Conférences de Robert Poole, professeur invité

1. mercredi 15 février à 17h30 : The space age as history, 1957-1972

salle R13, Bâtiment Ida Maier (anciennement bât. V), UFR LCE

The space age of 1957-72, once regarded as the future, is now firmly part of the historical past. The twentieth-century history of progress has been replaced by the twenty-first history of past futures. This lecture seeks to historicise ‘astrofuturism’: the belief in space travel as the inevitable ultimate in human progress. It looks at the role of techno-prophets such as Arthur C. Clarke (author of 2001: A Space Odyssey), the sudden rise of the belief in extra-terrestrial intelligence, the cold war context, and the connections between hopes for the human future in space and fears about nuclear war. The tension between atomic destruction and technological progress was resolved, for the moment, in favour of progress.

3. vendredi 17 février à 16h : Petitioning and rebellion, 1816-17

salle R14, Bâtiment Ida Maier (anciennement bât. V), UFR LCE
 

2. mercredi 22 février à 17h : Earthrise: the view of the whole Earth from space

salle R13, Bâtiment Ida Maier (anciennement bât. V), UFR LCE

The years 1968-72 witnessed both the Apollo programme of Moon landings in 1968 and the birth of modern environmentalism. This was no coincidence, since the space programme also brought the first views of Earth from space, which became the symbol of the environmental movement. Space advocates had anticipated that the sight of the Earth as an ordinary planet, taken by outward-bound astronauts looking back, would spread an awareness that the human future lay elsewhere. In fact it made Earth appear fragile, limited, and uniquely alive. ‘Earthrise’ can be seen in retrospect as the point when the tension between progress and the environment began to tip in favour of the environment.

4. vendredi 10 mars à 16h : After Peterloo

salle R14, Bâtiment Ida Maier (anciennement bât. V), UFR LCE (à confirmer)

The ‘Peterloo massacre’ of 16 August 1819 in Manchester was a landmark event in the history of British democracy. On the one hand, the non-violent rally of some 30-40,000 people, with a substantial contingents of female reformers, marked a new stage in organised political protest and in the mobilisation of workers, handloom weavers in particular. On the other hand its violent suppression by the authorities, with 18 deaths and hundreds of serious injuries, constituted a shocking use of military force – and one that governments were anxious not to repeat. Thanks to the bicentenary in 2019, there are plenty of online resources which recount what happened at Peterloo (links below).

These two lectures will look the two main political approaches which came together around Peterloo: the practice of mass petitioning, the main strategy of the radical movement when it mobilised again after the Napoleonic wars; and the strategy of insurrection, which reached its peak in Britain in the aftermath of Peterloo. The two were interdependent: the strategy of petitioning depended upon the threat of rebellion to make it effective, while the resort to insurrection was legitimated by the failure of lawful petitioning, and inflamed by the state’s use of violence to prevent it. It will be argued that non-violent mass protest, rather than armed rebellion, was the main political legacy of Peterloo.

Peterloo bicentenary: https://peterloo1819.co.uk/
Peterloo animation: https://vimeo.com/156157535
Peterloo and parliament
https://thehistoryofparliament.wordpress.com/2019/07/18/remembering-peterloo-protest-satire-and-reform/
Peterloo: the English Uprising: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/peterloo-9780198783466?cc=gb&lang=en& (Discount code AAFLYG6)