Goals and Objectives:
Through lectures, guest speakers, and films, we will explore the rhetorical, historical and social impact of acts of genocide in the 20th century perpetrated against a number of ethnic groups around the globe. We will begin with the Armenian genocide at the start of this century and move on to the Holocaust. Then several different non-western examples of genocide in the 20th century will be studied. Those include such case studies as the Russian/Eastern European community and the Gulag, the Armenian community in Turkey, genocide in Africa, the "Killing Fields" of Cambodia and some current hot spots around the world. We will explore the social and communicative actions which brought about each genocide while at the same time exploring the victims' responses to their extermination. Special emphasis will be placed on exploring the impact of mass persuasion on the development of genocide.
We will see the extreme results of inter-ethnic and inter-cultural conflict represented in the examples of the course. These case studies of genocide also provide examples of the use of modern technology without moral or ethical bounds. Studying them forces us to examine our own moral understandings in light of the realities of genocide in the 20th century, where genocide has occurred far too often as a pattern of inter-ethnic relations. Ironically, as our world becomes more "civilized" and technologically advanced, we do not seem to become more accepting of cultural or ethnic diversity.

Our understanding of genocide leads us to an appreciation of the necessity for maintaining tolerance of cultural diversity and a refusal to let hate-based policies of small groups become the policy of a nation. Through the examination of extreme hatreds and their resulting mass deaths, we begin to comprehend that ethnocentrism and prejudice, when allowed to grow, may have significant and horrible impact. And through the examination of the extreme results of prejudice and ethnocentrism, we begin to understand our own individual and corporate responsibility for moral and ethical acceptance of diverse peoples and perspectives.

This course fulfills requirements for non-western credit and is also part of the upper division general education War and Peace theme. In addition, this course is an elective that helps fulfill the requirements for majors or minors in either sociology or communication studies.

This class is organized around the following General Education, sociology and communications department objectives:
1. This general education theme deals with issues critical to your lives as citizens of this society and the larger world community.
2. This theme is both interdisciplinary and integrated in its investigation of genocide.
3. This theme systematically deals with the value assumptions and issues raised by approaching the subject of genocide from both the perspective of sociology and communication
4. This course integrates substantial aspects sociology and communication as well as the natural sciences, other behavioral and social sciences and the humanities in an examination of genocide in the 20th century.
5. This course covers core sociological and communication concepts.
6. This course investigates the effects of domestic and global forces on social institutions, on your life, and on the lives of other individuals and groups.
 
 
 

In this class, we will explore the rhetorical, historical and social impact of acts of genocide perpetrated against a number of ethnic groups around the globe in the 20th century.  We will begin with the Armenian genocide at the start of this century and move on to the Holocaust.  Then several different non-western examples of genocide including such case studies as the Russian/Eastern European community and the Gulag, the "Killing Fields" of Cambodia, several genocides in Africa, and some current hot spots will be studied.  We will explore the social and communicative actions which brought about each genocide while at the same time exploring the victims' responses to their extermination. Special emphasis will be placed on exploring the impact of mass persuasion on the development of genocide.

We will see the extreme results of inter-ethnic and inter-cultural conflict represented in the examples of the course.  These case studies of genocide also provide examples of the use of modern technology without moral or ethical bounds.  Studying them forces us to examine our own moral understandings in light of the realities of genocide in the 20th century, where genocide has occurred far too often as a pattern of inter-ethnic relations. Ironically, as our world becomes more "civilized" and technologically advanced, we do not seem to become more accepting of cultural or ethnic diversity.

Our understanding of genocide leads us to an appreciation of the necessity for maintaining tolerance of cultural diversity and a refusal to let hate-based policies of small groups become the policy of a nation.  Through the examination of extreme hatreds and their resulting mass deaths, we begin to comprehend that ethnocentrism and prejudice, when allowed to grow, may have significant and horrible impact.  And through the examination of the extreme results of prejudice and ethnocentrism, we begin to understand our own individual and corporate responsibility for moral and ethical acceptance of diverse peoples and perspectives.

This is a general education theme class structured for students in the honors program.  It also fulfills the general education requirement for non-western credit.  In addition, this course is  an elective that helps fulfill the requirements for majors or minors in either sociology or communication studies.

This class is organized around the following General Education, sociology and communications department objectives:
1. This general education theme deals with issues critical to your lives as citizens of this society and the larger world community.
2.This theme is both interdisciplinary and integrated in its investigation of genocide.
3.This theme systematically deals with the value assumptions and issues raised by approaching the subject of genocide from both the perspective of sociology and communication
4.This course integrates substantial aspects sociology and communication as well as the natural sciences, other behavioral and social sciences and the humanities in an examination of genocide in the 20th century.
5. This course covers core sociological and communication concepts.
6.This course investigates the effects of domestic and global forces on social institutions, on your life, and on the lives of other individuals and groups.
 

Required Reading:

ORDINARY MEN by Christopher Browning
 TRAP WITH A GREEN FENCE by Richard Glazar
 ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH by A. Solzhenitsyn
 Articles placed on reserve in the library
These articles are in the reserve room of the library. We have put two copies of each on reserve under both our names and both classes (Sociology 156H and CMST 156H).
 
James Mace  "The American Press and the Ukranian Famine"
John Pilger  "The Return To Year Zero" (Cambodian Genocide)
Ed Vulliamy  "Middle Managers of Genocide" (Bosnian Genocide)
Marla Stone  "Bosnia’s Untenable Peace"
Rene Lemarchand "Burundi: The Politics of Ethnic Amnesia"
David N. Smith "The Genisis of Genocide in Rwanda"
Filip Reyntjens "Rwanda: Genocide and Beyond"
Katherine Bigelow "A Campaign to Deter Genocide: The Bahai Experience"
Nathaniel Sheppard "Hate in Cyberspace"
The class email list. We will communicate with you over email. Therefore, you must have a student email account so that you can fully participate in the class. Be prepared, you will need to check your email often during the semester.
Genocide sites on the world wide web. Links to these sites can be found in the class’ homepage. The web address for the homepage can be found at the beginning of the syllabus.

 CLASS EMAIL LIST. Some of our communication with you will take place over email. Therefore, you are required to have an email account so that you can fully participate in the class. Be prepared, you will need to check your email often during the school week.

GENOCIDE SITES ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB. Links to these sites can be found in the class homepage. The address for our homepage is given above.
 
 

Course Grades & Assignments:

Grades will be based on the following required work:

1. Two Essays. Twice during the semester, we will send out essay topics via email. For the first one, you will have a specified amount of time to complete your essay and submit it to us via email or hard copy. For the second one, you will write your essay when the class meets during finals week. Each of these essays is worth 100 possible points.
 We expect your written work on these essays to be of maximum quality, both in content and form. Each essay you give us should follow the following guidelines: 1) Your essay should be clearly written. Organize your thoughts and express them clearly. Have introduction, body, conclusion and references sections. Poor writing will reduce your grade;
2) Do not plagiarize. Cite when you borrow ideas or information; quote and cite when you borrow exact words. Include the reference page for the sources you use. There will be severe penalties for plagiarism; 3) Your paper should be free of typographical and grammatical errors. Proofread for both. If there are too many errors, you may be asked to redo the paper or use the Writing Center at Taylor 107. Errors will reduce your grade. Those of you who complete the first essay the old fashioned way, via hard copy, must follow these additional guidelines: 1) The paper must be typewritten, double-spaced, with 1" margins. Pages should be numbered and stapled together; 2) Please include a title page. LATE ESSAYS WILL BE PENALIZED. One letter grade will be taken off for every day that your paper is late. In order to be fair to all the students in the class, NO EXCEPTIONS will be made.

2.  Periodic In-Class Writes. Most weeks, you will complete a short exercise in class. Each will be worth 10 points. These exercises have different purposes, such as assessing how well the material is making the journey from our notes to your notes, encouraging you to get the readings done on time, getting you to think about some issue relevant to the evening’s topic, and even stimulating discussion. These cannot be made up so you may miss points if you miss class; however, we will allow you to miss two of them without penalty. That means that if you take them all, we’ll drop the two lowest scores.

3.  Attendance and Class Participation. This class is designed to be a combination of lecture and discussion. Heavy emphasis is placed on discussing pertinent issues presented in the lecture and reading material, whether we agree with them, how crucial they are, how they affect our lives, etc. Therefore, class attendance and participation may effect your final grade. You are expected to attend, and while there, participate in the discussion of the material.

4. Extra credit. There will be limited opportunities for extra credit throughout the semester. Your task will be to type an intelligent 1 page critique of that extra credit experience (worth 5 possible points), heavily incorporating material from the lectures and readings (use citations). These critiques will not be accepted later than one week after the experience occurred. Only those events announced in class will count for extra credit and we will announce these as we hear about them. There is no way we can tell you now how many such opportunities there will be during the semester or when they will be; we can only let you know about them as we hear about them (if you know of something that might qualify for extra credit, please bring it to our attention so that we can announce it!).

 Please keep in mind that doing this extra credit work is not enough to get you extra credit points; the work must be done well. Also keep in mind that these extra credit opportunities will make slight rather then drastic upward improvements in your grade. That means that if you want a good grade in this class, you will have to do well on the course requirements listed above.

If you have special needs in terms of taking exams or completing the other graded work in the class, you need to speak to one of us after class or in one of our offices within the first two weeks of the semester so that special arrangements can be made.
 
 

Class Schedule:

The topics that will be discussed in class are:

Week 1	Introduction to the Course and Genocide  United Nations Convention on Genocide
Week 2	Patterns of Ethnic Group Relations  Mass Persuasion Theory  Netscaping to Genocide sites around the world  (see the links in our class web page for a start)
Week 3	Armenian Genocide
Week 4	The Nazi Rise to Power and the Nazi Propaganda Machine
Week 5	Planning & Implementing the Final Solution
Week 6	Responses from Outside the Reich: The Allies, Churches, and The Media  Victim Responses to their Persecution:
Week 7	Genocide in the USSR under Stalin: The Man and His Plan
Week 8	Implementing the Purges, Famine, and Gulag
Week 9	The Killing Fields of Cambodia
Week 10	Current Hot Spots: Balkans
Week 11	Current Hot Spots: Africa (including Rwanda, Burundi, Sudan, Ethiopia)
Week 12	Current Hot Spots: Africa
Week 13	Current Hot Spots: Asia and Middle East (including Timor, Tibet, Iraq)
Week 14	Moral Implications of Genocide for Today  Why Does it Keep Happening?  How is It Possible to Counteract Mass Persuasion?  Social Conditions and Genocide
	Final Exam Week meeting from 8pm till 10pm in the classroom

The schedule above is subject to revision. You will be informed well in advance if any changes are made.