso, 2015)
Lisa Milner, Swimming Against the Tide: A Biography of Freda Brown (Debbie Lee, 2017)
Angela Davis, Autobiography of a generation (any edition).
Patrick Karlsen, Vittorio Vidali. Vita di uno stalinista (1916-1956), (Il Mulino 2019, only in Italian)
Monika Krause, Queen of Condoms: Memoir of a Sex Educator in Revolutionary Cuba (Iliada editions 2022, available also in Spanish)
Sheila Fitzpatrick, A Spy in the Archives: A Memoir of Cold War Russia (I.B. Tauris 2015)
Eva Grlic, Memorie da un paese perduto (Scheiwiller 2005, only in Italian).
Miriam Mafai, Il lungo freddo. Storia di Bruno Pontecorvo, lo scienziato che scelse l'URSS (BUR, 2012, only in Italian)
Margaret Randall, I Never Left Home. Poet, Feminist, Revolutionary (Duke University Press, 2020).
Rossana Rossanda, The Comrade from Milan (Verso, 2005).
Jurgen Schreiber, The girl who avenged Che Guevara - Story of Monika Ertl (any edition, also available in Spanish)
Mokhtar Mokhtefi, I Was A French Muslim: Memories of an Algerian Freedom Fighter (Other Press, 2021).

The oral exam will include general questions on the context of the Cold War, questions on a key country or event covered during the course, and the presentation of the chosen biography, which must highlight how the biographical trajectory studied fits into the historical context of reference. Each of these three components will contribute to defining the exam grade.

A sufficient grade (18-22/30) is given if the student is able to outline the historical context of the Cold War in broad terms, showing a basic understanding of the topics covered during the course; is able to deal with at least one country or key event of the period; provides a sufficient summary of the chosen biography.

A test is considered good (22-26/30) if the student is able to demonstrate a fair command of the historical context and its transformations, knows how to deal with some key countries or events of the period, and provides an exposition of the chosen biography that highlights the connections between the general context and individual experience.

The test is considered excellent (27-30 cum laude/30) if the student is able to explain the complexities of the historical period in question and its transformations over time, connecting the historical dynamics of the different countries and key events, and examining the chosen biography in depth in relation to the general historical context, providing specific examples based on biographical texts or primary sources.

written and oral

The grade will be calculated on the basis of three elements: 1) knowledge of the manual; 2) presentation of the biography of your choice; 3) questions on the content of the lessons and assigned readings.

The course follows a seminar structure, with 50% of frontal lectures and 50% of participant discussion. Attendance at the lectures is strongly recommended.

The final syllabus will be uploaded to Moodle at the beginning of September.
The topics covered in the lessons will be the following:

1. Introduction: History and historiography of the Cold War: perspectives of cultural history, social history and gender history
2. Trieste and the eastern border as a “microcosm” of the Cold War
3. The break between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union and the battle between Stalinism and Titoism
4. The Korean War and women's pacifism in the atomic age
5. The United States and the Soviet Union, from the Second World War to the Cold War
6. McCarthyism and the “Iron Curtain”: the dissolution of the Congress of American Women
7. Decolonization and the Cold War
8. The Bandung Conference, Afro-Asian solidarity and the Non-Aligned Movement.
9. Third Worldism and Anti-Imperialism in the United States
10. Revolutionary Projects in Latin America Between Successes and Failures: From the Cuban Revolution (1959) to the Coup in Chile (1973)
11. Global 1968 and the New Feminist Movements between East and West
12. The UN Decade for Women and Feminisms between the First, Second and Third Worlds
13. 1989 and the End of the Cold War
14. Guest Lecture by an External Professor
15. Conclusions

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "International cooperation" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development